Aging Americans owe billions for unpaid student loans
Outstanding student loan debt is a bane for recent grads, but it is on the rise at an alarming rate among the nation’s senior citizens, according to the Association of Mature American Citizens.
The Government Accountability Office reports that student loan debt among seniors has risen by more than 600% since 2005. Older Americans owed $2.8 billion in unpaid school loans in 2005, last year the amount of debt had increased to more than $18 billion. Twenty percent of those loans were understandably taken out to pay for their children’s education.
But, the bulk of the debt, 80%, is the result of the failure of seniors to pay back the money they borrowed decades ago for their own schooling. Now it is having a negative impact on the retirement plans for many of them, particularly those on fixed incomes, as the government sets out to recoup the funds.