There is a ton of content online about student loans and student loan debt. The problem is that most of this content is pointless for one reason or another.
Before you quit reading, hear me out. I do think that student loan debt is a problem. There is an obvious solution, though: paying it down. Student loan debt is no more a problem than being unqualified for a job, having a medical issue that requires attention from a trained professional, or being hungry; all problems have solutions.
The problem with most content online about student loans is that they usually fall into one of the following categories:
- They reach the wrong audience – There is a TON of content out there that says what to do about student loans…before you head to college. Now, if you can think back far enough to when you were a high school senior, how much thought did you put into student loans? Maybe some, but primarily you were concerned about going to a school that fit other criteria: great academics, campus, location, student community, etc. I doubt that most people who just started to think about college are even remotely worried about the debt they will have after they graduate. Yes, there are a few, but they probably have already heard everything your article about “what not to do when it comes to student loans” talks about. In a nutshell, the wrong audience is being reached, namely people who have already graduated from college.
- “Broad Brush” approach to student loans – When it comes to online content about personal finance we typically run into problems with the “personal” part of the topic. Everyone’s situation is different; there’s a reason doctors and lawyers probably aren’t big readers of personal finance blogs – if someone says that student debt is wrong in every single situation, a doctor would have to laugh at such a ludicrous statement. Too often articles about student debt assume that someone 1) thought about this issue long before they stepped foot on a college campus 2) their parents fully understood student loans and guided their child through the process and 3) that everyone will have a middle-class income, no more, no less, so that when student loan income is discussed broad generalities can be used. Overall this broad brush approach simply is not useful if the content is supporting an opinion because there simply are too many scenarios not accounted for.
- Student debt payoff “brags” – While I certainly applaud anyone who pays off their student loans, I find it hard to believe that this type of content really helps those who are looking for strategies and tips to pay down their debt. This content MIGHT help motivate others to pay down their student loans as well, but oftentimes these posts come off (at least to me) as simple brags. While I understand some blogs were made specifically by people to chronicle their debt payoff journey, I can’t help but feel like these posts are worthless to people who still have a lot of debt to pay down.
So what content on student loans would be useful?
- Strategies to pay down debt – I think that much more content online about student loans should be focused on how to pay them down. This is the solution to most people’s problem. Most people looking for information on student debt have already gone through college and are realizing that they have a cash outflow each month that they didn’t have before. This doesn’t sit well with most people, though I think if you sit down and think about it for a while it really shouldn’t anger you that much. Content that focuses on increasing your income either through your full-time job or through a side hustle is valuable content for people who have student loans. I think that if you can offset your student loans through a side income source it can have a lot of positive psychological ramifications. The best thing about this sort of content is that it can be applied to other debt payoff goals as well, whether it’s consumer debt, a mortgage, or something else. I hope that there is more content focusing on this in the future as I see it as having more practical applications than other types of student debt content.
- Discussion on the root cause of rising student debt – Considering how quick most websites are to post content about student loans there seems to be very little discussion as to why student loans have increased so drastically over the years. I wrote an article titled Why College Tuition Will Continue To Rise back in August and had a relatively small response to the post. While this could be attributed to the fact that my blog was only a month and a half old at that point, I couldn’t help but think most people are not interested in actually looking into the root cause of rising student loans. A discussion on this issue is necessary and long overdue, especially if people continue to quote figures that make it appear to be a huge looming crisis.
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The reality of student loans is that they need to be paid down. Most people are looking for information about how to go about paying them down, not how to avoid them in the first place. Once people who run content sites start to realize this I think we will see a lot more articles about student debt talk specifically about how to get rid of it versus how to avoid it.
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What are your thoughts about the current content available about student loans and student debt? Do you think they focus too much on avoiding the problem and not enough talking about root causes and how to get rid of student loans?
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I think most content on the web is pointless, not just content about student loan debt:) I would say that student loan debt is just like any other debt (except that it is not dischargeable) – therefore there are plenty of resources about how to pay it off. However, I’d like to see more resources about how to not get into debt in the first place.
GregatClubThriftyI hear you Greg, I think overall I just think there needs to be more content about HOW to pay down that debt and manage it, since I think most people either already have it who are reading stuff online about student debt. I think more education for high school juniors and seniors about student debt would be the most beneficial place to talk about avoiding student loan debt and keeping it at a manageable amount.
I think we need to have targeted content and discussions about the major problems with student loans and why the are even needed. This all goes back to out of control tuition rates, but these wouldn’t even be an issue if the rates weren’t rising year in and year out.
DebtRoundUp “This all goes back to out of control tuition rates, but these wouldn’t even be an issue if the rates weren’t rising year in and year out.”
This is the real issue. Why has the cost of college gone up to much, when wages and inflation are pretty much flat. Is the ease of access to student loans/credit causing the spike in college tuition?
BryanatFatWallet DebtRoundUp Every school wants the best athletic complex, the best student center, best library, best teachers, etc. so I think a lot of that drives up the costs, though it really depends on how much you can bring in from donors. My school recently raised half a billion dollars for a new athletic complex and student center. I think schools aren’t really competing on tuition rates so why not keep raising them? I’m oversimplifying the issue and I definitely have not researched nearly enough to speak intelligently about the issue, but it’s something I’m interested in learning more about.
I would tend to agree with Greg as well that most of the content is really not helpful. What I find as the problem is that it is a multi-layered problem and so little of that is covered. Debt is debt, speaking generally, and I do think it would be beneficial to provide more targeted content as to ways to get out of it as well covering the root causes.
FrugalRulesI think there is more and more about how to make side income and increase your income, but it would be great to see some more content specifically about how to make student debt manageable. Maybe I’m preaching to the choir in this post? haha
I like reading about student loan posts because it motivates me. But I agree, there needs to be more posts out there about different strategies to pay them off.
SenseofCentsIt definitely is motivating to see people who pay off their student loans at an accelerated rate, so I don’t mind them. It’s even more helpful when people specifically outline how they went about paying down more and how it impacted their life (i.e. what sacrifices did they make to pay it down at a faster rate?).
I agree there are a lot of sites that just talk about how they are paying it off instead of avoiding it in the first place (of course for some that may not be possible), but I disagree about the bragging part. I mean there is some of that bragging type of behavior in PF blogs, but most people are just chronicling their journey so they are excited about reaching the end. Also a lot do discuss the techniques they used to pay off the debt quicker. I think if there was more info on avoiding it in the first place it would really help a lot of people.
Beachbudget
You’re probably right that I overstated how much “bragging” there is about financial successes, I just feel like SOMETIMES people think they are better than others if they make more money, have less debt, etc. and I pick up on it a bit from various bloggers. I’m probably being a bit hard on them, and I’m not talking about blogs I regularly read. I usually stop reading regularly if I don’t like the tone of the blogger.
DC @ Young Adult Money Beachbudget I pick up on the vibe sometimes too!
Beachbudget haha it happens.
I think reading about strategies would be more useful as there are probably a greater amount of people already in debt reading these types of articles than 17/18 year old’s just going off to college. I did consider costs and chose where to get my education based off of that, but my parents and I definitely weren’t 100% sure as to what we were getting into with the whole process. There were some great schools with good programs that I got accepted into, but at the end of the day I balked at how much it would cost me. However, you’re right in that every person is different, and some are so focused on going to the best schools that they don’t consider the cost beforehand.
As far as “brag” posts, sometimes it helps to motivate me, and other times it’s nice to share in someone’s joy as they send in their final payment toward debt.
JourneytoSavingI think high schools should really start including some sort of curriculum for junior and seniors that focuses on student debt and how to keep it manageable, what it’s like once you are out of college, “worst case” scenarios, etc. I think those who are out of school should really start focusing on figuring out how we can make college more affordable and why it currently isn’t affordable for most people, at least without taking out a ton of loans. Additionally for those in their 20s and 30s I think it’s important for content websites to focus on how to manage their student loans and what they can do to minimize their impact (i.e. make x dollars more per month to offset the loans).
DC @ Young Adult Money I definitely agree – we had our guidance counselors in HS asking what we wanted to go to college for, analyzing our grades for areas we were strong in, and then they often provided us with a list of colleges that would suit our criteria (if we had any), but they NEVER mentioned how expensive it might be. It’s often left up to the admissions department of the college, and they’re probably not looking out for you completely.
JourneytoSaving Admissions job is to get people enrolled, I doubt many focus on the cost of people’s education haha. Guidance counselors should be talking about this with students, though, and I also never discussed it with mine.
It’s an interesting point about reaching the wrong audience. While high school students would be the ones to benefit most from education on student loans, like you say that’s probably at the back of their minds. How many of us were really in tune with our finances at 18? I certainly wasn’t. I also think that there’s been a decent amount written demonizing all student loans, and I don’t think that’s fair. Even for a liberal arts education, I don’t think it’s the worst thing in the world to take on some amount of debt. A college education can provide many benefits if you have some initiative, and those benefits can be well worth the expense.
momanddadmoneyI don’t think it’s fair to demonize them either. The reality is that a college degree is a prerequisite to most jobs these days and NOT having one is really going to hurt your career prospects and earning potential.
I see “student debt” written about quite a bit on US blogs, not so much on other blogs around the world, primarily because tuition is not has high, in fact in some countries it is free.
With US tuition for college being so incredibly high, the only ways to get rid of student loans are to make more money, be born into a wealthy family, or win the lottery :-)
TacklingOurDebt Quote of the day! “With US tuition for college being so incredibly high, the only ways to get rid of student loans are to make more money, be born into a wealthy family, or win the lottery”
The reality is that a lot of people from all over the world come to the US for school. I’m not sure what the statistics are for other countries, but I highly doubt as many students from around the world are trying as hard to get into their universities as they are trying to get into the United States. I’m sure that adds to the tuition increase.
Good points DC. I think they can be applied to a lot of content on the web unfortunately. I have student loans an impossible topic to write about, since I never had them myself. The one student loan article I have had was a guest post and it was more about debt repayment strategies in general.
ayoungpro Yes everyone has different experiences. You don’t have to have life experiences with every topic you write about, though, as I have definitely written about things that I haven’t personally experienced.
I definitely think it’s pointless, because students aren’t reading it. It’s usually read after the fact, by people trying to get rid of their loans!
addvodka Comment of the day!!!!!!
You bring up some great points, DC. For me, where I struggle when I write about this subject is that I believe these conversations need to start happening years before the child even begins applying for college. College enrollment has become automatic and while I believe in it and want my own girls to attend, we are acting a bit like a herd of cattle. We just go to the best college we can get into – regardless of cost or whether it’s really the best fit for what our kids want to do. I honestly don’t expect 17 years old to care all that much because debt is such a foreign concept to them, but their parents should care deeply. The whole point of sending them to college is so they can get a better job, earn more money and have a better life. But then parents don’t prepare their kids to handle that debt afterwards or make sure any debt they are incurring is the smallest amount possible. They let their kids fend for themselves and most aren’t prepared to do so. And parents aren’t doing this because they don’t love their kids; they just don’t know to do any differently. In my perfect world, parents would be educated and guide their kids through the process and kids would leave college better prepared to manage their finances. We’re a long way from that reality but it’s one I’m willing to keep working towards.
TheHeavyPurse That would be an ideal world! I personally think that high school counselors need to step up to the plate and start focusing on finances A LOT more than they are used to.
Hoping I’m not a “bragger” but instead offering motivation to others that paying off student loans isn’t impossible (even when you don’t have a big shovel to get yourself out of the hole).
I don’t think that my posts are read by high school seniors, so I try to write mostly about my experiences working and side hustling to get myself out of debt. I think there are a lot of macro structural changes that need to take place in our country to get student debt under control, but since that doesn’t appear to be happening, I’m hoping that even one person will read what I write and have the confidence to start aggressively paying off their student debt.
StudentDebtSurvivor I certainly don’t think you are a bragger and I appreciate all the advice you share on HOW to get rid of student loans. It’s the countless (and I mean countless) posts that do nothing to help people pay off their loans that are worthless imo.
I think student loan debt is a huge issue in this country. Last year it surpassed 1 trillion in outstanding loans, and the average student in 2014 is graduating with over $33,000 in debt. That’s the average! That means there are a whole host of people with a bunch more debt than that!
I think there does need to be a holistic approach to educating not only high school students to be wary of taking on too many loans – especially in some arts and humanties majors – but also to make sure they have a plan when they go to school. I think far too many people go to school with no plan, just hoping to get the social aspect of school and figure out the rest later. Why pay 50-100k for schooling or more if you don’t even know what you want to do?
Like you mention I don’t think a lot of people understand the ramifications of taking on so much debt for school loans until they graduate and have to start paying it off. One study showed that somewhere around 20% of borrowers go into default in the first three years of loan repayment – that’s a huge number! So it’s important to fill them in on the details before they get there.
While I think it’s important to warn people about the dangers of student debt, it’s also good to make sure you’re also helping those on the other side, helping them to figure out ways to pay down the debt faster, make more income to make extra payments, etc. I’ve been there with the student loans, and the day I paid them off was a big weight off my shoulders.