Senior Citizens Still Owe $36 Billion In Student Loans

Student loan agencies love to claim that they are helping American’s gain a better footing on their financial future by receiving a college degree, yet a recent discovery reveals that even at the age of 60 many Americans are still paying off their debt.

According to a report in the Washington Post at least 10% of senior citizens with student loan debt are deliquent on paying off their loans, while 4.8% of the $85 billion worth of loans that were passed due in Q3 belong to seniors.

In other cases 80-year-0lds have had their social security checks garnished to pay off debts, in some cases student loans that are decades old. In many cases the loans occurred when seniors went back to school later in life or when they co-signed on student loans for kids and grandchildren.

An attorney with the Consumers Union said of student loan borrowing:

“This current generation of borrowers is going to be a generation of seniors who are burdened with debt.”

In 2011 the student loan crisis rose to the surface with President Obama addressing those concerns by easing repayment requirement. Lawmakers are now talking about plans to allow private loans to be erased in bankruptcy hearings.

Another plan recently announced would cut repayment times to 10 years at which point any other loan debt would be forgiven, lawmakers would also like to cut interest rates on current and future loans and set the maximum amount a person can pay at 10% of their overall income.

In the meantime the real issue, the skyrocketing cost of education has not been discussed perhaps as much as it should be.