Survey says students want forgiveness, will stop paying if they think they’ll get it

LendEDU, the student loan marketplace, decided to poll 1,000 adult Americans that currently have student loan debt and plan on voting in the 2020 primaries and election.

“People really care about student debt and the cost of higher education,” said Ted McCarthy with LendEDU. “From overall respondents, it was actually the second-most important topic to voters in this upcoming election, only behind health care.”

This is especially important as a separating issue in the Democratic primary.

“Sixty-three percent of voters are more likely to vote for a candidate who is promising to forgive student debt,” said McCarthy. “It just goes to show that, especially Democratic primary candidates, because the field is so crowded, the stronger of a policy they have on student debt and the cost of higher education, the more likely people will vote for them.”

If it looks like a loan-forgiveness policy might be on the way, though, it could stop the money flowing now.

“We asked if people with student debt would stop repaying their student debt in the hopes that the Democratic candidate wins and actually passes this legislation,” said McCarthy. “Upwards of 18% of respondents say that they would just flat out stop repaying their student loan debt.”

If 18% of all borrowers stopped paying their student loans, that would result in upwards of $270 billion in unpaid student loan debt.