• Home
  • About Donald
  • Contact Donald

Donald Marron

Musings on Economics, Finance, and Life

Feeds:
Posts
Comments
« Follow-up: Defense, Mortgage Modifications, and Yahoo/Microsoft
Broad Weakness in Q2 GDP »

The Budget Battle Over Student Loans

July 30, 2009 by Donald

Summary: President Obama and congressional Democrats have good reasons for wanting to eliminate federal guarantees for private student loans. They should keep in mind, however, that the resulting budget savings will likely be much smaller than official estimates suggest.

Health care and defense spending have grabbed most of the budget headlines lately, but they aren’t the only budget battles in Washington.

The latest tussle? Student loans.

The federal government supports college loans in two ways: by making loans directly to students and by guaranteeing loans made by private lenders. The current budget battle has arisen because President Obama and many congressional Democrats want to kill the guarantee program in favor of the direct program. Many Republicans, on the other hand, support private lenders, and thus want the guarantee program to continue.

There are three things you should know about this debate:

1. The guarantee program has experienced two crises in recent years. In 2007, the problem was kickbacks. Private lenders were being overpaid by the program, and some of them started competing for business by giving goodies to student loan officers. President Bush and Congress put an end to that by reducing payments to private lenders. Then the financial crisis hit, and we had the reverse problem: private lenders stopped lending. So President Bush and Congress stepped in with some duct tape and paperclips to keep the guaranteed loan market working. (Actually they gave private lenders a put option — the right to sell the loans back to the government — which many lenders used; in essence, the lenders got paid for originating loans, but didn’t hold them very long.)

In short, the guarantee program has been a headache for policymakers in recent years.

2. Guaranteed loans cost the government more than direct loans. There’s no law of nature that says that has to be the case. In principle, one can imagine a guarantee program that would cost less than direct loans. That could happen, for example, if the private sector is more efficient than the government in making the loans or if the private sector is willing to use student loans as a loss leader to promote other financial products (e.g., credit cards). In practice, however, the government has never been able to calibrate guarantees to the private lenders so that (a) lenders are willing to make the loans and (b) the guarantees cost less than direct loans.

When you put points 1 and 2 together, you can understand why many budget analysts and lawmakers want to kill the guarantee program and have the government make all the loans directly. That’s certainly the way that I am leaning. (If readers have any compelling arguments in favor of the guarantee program, however, I’m all ears.)

In fairness, though, opponents of the guarantee program should acknowledge one complication to their position:

3. Congressional budget procedures are biased in favor of direct student loans over guaranteed loans. As a result, the budget case against guaranteed loans is overstated. It isn’t wrong — we are still talking tens of billions of dollars over the next ten years — but it isn’t as strong as the official numbers suggest. One implication is that eliminating the guarantee program may not save as much money as lawmakers think. That’s important, particularly if lawmakers want to spend those savings on other programs.

This third point is the key to current budget brouhaha over student loans. To understand it fully, we need to delve into a bit of budget arcana.

Last week the Congressional Budget Office released a cost estimate for H.R. 3221, the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009. Among other things, that bill would eliminate the guaranteed loan program and correspondingly expand the direct program. Following usual congressional scoring procedures, CBO estimated that this change would save $87 billion over the next decade.

On Monday, CBO released a second analysis that used a different approach to estimate the savings from eliminating the guarantee program. In a letter to Senator Judd Gregg, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, CBO reported that, under that approach, the estimated savings would be $47 billion.

The $40 billion difference between the estimates results from two factors:

1. The administrative costs of the two programs show up in different budget categories. The administrative costs of the guarantee program are treated as mandatory spending, while the administrative costs of the direct loan program are treated as discretionary spending. If you look at just mandatory spending (the usual focus in many budget debates), you thus see the budget benefits of eliminating the guarantees (about $80 billion) and the benefits of not having to run the guarantee program (about $7 billion). However, you don’t see the added costs of operating a larger direct loan program (about $7 billion in discretionary spending). If you consider all the costs, the real savings from the proposal would be about $80 billion, not $87 billion.

2. The congressional scoring process does not appropriately measure the cost of bearing financial risk, such as that from extending loans or loan guarantees. The details here are arcane, so please just trust me on this or read the nice account in the CBO letter (for a related discussion, you can also look at a chapter I have in a forthcoming book from the NBER). The key point is that this error is more pronounced for direct loans than it is for loan guarantees. If you account for the cost of financial risk, CBO estimates that the savings from eliminating the guarantee program are about $47 billion, not $80 billion.

In short, you get from $87 billion to $47 billion by (a) recognizing that $7 billion in administrative costs will still happen, just in a different budget category and (b) adjusting for $33 billion in financial costs that traditional budget scoring doesn’t usually track. (One major exception is the TARP program; its costs are calculated using methods that reflect the cost of financial risk.)

Bottom Line: Eliminating the guarantee program would reduce government spending, but not as much as traditional budget measures indicate.

Disclosure: I played a peripheral role in designing the duct tape and paper clips. I don’t have any investments in student lenders.

Advertisements

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Email
  • Google
  • Reddit
  • Print

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related

Posted in Budget, Finance, Politics | Tagged Budget, CBO, Finance, Politics, Student Loans | 9 Comments

9 Responses

  1. on July 30, 2009 at 8:37 pm Alexandra

    There are so many ways to get loan even with a bad credit


  2. on July 31, 2009 at 1:50 pm Evinx

    The overall problem is not in the numbers – should the Federal govt have a role in student loans? Everytime you create (expand) a federal govt program, you create the opportunity for politics, not economics, to drive decisions. You also create the opportunity for lobbyists to exert more influence over the process – and costs — and what may have one time seemed like a good idea ends up being an economic disaster. Amtrak, Fannie + Freddie, Medicare, and so on. So the numbers are revealing but the underlying problem is never resolved and eventually, disaster strikes.


  3. on September 15, 2009 at 12:04 am The Simple Economics of Student Loan Crises « Donald Marron

    […] I threw in a third example of government intervention: the market for guaranteed student loans. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the government has a major program in which it provides guarantees for private student loans. […]


  4. on September 15, 2009 at 4:25 am The Simple Economics of Student Loan Crises

    […] I threw in a third example of government intervention: the market for guaranteed student loans. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the government has a major program in which it provides guarantees for private student loans. […]


  5. on September 19, 2009 at 6:51 pm Obama 'nationalizes' student loans - Conservative Republican Discussion Forums

    […] program would reduce government spending, but not as much as traditional budget measures indicate. More details __________________ There is a war going on for your mind. If you are thinking, you are […]


  6. on March 22, 2010 at 12:10 am About that Government Takeover of the Student Loan Business … « Donald Marron

    […] That step raises some interesting questions about the costs of the current system (see this post), possible benefits of the current system (some colleges and universities appear to prefer working with private lenders), and the potential budget savings of cutting out the middle man (which appear to be large but somewhat overstated in official budget analyses). […]


  7. on March 22, 2010 at 7:34 am Craigie

    Yes, the congressional scoring process does not fully measure the cost of bearing financial risk, such as that from managing direct loans or loan guarantees. The key point is actually that this “error” is more pronounced for guaranteed loan program than for direct loan.

    What if a “Senator Pro-DL” (none actually exists) asked CBO to perform a similar “Gregg” tolerance analysis for FFELP? Then the hypothetical savings for switching from 100% FFEL to 100% DL could be $150 billion. The financing risks, “market risks,” operational risks, compliance risks, oversight risks and enforcement risks of FFELP, from the government’s standpoint, are far more significant than in DL, and FFELP still represents the majority of new loans.

    Thus an apples-to-apples Gregg request would have included a far-end FFELP market risk comparison while noting that legislative changes over the past 15 years have quietly shifted large parts of the market risk from lenders to taxpayers, none of which has CBO ever agreed to estimate. Index risk is only one example. Look into the quiet change — tacked on to an SSDI/SSI reform bill at the end of 1999, for example, that shifted interest rate hedging costs from lenders to the American taxpayer. CBO explicitly refused to score the cost. This was less than 15 months after the Higher Ed Amendments of 1998, yet there were no hearings. The student groups don’t understand this stuff and the college associations don’t care, as long as their clients get their funding. In any case, scoring that change would add significant cost to the FFEL program.

    The Gregg ‘scoring’ is one of a long line of “special,” i.e., one-sided, requests sent to GAO and CBO over the years. By law and general practice, when GAO and CBO receive a request from a Member of Congress, they not only do not explore issues outside of the parameters of that request, they usually try to narrow it even further, because they are busy and also “human,” i.e., lazy. The bottom line is that the Federal Credit Reform Act (FCRA) is startlingly similar to the GAAP approach used by financial services corporations such as banks. The Gregg approach is not compliant with either but its most significant flaw is that it does not use an objective baseline, for example, 100% FFEL. Comparing a “risk-rated” 100% DL to a current FCRA FFEL (70%)/DL (30%) is a red herring. Compare it to a “risk-rated” 100% FFEL and you will find more than $100 billion in savings from shifting to DL. The default rate on student loans is low, even after 10 or 15 years into repayment.

    The Gregg analysis is reminiscent of a GAO request several years back that ignored payments of principal and focused on cash-accounting-based flows of interest — from years not even associated with the loans. Of course it made direct lending look bad, as that was the purpose of the exercise. The whole rationale behind lending, whether it is GMAC, the first national bank, the neighborhood credit union, or direct lending is accrual accounting. For some reason people’s common sense flies out the window when the word “government” is mentioned. What makes CBO’s scoring of the Casey, Greg and Sallie Mae proposals even more shocking is that CBO always had a rule against scoring any bill that has not even passed a committee somewhere in either the House or the Senate. They don’t score hypothetical legislation. None of these proposals were ever introduced as bills, never mind passing a committee. Apparently the opponents of direct lending are so powerful that they can get the rules bent. Look a little further and you will find the most powerful opponents aren’t the banks — FFEL isn’t really a “private sector”-driven approach. It is the state governments — 40 of whom operate a state lending operation or a state guaranty agency, or both. In comparison to the more high-tech federal operations, the state agencies are quite inefficient, antiquated, and non-compliant, as we saw with the so-called, 9.5 scandal.


  8. on May 6, 2010 at 6:23 am There Was A Part Of That Health Care Bill That Didn’t Get Much Attention « Around The Sphere

    […] That step raises some interesting questions about the costs of the current system (see this post), possible benefits of the current system (some colleges and universities appear to prefer working with private lenders), and the potential budget savings of cutting out the middle man (which appear to be large but somewhat overstated in official budget analyses). […]


  9. on February 7, 2011 at 6:17 pm Neda Duttinger

    This is a fantastic piece of writing, I located your web page checking google for a similar topic and arrived to this. I couldnt get to much alternative material on this post, so it was wonderful to discover this one. I probably will end up being back to look at some other articles that you have another time.



Comments are closed.

  • Most Requested

    Tax Policy Issues in Designing a Carbon Tax

    Carbon Taxes & Corporate Tax Reform

    Spending in Disguise

    How Big Is the Federal Government

  • Twitter

    Follow @dmarron
  • Get Updates by Email

    Click Here to Subscribe
  • Get Updates by RSS

    Subscribe in a reader
  • Share or Bookmark

    Bookmark and Share
  • Recent Posts

    • Three Things You Should Know about the Buyback Furor
    • Talking Money, Inflation, Fiat, & Bitcoin
    • How Should Tax Reform Treat Employee Stock and Options?
    • Eight Thoughts on Business Tax Reform
    • The 3-2-1 on Economic Growth: Hope for 3, Plan for 2, Pray it isn’t 1
    • Outside Research Organizations Can’t Replace CBO’s Budget Team
    • Can Trump Make Mexico Pay for the Wall?
    • Taxing carried interest just right
    • Britain Builds a Better Soda Tax
    • Budgeting for Federal Lending Programs Is Still a Mess
    • How Should We Use the Revenue from Taxing Carbon?
    • Happy 70th Anniversary to the Council of Economic Advisers
    • What Should We Do with the Money from Taxing “Bads”?
    • Should Governments Tax Unhealthy Foods and Drinks?
    • Should Governments Tax Products That Are Fun But Harmful?
  • 30-Second Economics

  • Tags

    Accounting Afghanistan Antitrust Arbitrage Auction Auto Banks Baucus Behavioral Economics Birds Budget Budget Process Business CBO Citigroup Climate Change Consumers Corporate Income Tax Data Debt Debt Limit Defense Deficit Economics Economy Energy Environment Europe Fannie Mae Federal Reserve Finance Freddie Mac GDP GM Google Graphics Greece GSE Health Housing Humor Incentives Income Inflation Interest Rates International Internet jobs Life Macroeconomics Measurement Medicare Microeconomics Monetary Policy Mortgage Natural Gas Nature Oil Politics Pricing Recession Regulation Search Social Security Spending Stimulus Stock Market Student Loans TARP Taxes Teaching Tragedy of the Commons Treasury unemployment Warrants
  • Categories

  • Archives

    • April 2018
    • March 2018
    • October 2017
    • September 2017
    • August 2017
    • July 2017
    • January 2017
    • October 2016
    • March 2016
    • February 2016
    • January 2016
    • December 2015
    • November 2015
    • September 2015
    • June 2015
    • May 2015
    • February 2015
    • November 2014
    • October 2014
    • September 2014
    • August 2014
    • July 2014
    • June 2014
    • April 2014
    • March 2014
    • February 2014
    • January 2014
    • December 2013
    • November 2013
    • October 2013
    • September 2013
    • August 2013
    • July 2013
    • June 2013
    • May 2013
    • April 2013
    • March 2013
    • February 2013
    • January 2013
    • December 2012
    • November 2012
    • October 2012
    • September 2012
    • August 2012
    • July 2012
    • June 2012
    • May 2012
    • April 2012
    • March 2012
    • February 2012
    • January 2012
    • December 2011
    • November 2011
    • October 2011
    • September 2011
    • August 2011
    • July 2011
    • June 2011
    • May 2011
    • April 2011
    • March 2011
    • February 2011
    • January 2011
    • December 2010
    • November 2010
    • October 2010
    • September 2010
    • August 2010
    • July 2010
    • June 2010
    • May 2010
    • April 2010
    • March 2010
    • February 2010
    • January 2010
    • December 2009
    • November 2009
    • October 2009
    • September 2009
    • August 2009
    • July 2009
    • June 2009
    • May 2009
  • Economics & Finance

    • Brad DeLong
    • Calculated Risk
    • Capital Gains and Games
    • Econbrowser
    • Economist's View
    • EconomistMom
    • Greg Mankiw
    • Infectious Greed
    • Keith Hennessey
    • Marginal Revolution
    • Modeled Behavior
    • Paul Krugman
    • Tax Policy Center
    • The Big Picture
    • The Money Illusion
  • More Fun Blogs

    • Donald and Esther’s Travels
    • Kottke
    • Olivia Judson
  • Seeking Alpha Certified

    Creative Commons License
    The content of dmarron.com carries a Creative Commons license.

    wordpress stat
  • Translate this blog into

    Albanian Arabic Bulgarian Catalan Chinese Simplified Chinese Traditional Croatian Czech Danish Dutch Estonian Filipino Finnish French Galician German Greek Hebrew Hindi Hungarian Indonesian Italian Japanese Korean Lativian Lithuanian Maltese Norwegian Polish Portuguese Romanian Russian Serbian Slovak Slovenian Spanish Swedish Thai Turkish Ukrainian Vietnamese
  • Advertisements

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

WPThemes.


loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.
%d bloggers like this: