2 Ways To Talk About Student Loan Debt! It’s a Crisis! It’s Not! (IT IS)

By Logan Sachon March 25, 2013

I. Pretttttttttttyyyyy stupid that one of the clearest overviews I’ve found of the student debt crisis was written for financial marketers: “10 Things Every Financial Marketer Should Know About the Student Loan Crisis.” Thing number one: There is a crisis: “By the time you’re finished with this article, you’ll see there are big problems (and perhaps big opportunities) in the student lending space.”

1. There is a Crisis

2. Student Lending is Bigger Than Credit Cards, Auto Loans and Home Equity Lines

3. Borrowers of all ages owe more on their student loans and for longer.

4. One in Three Borrowers Owe Over $25,000

5. Student Loan Debt is Hampering the Housing Market
“Young home buyers now make up their smallest share in the housing market in more than a decade.”

6. Student Borrowers Don’t Know What They Are Getting Into

7. Marketing Works … But Schools Are The Gatekeepers

8. Delinquencies on Student Loans Are Way Up

9. Big Banks Are Pulling Out of the Student Lending Market

10. The CFPB is Butting In
(lololol the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau is “butting in.”)

A few facts to keep in your factbook:

— Average debtload: $24K

— Median debtload: $8K public, $17K private, $31K for-profit

— In 10 years, percentage of 25-year-olds with student loan debt rose from 27 percent to 43 percent

Read the whole thing here.

II. “High school seniors are more worried about burdensome student-loan debt than about getting into the college of their dreams.”

III. Contrast that with this ridiculous Washington Post Op-ed directed at incoming students, “Don’t Listen to Those Scary Tales of Student Loan Woe.” OKAY WHY NOT?

“And, as many economists have shown, it’s almost always well worth what it does cost — assuming that you graduate and, if your loans are largish, study something that actually helps lead to a job.”

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