One in Five Student Loan Borrowers Have Missed a Payment in 2025

More than 9 million student loan borrowers have missed at least one payment this year.

That’s according to a report Saturday (Dec. 13) from the Financial Times (FT), which notes that delinquencies in the $1.7 trillion student loan market are soaring following the end of the government’s amnesty on loan payments following the COVID pandemic. About 44 million people are paying off student loans.

The report cited recent comments from the government’s Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) which said this week that student loans were “a notable exception” to low default rates on other loans held by American households.

Although student loan defaults have typically been higher than those for other types of consumer credit, the number of balances more than 30 days past due has doubled since the amnesty began in 2020, the FSOC added.

The FT said this rise in delinquency is happening in tandem with worries about a cooling labor market that’s made it harder for newer graduates to find jobs.

“They just don’t have the money,” Charlie Wise, senior vice-president and head of global research and consulting for credit bureau TransUnion, told the FT. “That speaks more broadly to some of the weaknesses that we’ve seen in the jobs market for recent grads.”

Research by PYMNTS Intelligence into student loans has found a mix of regret and pride among the parents and students who have taken on debt to pay for their education.

The burden sits heaviest on the paycheck-to-paycheck consumer, a designation that applies to 71% of Americans — around 186 million people — as of July of this year.

Close to a fifth of this group said that education expenses are part of why their budgets are tight. And within this group, opinion is divided on education’s payoff: 52% say their degrees boosted their earning power enough to justify the cost, while 48% say earnings fell short of expectations.

“Regret sits alongside resolve: 37% regret their financial choices about education, yet 63% would make the same decisions again despite the hit to their finances,” PYMNTS wrote.

The research divided borrowers into four distinct personas. First are there “payoff believers,” at 40%, who say that their education increased their earnings, and that they stand by the choice.

Next are the “education loyalists” (23%), who did not get an earnings bump but still find the experience valuable. Then there are the “education regretters” (25%) who did not see a payoff and would not repeat the experience.

The final group is “dissatisfied earners” at 12%, who gained financially but felt the trade-offs were not worth it, perhaps because the path took too long or they were disappointed by their jobs.