Indebted: How Families Make College Work at Any Cost

By reading this koob, you will discover how pursuing higher education comes at a great cost to future economic stability.

You will also learn about:

• The moral struggles of the middle class

• The illusion of independence

• Student finance’s bureaucracy

• Racial discrimination in the loans system

• The heavy burden of debt

In Indebted: How Families Make College Work at Any Cost, author and New York University professor Caitlin Zaloom details the stresses and anxieties of the college application process and the debt accumulated by middle-class families. By means of 160 in-depth interviews with college students and their parents, Zaloom understands first-hand the struggles faced by those juggling their finances to afford tuition. With college fees continually on the rise since the end of the 20th century, more and more graduates are entering their professional lives riddled with debt. In 2018, the US federal government was the biggest consumer lender in the country, with outstanding loans amounting to $1.5 trillion. Managing their personal finances and navigating debt, every year new families undertake one of the biggest financial investments they will make in their lifetime to ensure their child’s education opportunities.