Repayment: Bachelor’s Degree Recipients

Among the cohort who started college in 2011-12, two-thirds of all borrowers (65.4 percent) who completed bachelor’s degrees—but only 47.9 percent of Black or African American borrowers—were in the standard 10-year repayment plan six years after first enrolling. Approximately one-fifth of bachelor’s degree recipients with federal loans were in income-driven repayment (IDR) plans (20.6 percent). Participation in IDR plans ranged from 14.3 percent of Asian borrowers to 33.4 percent of Black or African American borrowers.

Distribution of Borrowers Across Repayment Plans: Bachelor's Degree Recipients, by Race and Ethnicity

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Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education: 2020 Supplement
Chapter Five: Undergraduate Debt and Student Loan Payment

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Source

Source: U.S. Department of Education, Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study, BPS:12/17

Notes:
Data reflect students who first entered college in 2011-12 and whose highest degree earned by 2017 was a bachelor’s degree. Data reflect all federal student loans taken within the six-year time frame. As a result, loan outcomes may reflect loans taken for additional enrollment beyond the highest degree attained by 2017.

Alternative repayment plan includes a few additional repayment options not separately shown.

‡ Estimate suppressed. Reporting standards not met.

Estimates for groups not separately shown were suppressed due to small sample size.