Student Loans | featured news

House Republicans are willing to give President Barack Obama a rare win, the chairman of the Education and Workforce Committee said Thursday in outlining a deal that would let college students avoid a costly hike on their student loans.

It's the latest snapshot of the growing burden of student debt and it's another discouraging one: Two-thirds of the national college class of 2011 finished school with loan debt, and those who borrowed walked off the graduation stage owing on average $26,600 - up about 5 percent from the class before....

Growing college enrollment has stretched student debt to a record number of U.S. households, burdening young, poor.

A decrease in the amount owed on mortgages helped drive overall U.S. consumer debt lower in the second quarter, even as Americans kept piling up student loan debt, data showed on Wednesday. Total consumer debt fell 0.5 percent to $11.38 trillion compared to the first three months of the year, the New York Fed said in its quarterly household debt and credit report.

They never got close, and Mitt Romney may not have even seen them, but protesters — some from Occupy Wall Street — took political theater to a new level Sunday outside the beachfront estate of billionaire David H. Koch, where the Republican candidate was raising money. Some of the 200 protesters marched down mile-long Coopers Beach toward the home in a cloud of sand, bearing banners and signs: "Your $50,000 ticket equals my child's education," "end corporate personhood" and "don't forget to tip the help."

Congress may have averted a doubling of interest rates on millions of new federal student loans, but the fix is only for a year, leaving students on edge over whether they'll face a similar increase next summer.

Finding rare political accommodation on the cusp of a holiday recess, Congress passed legislation Friday designed to salvage 2.8 million jobs and shield students from a sharp increase in loan interest rates....

Facing weekend deadlines for action, congressional leaders have agreed to deals overhauling the nation's transportation programs without a Republican provision forcing approval of the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline, and avoiding a doubling of interest rates for new student loans, congressional officials said Wednesday....

President Obama in his weekly address Saturday chided House Republicans for allowing electoral politics to stall passage of a transportation bill and student loan rate extension, both of which have deadlines looming next week.

Congressional bargainers seem near an agreement that would avert a July 1 doubling of interest rates on federal loans to 7.4 million college students and end an election-year battle between President Barack Obama and Congress, Senate aides from both parties said Friday....