Bill Clinton: “The answer to your question is, yes, it is going to happen. And the only question is--we haven't actually passed the…”

“The answer to your question is, yes, it is going to happen. And the only question is--we haven't actually passed the actual tax bill through the Congress yet, but we have allocated roughly $35 billion over a 5-year period to provide tax relief against the cost of college education. And we know that, among other things, there will be a tax credit, that is a dollar-for-dollar reduction off your taxes, for the first 2 years of college for an amount that will be roughly equal to the cost of a typical community college. So you can take that just off your taxes as a tax credit. Because our goal is to try to make 2 years of education after high school as universal as a high school diploma is today. If you look at--the last census figures we have in 1990 show that young people who have 2 years of--younger workers, now, it's not the same for older workers--but younger workers who have 2 years of education or more after high school tend to get jobs with rising incomes. Young people who have less than 2 years of education after high school tend to get jobs with stagnant incomes. Young kids who are high school dropouts tend to get jobs with declining incomes. So it would be a tax credit. In addition to that, there will be a tax deduction from your taxable income for the cost of any tuition after high school, not just the first 2 years, any tuition--the second 2 years, post-graduate, vocational, any tuition after high school. Now, beyond that, what we tried to do to help young people when they come out is for the schools that are in the Department of Education's direct college loan program, young people have the option of choosing to pay back their loans--they have big loans--either on a regular repayment schedule, which would be hard for them, particularly if they have become school teachers or police officers or nurses or something else where they're not making a lot of money. They have the option of paying that back as a percentage of their income, which lifts a huge burden off of them in the early years. So we've tried to do that. But the main focus of our efforts in this tax bill will be the tax credit and the tax deduction. But the details of it are still somewhat open because, obviously, Congress hasn't acted. And Secretary Riley and I talked about it on the way up here today, what we could do that would do the most good for the largest number of people. [Parent Katherine Folio asked what the President planned to do for the gifted student programs, under the new education program.]”