Turns out the budget outlook for student aid is even bleaker than it seemed.
On Tuesday, Republican leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives released a spending blueprint that would freeze the maximum Pell Grantfor 10 years and roll back some recent expansions of the program. On Wednesday they revealed that their plan would also abolish the in-school interest subsidy on Stafford loans, reverse a recent expansion of income-based repayment, and end public-sector loan forgiveness.
Those cuts in the federal student-loan programs don’t appear in a budget document that the House Budget Committee released on Tuesday. But when Rep. Mark Pocan, Democrat of Wisconsin, asked during a markup session on Wednesday if such changes were assumed in the measure, a committee aide confirmed that they were.
Taken together, the three changes would save taxpayers more than $61 billion over 10 years, according to budget estimates. But they would also make student loans more expensive for borrowers.
Read more at The Chronicle of Higher Education: http://chronicle.com/article/House-Would-Cut-Student-Aid/228609