The looming student loan default crisis is worse than we thought

Primary analysis of federal data, read 2026-09-01. Verbatim: “nearly 38 percent of all black first-time college entrants in 2004 had defaulted within 12 years, a rate more than three times higher than their white counterparts,” and “black BA graduates default at five times the rate of white BA graduates (21 versus 4 percent), and are more likely to default than white dropouts.” The figures describe a 2004 entry cohort followed to 2016 and are presented in the alert as that, not as a current rate.