30% of America’s Student Loan Borrowers Can’t Keep Up After Six Years

In order to compete in the economy of tomorrow, many young Americans will need to earn an advanced degree — around 65 percent of all jobs in the United States will require some post-secondary education by 2020. But wages have not grown significantly over the past several years, and student debt holders are being pinched.The result: More than 30 percent of student loan borrowers are in default, late or have stopped making payments after just six years.

CNBC cites reports that within six years, more than 15% of student borrowers had officially defaulted, while 10% more had stopped making payments and another 4.8% were at least 90 days late. And for-profit colleges fared even worse, where nearly 25% of graduates defaulted, and a total of 44% faced “some form of loan distress.”

These trends were masked by Department of Education reports which stopped tracking repayment rates after just three years (reporting defaults rates of just 10%), according to Ben Miller, senior director for post-secondary education at the left-leaning Center for American Progress. “Official statistics present a relatively rosy picture of student debt. But looking at outcomes over more time and in greater detail shows that hundreds of thousands more borrowers from each cohort face troubles repaying.”