"I'd Rather Be in Prison"

By: Zachary Pienkowski

With college campuses being bombarded with credit card booths and the cost of college life increasing, many students find themselves up to their ears in debt. One of the best lessons that a young person can learn in that piling up credit card debt can happen in no time, but paying it off may take a lifetime. MSNBC wrote an article about a college student that was in over $5000 of credit card debt and $50,000 of student loan debt before he even entered the workforce. This is not an unusual or rare situation anymore, as college tuition prices rising by double and sometimes triple the rate of inflation. The problem is not only are kids floundering in debt, but many cant find good jobs to even make any headway on the loans. The economic downturn has affected everything and everyone despite economic status. A growing number of students feel that going to college was the biggest mistake of their life because of how far back they set themselves in debt. Retirement or housing plans are not even in mind because there is no amount of money to be saved, only to pay off debt.There is an overwhelming feeling that students coming out of college or even in college can not get ahead because every time they make payments, another huge expense from school comes up. 9 out of 10 students have said they have used credit cards to pay for things like textbooks at school. Most of the cards are not paid of completely each month leaving students with enormous amounts of interest to pay off. A major reason for this problem is that the cost of education continues to skyrocket while financial aid has remained steady. In order to stay in school, many are forced to charge the difference and hope they can pay it off at some point, in many cases destroying credit ratings along the way.

Sources:

http://redtape.msnbc.com/2009/05/college-debt-so-crushing-grad-says-i-wish-id-gone-to-prison-instead.html

http://www.cardratings.com/studentcreditcarddebt.html

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/cc/19980605.asp