4 Quotes by Robert Shireman

We've seen a sea change, a real shift over the past generation from a system where less than half of students left with debt and now two-thirds leave with debt. Now, it's become the norm to leave with debt -- and often with a lot of debt.

Low interest rates have served as a sort of amnesty for graduates with debt. We haven't seen what the real impact is of much higher levels of borrowing.

When low-income students are saddled with debt and have a low probability of completion, they end up worse off than if they hadn't attended college at all. You end up in a very difficult situation to get out of -- ever.

The reason that we won't see a huge shift in the number of low-income students who are attending Harvard and Yale is that the academic expectations are so high that while there are some students who would qualify, the numbers are not huge.