Senators announce deal on student loans
By Ted Barrett, CNN
Washington (CNN) - A bipartisan group of senators announced an agreement on a student loans package Thursday that would cap rates, ending a standoff that lasted months and broke through a July 1 deadline for finding a solution.
Under the compromise measure, undergraduate students would pay a rate of 3.85% next year on subsidized and unsubsidized Stafford loans. The plan would cap rates on loans to undergrads at 8.25%, for graduate students at 9.5% and parents at 10.5%.
"While this is not the agreement that any of us would have written, and many of us would like to have seen something quite different, I believe we have come a very long way on reaching common ground," Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the Democratic whip in the Senate, said at a press conference Thursday.
Sen. Tom Harkin, the Democratic chairman of the committee that oversees federal education programs, also was present in announcing the deal. The Iowa senator had resisted for weeks agreeing to a plan unless it included caps on how high the interest rates on the loans could rise.
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Without a solution now the student loan crisis is the next Bubble and it is going to Bust!
Our lawmakers are going to try to tell us they tried to fix the student loan problem by keeping
the interest rates low! They're going to tell us they have proof just read "lollypop news" you know the news where you pick your own favor! The problem is lower rates has never been the solution, and never will be! At best the lower rates have just prolonged the pain and destruction our lawmakers have allowed to happen to our graduates and Our Great Country!
Real solutions are needed right now we give tax credits to big business that take the credits pay little or no tax an then send their profits off shore and our jobs overseas. I have suggest a program why not use the tax credits to match small business with graduates we already have $5250 Tuition Reimbursement program and The opportunity Maine Tax credit using those two plans loosely to grow small business and our economy use tax credit for their real purpose to simulate our economy! ProjectTuitionReimbursement
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