Dark clouds are forming over America’s public universities as the Wall Street mindset spreads across more of our institutions. A decade of excessive spending based largely on unlimited student loans is looming dangerously over a major national asset.
In January 2013, Moody’s, the nation’s premier credit rating organization, issued a report titled “U.S. Higher Education Outlook Negative in 2013.” Moody’s evaluation was based on the hundreds of billions of dollars in institutional debt incurred by America’s public universities, including exotic non-traditional financial schemes.
And Moody’s evaluation did not include the trillion dollars of debt currently owed by college and university students and former students. Today, more than 35 million Americans owe an average of $28,000 in college loans and half have not earned and are not likely to earn a four-year degree.