Top 100 Metros With Most Student Debt
Student loans debt reached $1.5 trillion in the United States and the Southeast has a large portion of it according to a new Lending Tree study provided to the Sports Techie community blog. They looked at loan data regarding the top 100 metro regions across the U.S. where Atlanta ranked number 2 overall. The Sports Techie community blog understands the pains of student loans as many of our readers and followers do as well. I have undergrad student debt after graduating from Whittier College where tuition in 2017 was a staggering $44,184 a year. Student loan debt was $600 billion around 10 years ago.
Student Debt Spiraling Up
The cost of an average four-year college education has risen 5 times over the past two decades and continues to climb towards unsustainable increases for most families.
Millennials are feeling the financial burden as are Gen X. Pew Research Center claims 37% of all adults under 30 have student loans to pay back. The study indicates on average, people have balances on three to four student loans.
A massive correction and sea of change seems to be needed to fix these issues for the common good rather continue forward as a massive and it seems unchecked revenue stream for the Federal Government.
How the Top 100 Metros Compare
The following cities popped out to me from the Lending Tree top 100 metros list.
Washington D.C. ranked 1, Atlanta number 2 and Charleston 10, Denver 12, Chicago 20 and SF 32, Boston 52 and Seattle 85. McAllen, Texas was ranked 100.
The Southeast is well represented in the top 20.
Educated Atlanta
Lending Tree says Atlanta has a median debt balance of $22,232. Breaking down the loaners helps to show reasons why the city is ranked so high and education is the main culprit.
According to author, Kali McFadden, “Atlanta is another city of the highly educated — 37% of Atlanta residents ages 25 and over have completed at least a four-year education, and more than 13% have a graduate or professional degree, which is higher than the nation as a whole (11.5%). But it doesn’t completely explain why about 9% owe more than $100,000, when the average of the metros we reviewed is 6%.”
McFadden adds, “The metro is home to a plethora of higher learning institutions including Emory University, Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School, Morehouse College, and Spelman College. Perhaps the need for so many professors helps to explain why Atlanta is more educated — and in more student debt — than the nation as whole.”
She finally states, “Unfortunately, one in five Atlanta residents left college before finishing a degree, which is in line with the rest of country.”
Number Crunching Reveals
- People in the Southeast carry the most student loan debt: 9 out 10 of the top 10 metros are below the Mason-Dixon line.
- State capitals carry a large portion of student debt: 7 out of 10 of the top metros are state capitals.
- Washington, D.C., ranks first among metros with the highest median student loan balances: where almost 10% of loan holders owe more than $100,0000.
- Multiple graphs and lists that bring further details: Top 10, Bottom 10, a full 100 metro list and we detail contributing factors for the top and bottom 5 on the list.
Methodology:
Lending Tree looked a sample of anonymized users who logged into My LendingTree in the first quarter of 2018 and calculated how many of them had student loans, as well as the other reported statistics related to their balances. In the event that someone logged in multiple times, they used their most recent report.
These results were then aggregated to the 100 largest metropolitan statistical areas by population. My LendingTree has more than 8 million users. Credit report information is provided by TransUnion.
Sports Techie, all this student debt made me think about various outcomes.
International students can head to Europe for tuition free education in a handful of notable countries. If we want to truly keep America First, perhaps President Trump can offer students financial incentives to attend and graduate from a university for a reasonable cost or even for free as a U.S. priority.
Not all student-athletes are awarded full scholarships, many go into debt just like the rest of us. Yet, college sports and in particular, football, earns the non-profit NCAA billions of dollars.
What happens to this data should Amazon HQ 2 be awarded to Atlanta?
Student debt will climb to number one is my nearly $200,000 education guess, Atlanta, both undergrad and graduate degrees.
Should you wish to refinance a student loan or loans, Lending Tree has information concerning the top options.
I say, go to college, stay in school and graduate.
I am glad and proud I graduated, regardless of the resulting debt.
See ya later sportstechie in Seattle, Atlanta and around the world!
Sports Techie Social Media Networks
Sports Techie Twitter: @SportsTechieNET: http://twitter.com/SportsTechieNET
THE #SportsTechie Twitter: @THESportsTechie: https://twitter.com/THESportsTechie
Sports Techie Facebook Fan Page: http://www.facebook.com/SportsTechie
Sports Techie YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/sportstechie
Sports Techie Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/108376451503395073827/
Sports Techie Google+ Community: https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/103708211458464405078
Sports Techie (Robert Roble) Google+: https://plus.google.com/+RobertRoble
Sports Techie LinkedIn Group: http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Sports-Techie-2958439
Sports Techie LinkedIn (Robert Roble): https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertroble
Sports Techie Instagram: http://instagram.com/sportstechie
Sports Techie Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/SportsTechie/
Sports Techie Moby Picture: http://www.mobypicture.com/user/sportstechieNET
Sports Techie Myspace (Bob Roble): http://www.myspace.com/549000677
Sports Techie Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/86791607@N04/
Sports Techie Vine: https://vine.co/u/906354614369136640
Sports Techie Quora: https://www.quora.com/Bob-Roble
Sports Techie Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/user36773456
Sports Techie Skyword: http://robertroble.skyword.com/
Sports Techie Skype: sportstechie
Sports Techie Periscope: Sports Techie
Sports Techie Snapchat: sportstechie
AND
Sports Techie Guy: https://twitter.com/sportstechieguy