this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2024
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Who cancelled it?
That's what it comes down to.
If the person that took out the loan cancels it by some kind of fuckery, then you could likely call it stealing.
If it's the entity that made the loan, obviously not.
If it's an agent of the government, which is ultimately the expression of the collective people which defines what stealing is and isn't, then it would depend on how it was achieved. If the agent of the government acted within the law as established at the time the loan was cancelled, then it can't be stealing from a legal standpoint.
Now, is it ethical? That's a different question. It could be seen as a form of theft, but I would argue that it is no more or less theft than taxes, fees for government services, interest, etc. If it is stealing, then pretty much every government enforced payments are theft to begin with, which includes the interest on those loans.
Stealing is when you take something from someone illegally. What you described, and what OP described, is not even close to that.
First, what was taken from who? Money from the government, let us suppose. But legally. And even if it were illegal, which it isn't, what is the damage? Of course there is none. It's still 100% moral.
Comically, this is such a mild example of the Prodigal Son. Didn't folks learn this shit in Sunday School?
Ahhh, not all of us went to Sunday school lol. Those of us that did, didn't all pay attention, and those that did didn't all accept it and internalize it enough to reference.
Like, I went maybe three times? Then I bailed because it was a tad, well bullshit. Too much of it just didn't scan.
With that, there's a lot of room in the concept of theft, of stealing that goes beyond taking things illegally. Looking at it in the context of an economics class, it's obviously meant to try the students thinking about things on a broad level, a way of breaking the box so that they can not just think outside it, but really abandon it so that new concepts can be explored fresh.
That's the framework of my response.