Simple fact: about 85% of student loan balances are federally guaranteed, and over time that percentage is increasing.
With federally guaranteed student loans - the situation is a very clear zero sum game - what the student/borrower fails to repay, the taxpayer will repay.
Find that in the attached article. Nine yards of sympathetic treatment of folks who were smart enough to know what they were signing up for, but unwilling to repay the money they borrowed to attend school. And now the government and the servicers are the bad guys. Just listen to Elizabeth Warren get on her high horse and rail at servicers. Why those bastards are trying to collect on the loans taken out by the students! The temerity!
The fellow who has the $300k balance at age 61 may well die with it, and his estate will probably satisfy a small sliver of the debt then due. That's when the Treasury makes an accounting entry and the taxpayers pick up the tab.
Lazy journalists manage to present the details of the poor schmuck graduates who have large loan balances they cannot service, but they never find time to cover the poor schmuck taxpayers who have to pick up the tab for the degree in Women's Studies at Brown that didn't led to a productive job with enough disposable income to pay back the debt.
How so? What are the prospects of a lawyer in his late 30s/early 40s with zero job experience in a difficult market?
Is he an idiot?
I know a few too many starving Jacoby's....
It's like "teachers" getting their degrees...and bitching about what they make.
Well....maybe not...when I think about it....You can get a law degree...and suck at Jacopy'ing...
Most "teachers"...will get a job...then bitch about their pay.
Ummmm...when I went to college...I researched what I could make.
I've met some dumber than dirt Master Degree dolts.
I've met some M.D. or D.O.'s...that were very lacking...
Letter's behind your name...don't impress me.