Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is coming under fire from the Democrats after some financial advice he gave to some students.
Personal responsibility has long been the backbone of many conservative principles, so when Romney told students to borrow from their parents rather than Uncle Sam, it doesn't come as much of a surprise.
"Take a shot, go for it, take a risk, get the education, borrow money if you have to from your parents, start a business," Romney told college students in Ohio. The statement is in context of a story where a friend of his borrowed $20,000 from his parents
However, at the University of Utah outside the loan office, students gave mixed reactions about whether they like the idea or not.
Take a shot, go for it, take a risk, get the education, borrow money if you have to from your parents, start a business.
–Mitt Romney
"If your parents are willing and able, I'm sure," said U student Griffin Bullock. "That's a better scenario to pursue than getting a loan from a bank or something else."
"I think that that kind of shows how out there Mitt Romney is in terms of what he thinks is a normal amount of money to deal with in a regular situation," added U student Karl Mathis.
Financial planners also say there are positives and negatives about Romney's statement.
"It's okay to say no," said Sharla Jessop, vice president of Smedley Financial. "It's okay for the children to ask if parents can loan them the money. And it's okay for the parents to say, ‘I can't — I'm not in a position to be able to do that.' "
The issue plays into a highly contentious topic for Republicans and Democrats: student loans. The federal loan burden currently stand at more than $1 trillion.
One Democratic activist told the Associated Press: "Only someone who paid for college by selling stock given to him by his CEO father would just casually assume students could go borrow $20,000 from their parents."
