America Shocked After Learning Debt Must Be Paid Back

Stop the presses: Americans have just learned that borrowing money means eventually paying it back. Who could have guessed?

According to CNBC, nearly 1 in 5 student loan borrowers aged 50 and older are “seriously delinquent”—meaning at least 90 days late—on their student loans.

50 and older. Student loans. Back in 2019, the delinquency rate for this age group hovered around 10%. Now, in a surefire sign that the economy is in great shape and stocks should always trade at 40x earnings even if the world is ending, that rate has almost doubled.

And delinquencies are not confined to the “I should be retired by now” crowd. Among 30-somethings, 11% are seriously behind, and nearly 8% of borrowers under 30 have fallen into the same hole.

Remember, these numbers are after years of federally sanctioned payment freezes, forbearances, and political promises that loan forgiveness would be handed out like Presidential Autopen pardons.

The moment the Trump administration flipped the switch and resumed collections, suddenly reality set in: the bills are real, the interest is real, and the consequences are—wait for it—real.

There’s something both hilarious and tragic about this situation. Americans spent the last five years being told that loans were more like Netflix subscriptions—cancel anytime, and nobody gets hurt. But the basic laws of economics and reality both have a way of breaking through the socialistic cosplay. If you take out tens of thousands of dollars to send Junior to college or to “reinvent yourself” with a master’s in Nepalese yoga studies, someday, someone will expect repayment. Wild concept, right?

Here’s the dirty little secret nobody wants to say out loud: if you can’t afford the loan, or if the education isn’t enough of an investment to return what you need to pay it back, you shouldn’t have taken it in the first place. If you chose to, you’re on the hook.

That’s how debt works. When you finance a car, the repo guy doesn’t care that you got laid off or that you thought the payments were “unfair.” He shows up with a tow truck. But somehow, when it’s student loans, we’ve decided that personal responsibility is a cruel and outdated idea.

Which brings us to President Autopen. His administration spent years conditioning borrowers — many of whom majored in things like Non-Binary Origami Theory or Vegan Drum Circle Dynamics — to believe they live in a magical kingdom where loan balances dissolve if you close your eyes tight enough or hug enough people.

But illusions have consequences. Biden’s “freeze now, worry later” policy essentially told borrowers: don’t worry, you’ll never really have to pay these off. So of course, when collections resume, delinquency rates explode. It’s almost as if when you remove accountability, people stop acting responsibly. Shocker.

This was par for the course during Biden’s broader economic fairy tale. Inflation? Just “transitory.” Gas prices? Nothing to see here. Student loans? They’re optional.

Meanwhile, those who did the right thing—who sacrificed, budgeted, drove old cars, skipped trips, and chipped away at their balances—are left wondering: what was the point? Why be responsible if the government will swoop in to erase the balance sheets of those who weren’t?

This is the fundamental injustice of it all: rewarding irresponsibility while punishing prudence. And people wonder why nobody saves anymore. Forgiving debt, or even just suspending the consequences indefinitely, teaches people that debt is basically fake money. Borrow as much as you want, because someone else—your neighbor, your taxpayer, your future self—will foot the bill.

What happens when you normalize that mindset? Well, you get more reckless borrowing. More Advanced Studies in Interpretive Screaming degrees financed on the assumption of free forgiveness. More people shrugging off repayment because “surely they’ll cancel it eventually.”

It’s not just bad economics; it’s corrosive to the very idea of accountability.

And don’t forget the flip side: those who resisted the siren song of debt—those who worked through college, went to community colleges, or chose affordable majors—are left punished. They carry the opportunity costs of not taking loans, while others reap the benefits of having their debts “forgiven.” It’s redistribution, not of wealth, but of responsibility.

According to CNBC, the Trump administration is stepping up collections: wage garnishments, credit score hits, and even the potential for Social Security benefits to be siphoned. And you know what? Good. Actions have consequences, even if we’ve spent the last five years pretending otherwise.

Because here’s the truth no politician wants to say: there’s no such thing as student loan forgiveness. There’s only debt transfer.

The balance doesn’t vanish into thin air—it just gets handed to the taxpayer. They’re just giving your neighbor the bill. And the taxpayer, by the way, is probably some guy who already paid off his loans and is now subsidizing the bad decisions of people who didn’t.

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