, Columnist
Three Charts Explain the Student Loan Mess
Student loans make up almost half of the federal government's financial assets, a source of a big chunk of revenue.
Hope she didn't major in art history.
Photographer: Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Portland Press Herald/Getty ImagesThis article is for subscribers only.
Here are three charts about student loans that have me worried. First, the total amount of student loans in the U.S. has risen steadily, doubling just since the financial crisis:
This is troubling, although by now it’s a story that most people know. But what fewer people realize is that the federal government has rapidly taken over almost the entire student-loan market since the crisis. Federally owned student loans rose from zero in the mid-1990s, to a bit more than $100 billion on the eve of the crisis, to about $850 billion in late 2014: