Eric Swalwell: “We have become in the Bay Area a place where approximately 75 percent of the venture funding is going right now. There…”

“We have become in the Bay Area a place where approximately 75 percent of the venture funding is going right now. There are a lot of smart, young, energetic determined people with good ideas, but they don't have a lot of funding. And for them the decision becomes, well, I have got this job right now that pays my student loan debt and pays my other bills, but I have this great idea, which is my passion, which is my dream. But if I leave my job and I risk it all, I still have this debt; it is going to follow me, and it is going to be really hard if this doesn't take off. I see that decision point so often across the Bay Area. I just think, as you said, we are not asking to just completely say to every bank, You no longer can collect on this debt. I think what we are asking is, Let's start the conversation. How do we reduce it? How do we refinance it? How do we give people more money in their pocket every month so that they can help themselves lift up their families and help our economy? I see in the Chamber here with us our former caucus chair John Larson, the gentleman from Connecticut. I am putting him on the spot a little bit here. But I know he cares just as much as the gentleman from Pennsylvania and I do about what young people in his district are doing and how student loan debt affects him. So I am just wondering if our former chair could weigh in on what we can do in the Congress to help young people with student loan debt.”