Killer Student Loans

“This year Americans’ total outstanding student loan debt from federally funded and private loans was estimated at $833 billion, a sum that exceeds our credit card debt (though the two kinds of debt overlap, since, as the Smith study showed, credit cards are used to help pay tuition). The Chronicle of Higher Education reported in July that the 15-year default rate for federal loans is 20 percent; for loans to community college students, 31 percent; for loans to students at for-profit schools, 40 percent.”

**** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED READING if you are new to the Student Loan Disaster. ****

LINK to “Killer Loans: Student loan borrowers drown in debt as lenders make billions.” in Valley Advocate News

The Student Loan Disclosure Document You Should Read

“Very, very few borrowers fully understand the potential ramifications of the loans that they are taking out.”

LINK to “The Student Loan Disclosure Document Every Borrower Should Read” by Zac Bissonnette at Huffington Post

VIDEO: U.S. Students Drowning In College Debt

Bankruptcy Protection Bill for Private Student Loans Advances in Congress

The Private Student Loan Bankruptcy Fairness Act (H.R. 5043), originally introduced in the House on April 15 by Reps. Steve Cohen of Tennessee and Danny Davis of Illinois, was passed by a House subcommittee on Sept. 15. The proposed legislation would reverse a provision of a lender-friendly bankruptcy reform bill that, in 2005, created special protections for lenders of private student loans, making private student loans almost impossible to discharge in bankruptcy, unlike most every other form of private consumer debt.

LINK TO FULL STORY

Starting Life With Student Loan Debt

Student Loan Scam: the fast road to Debt Slavery

Student Loan Debt Clock — $848 billion and counting

A new tool lets you watch the country’s collected student debt pile up in real time.

Sponsored by FinAid.org, the Student Loan Debt Clock tallies an estimate of total private and federal outstanding student debt. According to FinAid, now is peak time for debt growth, as more student loans are doled out at the semester’s start.

Link (to Huffington Post)

High Costs, Loan Defaults at For-Profit Colleges

From USAToday:

According to the Department of Education, 77% of for-profit universities’ revenue — some $24 billion in the 2008-09 academic year — comes from federal grants and loans. Amazingly, even though the industry accounts for only 10% of students, it is responsible for 44% of all loan defaults. On average, more than one in five people who borrow to attend for-profit institutions is in default within three years of leaving school. The schools don’t care because the loans are federally guaranteed — an echo of the practices that led banks to issue subprime mortgages.

Link (to USAToday)

Meet Your New Roommate: Student Debt

Chiropractors Defaulted on Student Loans “In Droves”

The  chiropractic industry counted a win after it successfully lobbied for  inclusion in a federal student loan program for those studying  health-related professions. Decades later, though, significant numbers  of chiropractors have defaulted on their loans, leaving Uncle Sam to  make up the difference.

Fifty-three percent of  healthcare providers barred from receiving Medicare and Medicaid  reimbursements from patients because they defaulted on Health Education  Assistance Loans (HEAL) are chiropractors, according to an analysis of  the Department of Health and Human Services’ exclusion list.

The data shows people well into middle age–even in their 60s–saddled with debt, sometimes as much as $500,000, from the four years of graduate chiropractic school.

Link (via Sunshine Foundation Reporting Group)

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Don’t become a chiropractor unless you like STUDENT LOAN DEBT you can’t repay — and lots and lots of it. You have been warned.