If the government is going to underwrite, guarantee and/or subsidize students loans, then the colleges and universities know they can keep raising their tuitions and costs to whatever the traffic will bear. After all, the government is good for it.
Since the colleges and universities aren't negatively affected if the loans aren't repaid, they have no skin in the game so they keep raising the fees to attend their institutions.
As a result, attending college has become almost prohibitively expensive to attend without the government backed student loans or rich parents or benefactors. Vicious cycle.
When I attended Arizona State University as an in-state student in the late 60s, early 70s, I worked three part time jobs while carrying a full load of classes year round and paid all of my tuition myself. My parents did help with my books. That wouldn't be possible nowadays.
what happened to the bills where colleges would have to pay the student loan debt of students who could not get employment in their major?