Rising Student Loan Burdens and What to Do About Them

Student loans help many individuals obtain higher education that they otherwise could not fund, but concerns have arisen in recent years about the large number of borrowers that appear to be struggling to make their payments. This article considers the economic consequences of excessive student debt. It then turns to policy options for relieving excessive debt burdens—most notably, the debate over student debt forgiveness and ways to change the federal student loan program to limit the  number of new borrowers that will struggle to make debt payments.