In the category I like to call, “They needed a study for that?”, the Pew Research Center released a study in May 2014 in which it finds that households with student loan debt are worse off financially than households without student loan debt. More specifically, the Pew Center’s key findings include:
- The net worth of households with student loan debt is lower than those households without student loan debt;
- Taking on student loan debt does not have an impact on income;
- Households with student loan debt are more likely to have credit card debt and car loans;
- In households with student loans, the percentage of income going to pay debt has increased while that same percentage has decreased for households without student loan debt; and
- Households with student loan debt are less likely to see their education as having been paid off and they are not as happy about their financial situation.
Here is a link to the entire report in a pdf file.
