The interest rate for federally subsidized student loans has doubled to 6.8 percent after Congress failed to reach a deal to avoid the hike. A proposal by Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren to lower student loan interest rates to 0.75 percent — the same rate given to big banks on government loans — also faltered before the deadline. Lawmakers will still have a chance to come to an agreement before the next school year, but whatever they decide will barely impact the massive crisis of U.S. student debt. Student loan debt in the United States stands at about $1 trillion after roughly quadrupling over the past decade. The Congressional Budget Office has forecast a profit of $50.6 billion from the interest it charges students paying back their college debt. We’re joined by two guests: Micah Hauptman, the financial policy counsel for Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division; and Pamela Brown, a Ph.D. student in Sociology at the New School, where she helped launch the “Occupy Student Debt Campaign Pledge of Refusal.”
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