A Generation Hobbled by the Soaring Cost of College (New York Times)

“I knew a private school would cost a lot of money,” said Kelsey Griffith, a 2012 graduate of Ohio Northern University. “But when I graduate, I’m going to owe like $900 a month. No one told me that.” For all students borrowing to pay for college, the average debt in 2011 was $23,300, with 10% owing more than $54,000 and 3% owing more than $100,000, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The current balance of federal student loans nationwide is $902 billion, with an additional $140 billion in private student loans. “If one is not thinking about where this is headed over the next two or three years, you are just completely missing the warning signs,” said Rajeev V. Date, deputy director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the federal watchdog created after the financial crisis. A bill to keep interest rates on student loans from doubling this summer was passed in April.