College Loans Weigh Heavier on Graduates

[alp227]

Source: The New York Times

Student loan debt outpaced credit card debt for the first time last year and is likely to top a trillion dollars this year as more students go to college and a growing share borrow money to do so.

While many economists say student debt should be seen in a more favorable light, the rising loan bills nevertheless mean that many graduates will be paying them for a longer time.

“In the coming years, a lot of people will still be paying off their student loans when it’s time for their kids to go to college,” said Mark Kantrowitz, the publisher of FinAid.org and Fastweb.com, who has compiled the estimates of student debt, including federal and private loans.

Two-thirds of bachelor’s degree recipients graduated with debt in 2008, compared with less than half in 1993. Last year, graduates who took out loans left college with an average of $24,000 in debt. Default rates are rising, especially among those who attended for-profit colleges.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/12/education/12college.html

[OhioChick]

1. Hard to pay off those loans when you can't get a job n/t

[SheilaT]

4. Back in about 1976 I knew a young woman

who bitterly regretted her college loans. She owed maybe $5,000, but said that she wished she'd borrowed less, had only borrowed during her final two years, not all four.

I've never forgotten that, and when I get the chance, I preach to young people that they should exit college with as little debt as possible. That may well mean starting out at the local community college, then transferring to the least expensive state university in your state.

The really lucky and smart ones get full ride scholarships, I know, but those are rare.

The other thing more young people should look at are the various vo-tech kinds of programs found at the community colleges. Most of them are highly practical and lead to good jobs.

[Rage for Order]

7. Won't they means-test the federally guaranteed student loans...

And if one does not have the means to pay they will put those loan payments on a hardship deferment?

[iris27]

10. Hardship deferments stop after 3 cumulative years.

And you only qualify if you make 150% of poverty level or less. Right now I am the only income for myself and my husband; I make $26k/year, and this is too much for me to qualify for a hardship deferment.

[InkAddict]

5. Harder still when you in your early 60s w/Stafford loans taken in

better days to help the kids debt load stay lower. That sure now seems like a century ago. Go ahead, dock the only income we'll have in a few short years, SS#, and make us pay the high balances and co-pays of mandated insurance and reduced "entitlements" of Medicare and Medicaid. Somebody's gonna pay the final bills, so I LOL at their short-sightedness - That Boehner - killing me softly, with his words....I'm thinking it would be better to invite him over and hand him a weapon. They'll get as much from the dead as the living - nada.

[bluestateguy]

2. Most of that debt will never be paid

I would not be surprised if some of these borrowers are still paying those loans off when they are of Social Security age.

It's not hard to see how: some kid runs up say $25,000 as an undergraduate and then $150,000 to attend an overly expensive, but third tier law school. Then he finds that there are no good law jobs out there for someone who went to Bumble Fuck State Law School (some ass clown college that probably should not even have a law school at all, but uses the law school tuition as a cash cow). Any job the graduate gets will not enable him to do any more than simply tread water on the loan repayments. Meanwhile the interest is building and building and the balances are not going down.

[quakerboy]

6. You exagerate. There are jobs to be had

The Republicans always have room for 3rd tier lawyers with mailable ethics.

[OverDone]

12. Students wont be paying

There is no way, not even half the graduates will be able to repay their student loans. You can't come out of college with $60,000 in debt and expect them to pay for housing, food, car... Just too much on a new grads plate.

[DBoon]

3. I wish today's students had the same opportunities I did

I could actually almost completely pay for college out of minimum wage jobs. Really very little debt even after an unmarketable MA.

The amount of debt college students need to take on has completely destroyed the value of college.

[Devil_Fish]

9. Ya know what would happen if kids couldn't get loans? Tuition would drop.

Same thing with the houses. If people couldn't get a 60 year loan, they couldn't buy a house. If no one can buy a house, the seller is forced to lower the price, or keep the house. You wanna know why tuition is so expencive? cause kids can get loans to pay for it.

I'm about to pay off my Sally mae loan with money I borrowed with my 401k. Lucky me to have a job and a 401k. Looking back I would not have bothered with the second school that I spent 25k on, and am just now paying off. I'm going back to school for my B.S. but this time on my Company's dime. Again lucky me, and I'm knocking on wood right now.

Not every one is so lucky and I am sad, and sorry for thouse that are not. Thanks for your prayers Mom and Sis, and thanks Grandma and Grampa for looking after me from heaven. I told you I would make you proud. To every one else, I wish you the best of luck.

D_F

[stockholmer]

8. up until this fall semester, for the last 50+ years anyone in the USA could've came to uni here free

We here in Sweden just ended free tuition for all non-EU students after decades of it being free for all the world. USA students by the tens of thousands go all over the world, and pay huge fees, but we had so so few Americans come.

Just in Stockholm we have 4 universities in the top 100 in the world, Stockholms Universitet (81st best uni overall globally), KTH (Royal Institute of Technology (top 15 tech unis in the world), Stockholm School of Economics (top 25 econ unis), and Karolinska Medical School (top 20 med schools).

Holland and Denmark were free for non-EU up until the mid 2000's.

Finland and Norway are the last 2 still free for all non-EU. Finland is the better deal, as it is cheaper to live there.

I think it is so imprudent for USA students to rack up $30,000 to $100,000 in debt for what amounts to a middling public uni education, especially in the last 10 years. Out of state tuition for middle-ranked USA public state unis is now more than the tuition was for Harvard and Yale in the late 1980's to mid 1990's, in some cases much more.

[iris27]

11. considering this is the first I've ever heard of that, it doesn't surprise me that you had so few

Americans. I can tell you if I'd known about that at 14, I would've been cramming all the Swedish I could learn in my four years of high school.

[stockholmer]

16. the courses are in English,USA students go ALL over the planet for uni, and pay tuition, we even

advertised, as did Denmark, Finland, Holland, etc.

No one has a good answer why, when US is so big, and already has huge overseas student population, the numbers of Americans were so small. Canada, Pakistan, Australia, some African countries even sent more, especially in the 2000's.

Our Ph D's are still not only free for all, even non-EU, here we pay $40,000 to 120,000 plus US dollars (depending on field) to the student each year.

[bikebloke]

13. I wish I knew about that 30 years ago.

After clicking with European social democracy, I wanted to live in Scandinavia but couldn't find a way. There was something on Gotland, but it wouldn't work for me. The education would've been nice after growing up in an anti-intellectual and anti-education household.

Damn, now where did I put that time machine?

[stockholmer]

17. we're still,by far, the easiest EU country to emigrate to,& almost all under 50 or 60 speak English

well, if not superbly.

We will run a national surplus this year, unemployment (we measure what is called the 'U6'in US) is down to 6.6% versus your 16% U6 rate, our krona is up around 30% versus the dollar in last 7 months, the taxes are high, BUT compared to a US person in NYC, on $70,000 per year, the US workers pays more, especially after employer health care is deducted out here (ours is basically free). I know this for fact, I did the taxes in back to back years at roughly same salary in NYC and Stockholm.

give it a look, if the situ there really becomes all gone pete tong

cheers

[bikebloke]

18. Jag pratta några svenska

But I'm probably beyond any age limit for incomers.

[liberalplus]

14. So much College Debt makes them slaves

to the system....it can't continue when there are no jobs for them

the colleges are making it practically impossible for a middle class kid or poor kid to get a college education

[Snoutport]

15. my partner works at a university...he takes home $1300 and was just told he will be cut 20% next yea

year. He has to take classes every term to keep his student loan payments from kicking in...they would take up half his paycheck otherwise!! i'm a teacher paying on my undergrad and my masters student loans so we are pretty much stuck. We chip away at my loans while his are on hold and getting bigger and bigger.

Kind of sick when two people with masters degrees and full time jobs can afford a 1400 square foot house payment, student loans, insurance and utilities and pretty much nothing else.