The average recipient of a bachelor’s degree this year is saddled with an average of $30,000 in debt, according to a study by Edvisors.
Student debt has long been considered America’s most prominent financial crisis, and reform is as needed as ever. Now, it can safely be described as the defining financial circumstance of an entire generation:Â For the 2011-2012 school year, students borrowed $76 billion to pay for school, a number that the economy and even decreasing unemployment can keep up with: All told, Americans owe $1 trillion in debt.
Meanwhile, the president has put forth a plan to help stem the tide of suffering for tens of millions of borrowers in his new, but late, budget. The House will vote on a Republican plan, which could decide whether interest rates double this summer.
From USA Today:
The U.S. House will vote Thursday on a Republican plan to head off the increase inspired by an unlikely source: President Obama.
“No one wants to see student loan interest rates double on July 1. The president put forth a plan in his budget to address the problem with a market-based solution, and my Republican colleagues and I worked in good faith to offer a proposal that largely mirrors the president’s,” said House Education and Workforce Chairman John Kline, R-Minn.
In his 2014 budget, the president called for tying college loan rates determined by the federal government to market-based interest rates, which is the foundation of a GOP proposal.
Analysts say many students are misinformed or uneducated about the options available to them, such as a lowering of payments, and forbearance options.