College Students Use Private Loans to Meet Growing Tuition Bills

Washington

As college tuition costs continue to rise, more students are relying on private loans to cover their expenses, sometimes instead of those subsidized by the federal government.

Some policy analysts applaud the burgeoning private-loan market for improving college access and offering students a streamlined, user-friendly approval process. But others worry that such loans benefit only well-to-do students and families with good credit histories, leaving others vulnerable to lenders who might take advantage of them.

“Is this good or bad? I think it’s both,” Frederick M. Hess, the director of education policy at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think tank that emphasizes free-market approaches to public policy, said about the rise of private loans. The organization held a conference here last week on...