Black students take out the most student loan debt for a bachelor's degree, followed by white students. Black bachelor's degree holders have an average of $52,000 in student debt. Eighty-six percent of Black students take out student loans to pay for college, compared to 68 percent of white students.
Four years after graduation, black students owe an average of 188% more than white students borrowed. Black and African American student borrowers are the most likely to struggle financially due to student loan debt making monthly payments of $260.
Approximately three-quarters of Black- and White-headed families have debt, but the median debt-to-asset ratio is 50% higher among Black than White families (Copeland, 2020), with Black borrowers less likely to fully repay loans (Brevoort et al., 2021).
Adults with a postgraduate degree are especially likely to have a large amount of student loan debt. About a quarter of these advanced degree holders who borrowed (26%) owed $100,000 or more in 2023, compared with 9% of all borrowers. Overall, only 1% of all U.S. adults owed at least $100,000.
Higher percentages of Black (88 percent) and American Indian/Alaska Native (87 percent) students received grants than students who were of Two or more races (79 percent), White (74 percent), and Asian (66 percent).
The Gen X debt situation
The cohort also has the largest share of people with debt, nearly 99% carry some type of balance, LendingTree found. Gen Xers led the way in three of the four categories analyzed. The group — between 44 and 59 years old — has the highest median credit card, auto loan and student loan balances.
Asian households overall had more wealth than other households two years since the start of the pandemic. In 2021, Asian households had a median net worth of $320,900, compared with $250,400 for White households. The median net worth of Hispanic households ($48,700) and Black households ($27,100) was much less.
Overview. Black and Hispanic or Latino student loan borrowers are more likely to have difficulty repaying their loans than their White peers, according to a significant body of research.
64% of all student loan debt belongs to women. The average student debt for women in the U.S. is $31,726. Women have a median annual salary of $56,170 following college graduation, which is 26% of what men can expect to earn following graduation.
Due to racial wealth disparities, most Black and Latino college students come from low-income backgrounds and can count on only a fraction of the financial support. Over half (56 percent) of the students who attend public two- and four-year institutions in California come from families that earn under $40,000 annually.
Do workers have the education needed for the jobs of the future? United States: In 2022, among people at all income levels, 61% of Asian American adults had BA degree or higher, the highest of all racial/ethnic groups identified by the census. Educational equity is necessary to build a strong workforce.
Out of the multiple countries we examined, the United Kingdom and the United States hold the record for the highest average student loan debt. In England, students graduate with an average student loan debt of over $54,000, while in the U.S. students have an average of $28,400 at graduation.
Black adults are more than twice as likely than white adults to have student loan debt. The following graph includes federal and private student loan debt among all adults. On average, Black adults in the U.S. also hold higher student loan debt balances than borrowers of other races.
Black families borrow student loans at higher rates than other races — and they owe more. 30.2% of Black families hold student loan debt, versus 20.0% of white and 14.3% of Hispanic families.
Running up $50,000 in credit card debt is not impossible. About two million Americans do it every year. Paying off that bill?
For example, Black individuals made up 20.1% of the population in poverty in 2022 but only 13.5% of the total population. This results in a ratio of 1.5, meaning that the Black population was overrepresented in poverty. The Hispanic population was also overrepresented in poverty (ratio of 1.5).
Nearly 86% of millionaires are white. That's not constrained to just millionaires: According to the Federal Reserve, a typical white family's wealth dwarfs that of typical Black and Hispanic families, with the white family's wealth six and five times higher, respectively.
However, the share of American families that manage to save varied significantly according to their ethnicity. White non-Hispanic households appeared to be the most likely to save (60.2 percent), whereas Hispanic or Latino households were the least likely to save (40.3 percent).
Black women owe a disproportionate amount of student debt. They hold 43% more undergraduate debt and nearly 99% more graduate school debt than their white woman counterparts 12 months after graduation, according to an April 2022 study by the nonprofit organization The Education Trust.
Analysis of the debt share in the U.S. shows that people aged 40-49 hold the largest amount of debt at $4.21 trillion in total. People aged 50-59 have the most credit card debt in total at $0.21 trillion, and people aged 30-39 have the most student loan debt at $0.5 trillion.
The Gen Z debt situation
The youngest generation in the study has the lowest debt ($16,652) but the vast majority, 97%, still carry a balance. As far as student loans, Gen Zers owe significantly less than other generations, with a median balance of $12,172 — roughly half of what millennials owe for school.