Yes, it's real. Lenders have computers that sum lots of accounts; they're expected to do that and disclose how much they've lent.
$4.1E12 isn't really that difficult to relate to. Just amortize it across the US population of 325 million. That's $12,612 per citizen. It's also about one year of Federal spending.
It's a negative thing. Both individual debt load the and the rate of delinquency has been increasing, with student debt being the worst of these; if you can fog a glass you can make the Federal government send money to some school against your future earnings. There is probably no form of debt easier to assume in the US and upon this river of money floats a horde of careers, bonuses, pensions, endowments and gold plated benefits for The Great and The Good of academe, which makes questioning the value of it all a political third rail.
What do economists think? They're watching the bubble grow and devising ever more contrived ways to pretend it's not a bubble.
I've actually been thinking about the implications of student debt for a while and it seems like a really terrible thing for a lot of reasons. I think it sucks people are forced into jobs they probably wouldn't otherwise do, just to pay off some debt.
The only thing I'll say about your response is that, I frequently hear about "the bubble getting ready to burst", but it never seems to happen. Similar to radical increases in housing prices, they seem to just keep rising, contrary to economists predictions about a crash. It's a totally anecdotal observation, but it's the reason I asked the question in the first place.
There is no force involved; please maintain perspective. There are no debtors prisons filled with 20-something Berkeley graduates. Every penny of every student loan was voluntarily assumed by the debtors. The terms for much of this debt allow payments to be deferred based on income. The average amount of student debt being carried is typically less than the cost of a new car. We deal here with "first world problems."
>> but it never seems to happen
2008? TARP? "Great Recession"?
It clearly registers on every measure of economic activity I've seen. Rather hard to miss, really. You can have a look and the 07-08 collapse of property values over here if you missed it:
$4.1E12 isn't really that difficult to relate to. Just amortize it across the US population of 325 million. That's $12,612 per citizen. It's also about one year of Federal spending.
It's a negative thing. Both individual debt load the and the rate of delinquency has been increasing, with student debt being the worst of these; if you can fog a glass you can make the Federal government send money to some school against your future earnings. There is probably no form of debt easier to assume in the US and upon this river of money floats a horde of careers, bonuses, pensions, endowments and gold plated benefits for The Great and The Good of academe, which makes questioning the value of it all a political third rail.
What do economists think? They're watching the bubble grow and devising ever more contrived ways to pretend it's not a bubble.