Survey Shows Student Loan Holders Most Likely To Be People of Color

While Congress and the Biden administration go back and forth on whether to cancel $10,000 or $50,000 of student loan debt (even though President Biden says he would not do more than $10,000, potentially), the total $1.7 trillion amount is impacting 45 million Americans. While many share this burden and are looking for a solution to unusually high-interest rates, some groups are more affected than others.

According to CNBC & Acorn’s Invest In You Student Loan Survey, 68 million American adults have student debt. 15 percent have federal student loan debt, and women and people of color are disproportionately represented in these groups. Momentive interviewed 5,162 American adults online between Jan 10 and Jan 13 to get a clear picture.

From CNBC:

“Reflecting historical access to capital, more people of color and women have federal student loan debt,” explain Momentive researchers. About 24 percent of Black adults say they have federal student loan debt, compared to 15 percent of Hispanic, 14 percent of White, and 11 percent of Asian adults.

Women (19 percent) are also more likely than men (11 percent) to have student loan debt, and this trend can be seen across races. In fact, the survey results suggest that 11 percent of white men, 17 percent of white women, 15 percent of Black men, 31 percent of Black women, 10 percent of Hispanic men and 19 percent of Hispanic women have student debt.

The Brooks Institute notes that Black college graduates owe $52,726 in student debt while white college grads owe closer to $28,006 on average. Data from the National Center for Education Statistics offers more of the disparity.

Data from the National Center for Education Statistics suggests that Black and African American college graduates owe an average of $25,000 more in student loan debt than white college graduates. Four years after graduation, 48 percent of Black students owe an average of 12.5 percent more than they borrowed and 29 percent face monthly student loan payments of $350 or more.

Navient is due to cancel $1.85 billion in loans in terms of immediate solutions, and the Biden administration extended the federal student loan pause until May 1st. Those are the only solutions, either temporary or permanent, depending on if you qualify.