Constantine Yannelis

Constantine Yannelis, an Associate Professor of Finance at the Booth School of Business, sheds light on the U.S. student loan crisis affecting over 45 million borrowers. He discusses how decades of federal regulation and de-regulation have led to a staggering $1.6 trillion in debt. The rise of for-profit educational institutions is explored, alongside the challenging impacts of recent policies like the Biden administration's loan forgiveness efforts. Yannelis emphasizes the necessity of accountability and targeted solutions to navigate this multifaceted crisis.

We’re taking a week off here at the end of the summer, but with Biden’s recent student loan announcement we couldn’t help but think back to our episode about student debt with Constatine Yannelis. Before he was elected, Biden had promised to remove 50K in debt from borrowers. His recent announcement doesn’t quite match that promise, but this episode still contains an incredible amount of vital information about our student debt problem, who really benefits from forgiveness, and what are real solutions for the future. We hope you enjoy, and thanks for listening. Your support is crucial to keeping our show going, so please tell your friends and family to give us a listen and a review. We’ll be back in two weeks with a brand new episode of Capitalisn’t. As Bethany mentions during the episode, if you are a journalist with some years of media experience and have an interest in deepening your knowledge and understanding of the many issues we cover on this podcast, you are encouraged to apply for the Stigler Center Journalists in Residence program, which offers training in business fundamentals at Chicago Booth. Learn more, share, and apply: www.chicagobooth.edu/stiglerjir