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As students increasingly incur debt to finance their undergraduate education, there is heightened concern about the long-term implications of loans on borrowers, especially borrowers from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Drawing upon the concepts of cultural capital and habitus (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977), this research explores how student debt and social class intersect and affect individuals’ trajectory into adulthood. Based on 50 interviews with young adults who incurred $30,000–180,000 in undergraduate debt and who were from varying social classes, the findings are presented in terms of a categorization schema (income level by level of cultural capital) and a conceptual model of borrowing. The results illustrate the inequitable payoff that college and debt can have for borrowers with varying levels of cultural resources, with borrowers from low-income, low cultural capital backgrounds more likely to struggle throughout and after college with their loans.

This chapter explores the role of student loan debt in the lives of American students and graduates in Wisconsin, US. The total amount of student loan debt in the United States is now at a record high. While debt is considered an integral part of a “forced timeline” toward a greater good, namely the American Dream, it is at the same time a disciplinary mechanism binding individuals to their families in various ways. While most anthropological research on college students and debt has not focused explicitly on student loan debt, this chapter offers insight into a phenomenon currently affecting more than 44 million Americans.

Purpose – Drawing on a survey of over 1,000 Library and Information Science (LIS) professionals and over a dozen interviews, this chapter explores the student loan crisis from an LIS perspective and offers practical solutions for the field to decrease debt from LIS graduate programs, which has ballooned in recent years.

Design/Methodology/Approach – In April 2016, I sent a survey via email to approximately 10 library-affiliated listservs ranging from Code4Lib to the UMD iSchool discussion list. While I attempted to keep the reach small and controlled to only library-affiliated listservs, the survey link quickly spread to Twitter and other social media. The survey attracted 1,630 qualified responses and ran for two weeks in total. Using skip logic, all potential respondents who did not attend a library school (26 in total) were automatically disqualified. Email addresses were provided by 497 participants for interview post-survey. I received 215 partial responses. In September 2016, I conducted qualitative interviews with participants. Thirty-two telephone interviews were conducted extending for 15–20 minutes and I received 38 written questionnaires in response to my questions.

Findings – The findings are outlined in sub-chapter headings, including increased tuition does not equal increased aid, older students borrow less and take longer in programs tailored to their needs, new graduates unlikely to pay off their loans soon, and students with high undergraduate debt: a divided loan burden. Other findings include interview results, which are embedded within the chapter.

The final section offers recommendations for LIS programs to lessen the burden for students. These recommendations include better financing information and counseling for students; shorter, more flexible degree programs; apprenticeship model, more pathways for a paraprofessional to professional track; and expand public service loan forgiveness programs.

Originality/Value – This is the first comprehensive qualitative/quantitative study of the cost of library school as well as the debt burden for students. It provides actionable outcomes as well as an analytic framework through which to view the academic debt crisis. It features the voices of librarians from around the country as they struggle through a changing job market and increased monetary burden.

This study investigates the relation of bank loan delinquencies to Fed Survey delinquency data from 2003 to 2017. Bank-generated loans have lower delinquencies than all Fed Survey loan types. Survey mortgage and auto loan delinquencies are positively related to bank loan delinquencies indicating complimentary delinquency decisions for borrowers. Conversely, student loans delinquencies are negatively related to bank loans, consistent with borrowers substituting student loan payments for bank debt for the entire sample period. Student loan delinquencies are negatively related to per-capita bankruptcy, and all other types of debt have a positive relation. The relation between Fed Survey loan delinquencies and bank-generated loan delinquencies is time varying and changed after the financial crisis in 2008.

Seemingly Unrelated Regression is used to study delinquencies for three bank loan types and whether or not they are related to Fed Survey loan delinquencies. The sample is split into pre-financial crisis before 2008 and post-crisis after 2008.

Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) results show that bank delinquencies for second mortgages and “Other” loan types are consistently complementary to Fed Survey mortgage loan delinquencies. Fed Survey auto loans delinquencies are also consistent with a complimentary relation, and these results are largely driven by the relation after the financial crisis of 2008 since pre-crisis regression results are not significant for every dependent variable. Credit card loan delinquencies have a negative and substitute relation with bank-generated first mortgage loan delinquencies prior to the crisis in 2008, and with bank-generated second mortgages after the crisis. Conversely, student loan delinquencies from the Fed Survey are negatively and significantly related to bank mortgages for the entire sample period, but only with bank-generated first mortgages after 2008. The student loan delinquency results are consistent with income smoothing, on average, although this is not explicitly tested at the micro level since this study uses macro-level data and not borrower-specific data. These findings are also consistent with conventional wisdom that student loans provide “financial slack” and borrower flexibility.

A limiting factor is this study uses macro-level data and not borrower-specific data.

Empirical findings are consistent with prior research that student loans provide income smoothing and “financial slack,” and borrowers with payment challenges will pay other debt before student loans.

Borrowers in financial trouble tend to be delinquent for all debt, and more so for student debt.

To investigate whether Fed Survey delinquencies of auto loans, first mortgages, student loans and credit card loans from all sources have complementary or substitution effects with bank debt at a macro level. The study investigates whether bank debt follows “market trends” as a complementary effect, or if bank debt has a negative relation to other debt indicating a substitution effect.

This study examines the relationship between financial literacy and risk-taking behavior in the stock market for both graduates and undergraduates.

This study conducted two surveys on two groups: graduates and undergraduates. The questionnaires were sent to the two groups via “Google Form”. The surveys were undertaken from March to October 2021, with final data on 500 undergraduates and 400 graduates. The three techniques used are multiple linear regression (MLR), structural equation model (SEM) and ordinal logit regression (OLR) to examine the causal relationships.

Based on survey data on 400 graduate and 500 undergraduate students, our results show that financial literacy is positively associated with risk-taking behavior (i.e. use of debt and willingness to use debt) after controlling for demographics. Graduates with higher levels of financial literacy are more likely to use debt. Undergraduates with higher levels of financial literacy are more willing to use debt. In addition, parental education has a significant moderating effect on the association between financial literacy and debt use among undergraduate students. The results are robust compared to the alternatives.

Although this study finds a positive association between financial literacy and risk-taking behavior among graduates and undergraduates, and these results are robust to the alternatives, the scope of this study is limited and only focuses on Vietnam. Hence, it needs to be expanded overseas. Next, graduates may make investment decisions based on stock prices or valuations, and as a result, the link between financial literacy and stock valuations should be investigated in subsequent research. Last but not least, further studies should also examine the digital financial literacy level of the younger generation, as it plays an important role in the digital age.

First, this study finds that higher financial literacy tends to use more debt, implying that financially literate people know how to use debt smartly to earn more profits. Second, students with higher-educated parents are less likely to use debt for stock investment, meaning that parents help students avoid possible risks while in the university. Finally, female graduates and college students all perform lower in financial literacy than their male counterparts. This can create a larger gender gap in financial literacy between women and men, particularly, in a society in which men often play the leading role in the family. As a result, it calls for policymakers, educators and parents to pay more attention to improving financial literacy among girls and women in general.

This study has three contributions. First, this is the first study to examine the impact of financial literacy on risk-taking behavior between two groups of graduates and undergraduates. The results show that individuals with a higher level of financial literacy are more likely to engage in risk-taking behavior (i.e. debt use) in terms of the stock market. Recent research, for example, Phung et al. (2022), examines investors’ informal debt (from families and friends), while this study investigates graduates’ debt use (from brokerage firms). Second, parental education is a significant mediator between college students’ financial literacy and debt use. The literature on parental socialization mainly documents parents’ direct influence on children’s financial knowledge and performance (Shim et al., 2010; Phung, 2023). Unlike previous research, this study finds that parental education plays a moderating role between college students’ financial literacy and their risk-taking behavior. Finally, three methods and multiple models are used to test causal relationships. The results are robust compared to the alternatives.

Research shows that having student loan debt in retirement is associated negatively with life satisfaction, suggesting that student debt is a bane of retiree well-being. The rationale for this study is to determine the factors related to owing student debt in retirement, given the adverse effects on the well-being of retired households.

The study utilizes pooled cross-sectional data from the 2015 and 2018 U.S. National Financial Capability Study. The empirical analysis uses a sample of retired Americans aged 65 years and older (N = approximately 8,000) and estimates two-block logistic regression models to examine the effects of demographic, socioeconomic and behavioral factors on student loan indebtedness in retirement. A sensitivity analysis is performed for the subsample of retirees holding student debt for their children's education. Statistical interpretations use odds ratios.

The findings indicate that financial literacy, age, homeownership and high subjective financial knowledge are associated with a low likelihood of holding student loan debt in retirement. However, being Black, having postsecondary education, having difficulty covering expenses, having financially dependent children, having high-risk preferences and spending more than income increase the likelihood of holding student debt in retirement. The ensuing discussion will assist financial planners and educators identify practical ways to shape decisions regarding student loan debt in retirement.

The amount of student loan debt is unavailable in the dataset for analysis. One cannot infer causal relations from the study. The factors examined do not reflect the time the student loan was obtained.

The study focuses on the determinants of student loan indebtedness among retired Americans rather than young adults or older adults on the verge of retirement. The paper enhances the understanding of student loan holdings in the decumulation phase of the life cycle. Many US individuals have low retirement savings from which they draw a retirement income. The more the student debt burdens on retired Americans, the greater the likelihood of outliving their resources and experiencing poverty.

This study explores the role of rising US student loan debt in explaining income inequality.

The study uses the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) modeling approach to explore the short- and long-run impact of college debt on income inequality in the US through quarterly data over the period 2000–2019.

The results demonstrate the detrimental impact of student debt on national and regional income inequality. Moreover, the regional analysis highlights a more pronounced impact of student debt on income distribution in South and West regions. The findings document that these regions, with the lower student debt proportions, have the lowest average cost of attending college. Finally, the analysis explores two potential channels – i.e. race and homeownership – that could explain the link between college student debt and income inequality.

The results can be helpful for policymakers and researchers to formulate practical approaches for assessing and addressing the rising national student debt and income inequality.

This is the first, to the best of the author's knowledge, study that explores the impact of US college debt on income inequality.

This research seeks to explore current attitudes, motivations and behaviours in relation to student credit and debt consumption in the UK and Ireland.

Key qualitative consumer research based on 20 interviews with Irish and UK higher education students is presented.

The findings highlight that, while the UK and Irish student contexts are significantly different in terms of accommodation costs, tuition fees and living expenses, many Irish students reported relatively high debt levels, with some exceeding their UK counterparts. The research identifies key contextual factors associated with the credit‐friendly environment in which students live in addition to shedding light on student orientation towards credit and debt, with specific conclusions for future student debt.

Given the rise in debt and its detrimental consequences, the study has far‐reaching implications for policy makers, consumer agencies financial providers and marketers in terms of creating an environment where good student financial capability and management is developed and facilitated through increased financial education and regulation. The research has implications for other western countries in terms of predicting comparative trends in student credit and debt attitude and behaviour.

This paper addresses the lack of analytical and academic commentary exploring the dynamics and nature of student credit and debt, particularly within an Irish context, in addition to providing a cross‐cultural comparison between credit and debt consumption in Ireland, where debt is a relatively new phenomenon, and the UK, a country well‐entrenched in debt.

This paper aims to examine the relationship between student loan debt and first-time home buying among college graduates aged 23 to 40 years old in the USA.

The authors use the Federal Reserve’s 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances data on American households to present descriptive statistics and run logistic regressions that measure the effects of student loan debt on first-time home buying. The authors also present original survey data of mortgage lenders that provides an industry-level perspective.

The authors find that having student loan debt does not by itself prohibit first-time home buyers. On the contrary, having student loan debt increases the likelihood of homeownership by 15.1%. People with student loan debt, however, buy homes that are 39.2% less expensive and have 58% less home equity compared to first-time home buyers without student loans. In addition, it is found that the amount of student loan debt is important. People with student loan debt above the median amount among people with student loan debt ($35,000) are 27% less likely to be first-time home buyers.

This paper provides public policy analysts and other researchers a different perspective on the correlation between student loan debt and home buying. This study focuses narrowly on first-time home buyers who are college graduates between 23 and 40 years. Thus, capturing the youngest cohort of first-time home buyers and examine the primary factors that influence their home buying decisions.

First-time homebuyers are historically the largest segment of home buyers making them an important subcategory to study. The rise in student loan debt is posited to explain declining homeownership among younger people. The current literature on student loan debt and home buying often studies samples that are too heterogeneous resulting in mixed findings. This paper adds to the existing literature by filtering the sample to study the effects of student loan debt and first-time home buying among people with at least a college degree who are between 23 and 40 years.