The 2016 presidential election is settled and a new administration will take office in two months’ time. Considering all that was said during this particularly contentious campaign, it’s no surprise that student loan borrowers are concerned about what that will mean to them beginning in 2017.
Two of the many items on my list of concerns have to do with the future of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, within the context of a potential repeal or overhaul of the Dodd-Frank legislation that created the consumer watchdog agency in the first place, and the Federal Direct Student Loan program, which the Obama administration established in 2010 as a successor to the simultaneously discontinued Federal Family Education Loan program.
The Possible Negatives
In the case of the CFPB, should Congress move to curtail the agency’s regulatory authority and/or impose more stringent oversight on its activities, I worry that less will be done to address loan-servicing-related problems, which include the misapplication of remittances on the part of private-sector administrators and their failure to promptly conduit financially distressed debtors into a government-sponsored payment relief program, or to prevent collection companies from pursuing past-due payments in a manner that violates the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. (You can see how your student loan repayments are impacting your credit by checking your two free credit scores, updated every 14 days, on Credit.com.)
As for the Federal Direct Loan program, a financial services industry that benefited from virtually risk-free income courtesy of the government-guaranteed FFEL program is probably getting pretty excited about the potential for its reincarnation, now that smaller-government-minded lawmakers are in control of all three branches of our system. And not just for the new loans that will be taken out in the future.
A Fresh Approach
At present, roughly one trillion dollars’ worth of Federal Direct Loans are currently on the books, plus another $200 billion to $300 billion in legacy FFELs.
But if one were to tally together all the federally-backed loans that are at present delinquent and in default, plus all those that have been granted temporary forbearance and longer-term relief to date, and compare that total to the aggregate value of all the loans that are currently in repayment, that number would approach 50%.
Any loan portfolio that looks anything like that is one whose loan agreements were improperly structured at the outset. If we want these debts to be repaid anytime soon — without continuing to spend outrageous sums of money to accomplish that objective — the new administration would be wise to bite the bullet and restructure all these contracts over an extended term at a rate that properly reflects the federal government’s costs.
That’s the first step.
The second is to lock in that cost by financing the Federal Direct loans that currently reside on the education department’s balance sheet as any prudent private-sector lending institution would, instead of continuing the government’s potentially ruinous tact of borrowing short to lend long in a rising-interest-rate environment. The new financing can take the form of direct borrowing on the part of the federal government as it does now, or the education department can oversee the sale of these loans into the private sector while retaining administrative oversight of their servicing.
This stands in contrast to the old FFEL program, where private-sector lenders originated student loans backed by the federal government, and had the option to later sell these contracts into the secondary market for added profit. Not only did that program create significant remunerative opportunities at the expense of taxpayers (who would be called upon to make good on the government’s guarantees), but it also distanced the feds from directly overseeing the administration of the loans it backed.
In a nutshell, that’s the key reason why there’s been so much foot-dragging on the part of the companies that service the FFEL loans that are in repayment: the interests of the private-sector note holders and investors are at odds with those of the taxpayers.
Finally, the new administration would also be wise to address the matter of student loan dischargeability in bankruptcy. Not so that borrowers would have an easier time getting out from under the legitimate debts they incurred, but so the potential for abject loss at the point of default would inspire all lenders to negotiate in good faith with financially distressed debtors who, for the most part, truly desire to honor their obligations.
All of this boils down to having the courage to take an evenhanded approach to solving a trillion-dollar problem. Hopefully, this new administration has enough of that to go around.
This story is an Op/Ed contribution to Credit.com and does not necessarily represent the views of the company or its partners.
Image: Bastiaan Slabbers
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