Cancel Black Student Debt As Reparations

In recent months, the country has engaged in an important conversation about racial justice, particularly as it relates to police brutality. The conversation has also pushed some to engage in a conversation about reparations. There are many ways reparations could be enacted. One idea—to be paired with others—is to cancel the student debt of Black borrowers.

There are significant wealth gaps in the United States, and there are even worse racial wealth gaps. Systemic racism has left Black families with just $5 in wealth for every $100 in wealth that white families have.

And those are particularly evident when you look at student debt. Canceling student debt for Black borrowers would go a long way to closing the gaps for those students.

Because Black students have less wealth, they are more likely to borrower to attend college. Data shows that Black students borrow for a bachelor’s degree at a rate 17 percentage points higher than their white peers.

Not only are Black students more likely to borrow for college, they borrow more when they do. A study of Millennial student debt shows that Black Millennial bachelor’s degree holders had a median debt of $31,000 compared to $26,726 for white Millennials.

And Black students are also disproportionately more likely to attend for-profit colleges that are often predatory schools that load students up with excessive debt and show poor student outcomes. Thirteen percent of all Black students enroll in for-profit colleges, while only 4% of white students do.

That’s why 31% of Black families have education loans compared with only 20% of White families, despite the fact that Black students go to college at a lower rate than White students.

And worse, once Black students graduate, they face a discriminatory labor market that pays them less. So they’ve borrowed more but can’t recoup the costs of their degrees at the same rate as others.

Borrowing more but making less is connected to higher default rates. Research shows that the median Black graduate with a bachelor’s degree is more likely to default on their student loans than a White student who dropped out of college with student debt. That’s an astounding finding given that, on average, students who don’t finish are most likely to default.

Canceling student debt for Black borrowers should be part of any reparations conversation, along with many other ideas. But it can’t be just student debt. Reparations must do more than that because Black students are already less likely to enroll in higher education. A true reparations plan must address systemic racism in many ways.