Student Loan Debt: To Pay or Not to Pay?
More than 40 million student-loan debtors have to resume their monthly payments as of today after enjoying a three-year moratorium on payments that began at the height of the pandemic. What will they do next?
For Rachel Jerome, 28, resuming her nearly $1,000 per month payments will mean watching the savings she slowly built up during the pandemic vanish within a few months while she cuts back on groceries, transportation and her gym membership.
Amy struggles to make payments on her $238,000 in student loan and carries the pain of knowing her mother, a public school teacher and co-signer on one of her loans, is held responsible for each one of her late or missed payments.
Mike McGuirk, 35, also needed his parents to cosign his $150,000 private loan for his undergraduate education. As a freelance filmmaker, he has always struggled to make consistent payments — right now, he’s completely out of work due to the actors' strike taking place across the country.
“Beyond the monetary payments and financial burden, it’s put a tremendous amount of stress between myself and my parents,” McGuirk said.
Student Loan Debtors Weigh Options as Pandemic Debt Payment Moratorium Expires October 1
By Keating Zelenke
To hear Keating Zelenke discuss her article on the end of the student loan payment moratorium, click here.
Yes, I want to make a contribution today.
From the Archive
The student-loan debt crisis has been building for decades and swallowing up the lives of countless people along the way. In September 2012, as the total student-loan debt surpassed $1 trillion (it’s now pushing $2 trillion) we spoke with members of “Generation Debt” about their experiences and whether going to college was still worth it. In the same issue, Indypendent Editor-in-Chief John Tarleton recounted his own experiences with repaying his student loans. Instead of insisting that others must do the same, he argued “the only real solution to the student debt crisis lies in collective action.”
Indypendent News Hour Roundup
On this week’s edition of the Indypendent News Hour, we spoke with Jeff Purcell, president of striking UAW local 3039 in Tappan, NY; New Jersey anti-money laundering specialist Hector Oseguera about Senator Robert Menendez’s corruption scandal and with Keating Zelenke on her new article on student loans debtors.
Next Week’s Show
For next week’s show, we will speak with historian Toni Gilpin about the resurgence of the labor movement and with Socialist Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani about a new MTA pilot project he fought for to make five bus routes – one in each borough – free of charge. The Indypendent News Hour airs Tuesdays 5–6 pm on WBAI-99.5 FM and streaming on wbai.org. You can find our full archive at Soundcloud.com.