The student debt crisis is back in the news. That’s not too surprising, given that 44 million debtors now hold a staggering $1.5 trillion in student loans. What’s more surprising is the immediate source of the media attention: centrist New York senator Chuck Schumer, who (along with Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren) is calling on Joe Biden to cancel $50,000 worth of student debt per borrower by executive order.

The Higher Education Act, which empowers the federal government to issue student debt, also permits the Department of Education to cancel debt through the “compromise and settlement” provision. That means that by executive order, without new legislation, the president can make student debt vanish.

It should go without saying that Joe Biden should issue such an order and cancel all student debt. Doing so would inject a massive tranche of money into a beleaguered economy while removing the anvil of debt around millions of workers’ necks. The benefits to ordinary people would be immense and the cost to the government extremely low.