America’s Student Loan Debt Swelled During Biden Years Despite Largest Loan Forgiveness Effort in American History

Despite President Biden handing out billions of dollars in student loan debt cancellation, the balance of America’s student loan debt actually increased during his time in office. The director of the Research Science Institute at MIT, Mark Kantrowitz, analyzed the data from the Education Department and found that the amount of outstanding federal student debt at the end of 2024 stood at $1.64 trillion, up from $1.59 trillion at the beginning of 2021.“Total student loan debt went up while President Biden was in office, despite all of the student loan forgiveness,” Mr. Kantrowitz told CNBC. During his four years in office, Mr. Biden canceled student loans for 5.3 million borrowers and wiped out roughly $188 billion in debt. Despite his student loan efforts, the number of Americans with loan balances stayed roughly the same from when he entered office to when he left — 42 million.Mr. Biden’s sweeping $400 billion student loan cancellation plan was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2023. After that decision, he said the court “tried to block me from relieving student debt. But they didn’t stop me.” In his last two years in office, he announced various plans that canceled hundreds of millions or billions of dollars of student loan debt at a time. In December 2024, he announced $4.28 billion in student loan cancellation for 55,000 public service workers. That plan applied to borrowers who were enrolled in the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, which allows for the cancellation of student debt after ten years of payments. Just days before leaving office, he announced another round of debt cancellation that forgave $600 million in loan debt for borrowers who the government deemed were defrauded by the colleges they went to. CNBC notes that Mr. Kantrowtiz’s analysis does not account for inflation. The College Board reported that tuition and fees for public two-year and four-year colleges increased by 3 percent, less than the rate of inflation, for the 2024-2025 school year. However, the published cost of tuition at some private universities is as high as $100,000. The College Board notes that the average cost for students who attend a public four-year in-state college in the 2024-2025 year is $24,920. At a private four-year college, the price is $58,600. While the cost of attending college stays at its high levels, Mr. Kantrowitz noted, “New borrowing outpaces repayment.” Although Mr. Biden canceled billions in student loan debt, there were many Americans who did not see their balances shrink as they were given a reprieve from payments due to the Covid pandemic.

America’s Student Loan Debt Swelled During Biden Years Despite Largest Loan Forgiveness Effort in American History

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