Total Student loan debt now exceeds total credit card debt

[Liberal_in_LA]

Student loan debt now exceeds credit cards

Eight thousand dollars and climbing. The debt counter keeps on turning for college freshman Allison Clevlend.


The 18-year-old University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh student has started her higher education under a new reality where debt sometimes has the final say over where she goes and what she does.


“Oshkosh was my last choice of school, but I didn’t get the financial aid I need,” said Clevlend, who lives at home and works part time to limit her need to borrow.

“I’m looking beyond college,” she said.

Total student loan debt now exceeds total credit card debt in this country, according to Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.org, a website that provides information about student aid and scholarships.

College graduates owe more than $850 billion in student loans, according to FinAid.org. The Federal Reserve estimates Americans owe about $828 billion in revolving credit, including credit card debt.

The change, which first happened in June, reflects the culmination of multiple trends: Consumers are paying down their credit cards, more students are going to college than ever and tuition continues to outpace financial aid.

“We have students who are living off their loans. When you get to that point, it’s no wonder students are having to borrow the maximum,” said Beatriz Contreras, director of financial aid at UWO. “That was not the intention of financial aid when it was started.”

http://www.thenorthwestern.com/article/20101020/OSH0101/101020089/Student-loan-debt-now-exceeds-credit-cards

[Bobbieo]

1. It's gonna get worse. Repubicans don't want the common people educated. They never did.

[Tansy_Gold]

2. Well it certainly does in my house

Total credit card debt -- <$200

Total student loan debt -- >$200, >$2,000, >$... . . . . . .

[TexasObserver]

3. Wow.

We have private "schools" mining the market that is supported by such debt. I wish more of them really had a promise of better jobs for those who attend them. Without market demand, skills cannot be used.

[unkachuck]

4. "...graduates owe more than $850 billion in student loans..."

....in this country, we make our people poor BEFORE they draw their first paycheck....getting a free or inexpensive education should be a right, not a privilege....

....who's going to invent our future?....are we going to out-source that to the Chinese too?

[Bobbieo]

5. Oh for the days whe one could get through colllege for $100 per semester.

Like the 70s.