UK: Student debt set to match welfare bill

28 August 2011

The crippling legacy of the coalition's new system of tuition fees was laid bare recently with a government analysis that shows Britain will be loading almost £200 billion (US$327.44 billion) of debt onto students of the future, write Sarah Morrison and Brian Brady for The Independent.

As tens of thousands of teenagers attempt to secure a degree place before tuition fees rise towards £9,000 (US$14,700) a year, a devastating official forecast of the price they will pay for a university education estimates that total student debt will rocket to £191 billion over the next four decades.

The analysis, compiled by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, concedes that the fee increase, from a maximum of £3,290 a year, will add £124 billion to the burden of personal debt by 2047. The total of student debt at its peak is equivalent to more than a quarter of Britain's national debt, or the entire welfare bill.
Full report on The Independent site

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