{"id":3728,"date":"2022-04-02T15:55:21","date_gmt":"2022-04-02T15:55:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/linksus.net\/the-student-loan-pause-is-set-to-end-soon-that-looks-unlikely-the-new-york-times\/"},"modified":"2022-04-02T15:55:21","modified_gmt":"2022-04-02T15:55:21","slug":"the-student-loan-pause-is-set-to-end-soon-that-looks-unlikely-the-new-york-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/2022\/04\/02\/the-student-loan-pause-is-set-to-end-soon-that-looks-unlikely-the-new-york-times\/","title":{"rendered":"The Student Loan Pause Is Set to End Soon. That Looks Unlikely. – The New York Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Loan servicers were told to hold off on sending bills, signaling that an extension is probably in the works.
By <\/span>Stacy Cowley<\/a><\/span> and Zolan Kanno-Youngs<\/a><\/span>
On May 1, the federal government is supposed to resume collections \u2014 for the first time in more than two years \u2014 from 43 million borrowers on $1.6 trillion in federal student loan debt.
Virtually no one involved in the collection process thinks that will happen, but no extension of the pause has been announced.
\u201cWe\u2019re 30 days out \u2014 this is ridiculous,\u201d said Natalia Abrams, the founder of the Student Debt Crisis Center, a nonprofit advocacy group. \u201cBorrowers are checking the news every day so they can plan their lives.\u201d
The Education Department, the primary lender for Americans who borrow for college, outsources the work of collecting payments to six outside vendors. Last month, it told those loan servicers to hold off on notifying borrowers<\/a> that their payments would soon be due.
The servicers took that as a sign that the payment pause \u2014 which began in March 2020 as a pandemic relief measure, and has now stretched across two presidential administrations \u2014 would once again be extended. But with just weeks to go, they\u2019re still waiting for guidance from the government on whether they should start billing borrowers again.
Two officials at different loan servicers said that their businesses had staffed up to be ready for the May 1 restart. The executives, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid alienating government officials, said they were frustrated by the lack of clear instructions.
Those instructions come from the Education Department, which manages federal student loans. But the department is also stuck: It has been awaiting a decision from the White House on extending the pause, according to two department employees who are involved in student loan operations.
Neither the White House nor the Education Department answered questions about whether the May 1 restart date would be pushed back. In separate statements, both said the Education Department would continue communicating with borrowers and servicers, including about \u201cthe type and cadence of servicer outreach to borrowers.\u201d
Even lawmakers in Congress have said they were in the dark about the administration\u2019s plans. The two Democratic chairs of the Senate and House education committees \u2014 Senator Patty Murray of Washington and Representative Robert Scott of Virginia \u2014 issued statements on March 16 asking the Biden administration to extend the payment pause until 2023.
\u201cThe student loan system is broken,\u201d Ms. Murray said<\/a>. \u201cIt is ruining lives and holding people back.\u201d
The White House has not publicly responded to that request.
On Thursday, more than 90 Democrats in Congress sent President Biden a letter<\/a> urging him to extend the payments pause and take executive action to \u201ccancel student debt now.\u201d
They added: \u201cRestarting repayment will financially destabilize many borrowers and their families, and will cause hardship for many who could not afford repayment.\u201d
A Democratic House aide who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter said that frequent requests to the Education Department for updates have yielded no firm answers about an extension of the moratorium.
But Ron Klain, Mr. Biden\u2019s chief of staff, hinted last month on the podcast \u201cPod Save America\u201d that an extension was under discussion.
\u201cThe president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or he\u2019ll extend the pause,\u201d Mr. Klain said<\/a>. \u201cJoe Biden right now is the only president in history where no one\u2019s paid on their student loans for the entirety of his presidency.\u201d
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AdvertisementLoan servicers were told to hold off on sending bills, signaling that an extension is probably in the works.By Stacy Cowley and Zolan Kanno-YoungsOn May 1, the federal government is supposed to resume collections \u2014 for the first time in more than two years \u2014 from 43 million borrowers on $1.6 trillion in federal student […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":869,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3728"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/869"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3728\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/linksus2.linksus.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}