Brian Chappatta, Columnist

If Students Are Borrowing Less, Why Do They Owe More?

The growth in college debt continues unabated because borrowers are not paying down their balances, often intentionally.

January 21, 2020 at 12:00 PM UTC

By Brian Chappatta

Brian Chappatta is managing editor of Bloomberg News' leveraged finance and distressed debt teams. He was previously managing editor and team leader of its wealth group. Before that he was a Bloomberg Opinion markets and finance columnist and a bonds reporter for Bloomberg News.

Student borrowers as a whole aren’t even treading water. — Student borrowers as a whole aren’t even treading water.
Photographer: Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images

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In finance, and in the world in general, few things move in a perfectly linear line. Markets and economies rise and recede. Demographic trends shift over time. Life itself is full of twists and turns.

The growth in U.S. student-loan debt, on the other hand, has been entirely predictable for the past 17 years, rising to $1.5 trillion: