Thousands of over-60s take out student loans they are ‘unlikely’ to ever repay ...Middle East

Thousands of over-60s are taking out taxpayer-funded student loans they are unlikely to ever repay due to a loophole in the tuition fee system.

There is currently no upper age limit on the government loans, meaning mature students can access them on the same terms as young people, repaying 9 per cent of their income over £25,000.

However, a person’s income tends to dip as they they hit retirement, and for some people, pension income is not included when calculating their repayments – meaning they are unlikely to ever repay the loan in many cases.

House prices up by 4.7 per cent - but stamp duty changes will cause 'volatility'

In contrast, younger students entering the workforce face several decades of loan repayments, on top of mounting housing, childcare and utilities expenses.

Since 2019, 4,648 over-sixties have taken out loans to cover the cost of higher education, according to freedom of information data obtained by The i Paper.

Around three-quarters of those over 60s who have now finished their course have not yet repaid anything as their income isn’t high enough to do so –  compared to only a fifth of people overall who have yet to re-start re-paying their loans.

The data raises fresh questions about inter-generational fairness, with older people who have benefited from cheaper housing and bigger pensions able to take out the loans without being likely to face decades of crippling payments.

Unlike mortgage debt, student loans are also not repayable when someone passes away, being wiped upon death.

Liz Emerson, co-founder of the Intergenerational Foundation, said: “Nobody would want to prevent anyone, irrespective of their age, from accessing higher education for the first time, but there is an obvious cost to younger taxpayers if the repayment terms remain the same for all ages.

“Unlike those taking out loans in their sixties, who are unlikely to repay in full, many taking out loans at 18 will face four decades of repayments, throughout their whole working lives.

“Of course within a publicly funded system where higher education is a public good and free for everyone, we would not need to have this conversation.”

The Government provides loans for undergraduate students to cover tuition fees and help with living costs and there is currently no upper age limit for tuition fee loans, meaning students over the age of 60 can access them.

Students are not eligible for a maintenance loan if they are 60 or over on the first day of the first academic year of their course. Instead, full-time students aged 60 and over can apply for a “special support loan” – though these are means-tested.

Over-sixties are not allowed to take out postgraduate fee loans, with ex-education minister Robert Halfon telling MPs in 2023 that this rule was “designed to restrict eligibility to those statistically most likely to continue in long-term employment and be able to repay the loan.”

According to a House of Commons Library briefing paper published last year, people’s earnings tend to peak in their forties, at around £40,040 per year, with those who take out loans at 18 facing repayments during this period.

Most people’s incomes drop back significantly by their sixties, to an average of £33,852 per year.

But added to this, student loan repayments are generally taken from people’s salaries via HMRC’s pay-as-you-earn (PAYE) system, and repayments are typically deducted from income that is subject to class 1 national insurance payments.

There are around 1.43 million workers aged over 65 in the UK, but many are self-employed or working part-time.

Pension payments are not subject to this, so some pensioners may get away with having income above the repayment threshold but not having to repay their loan.

However, they may still have to make repayments if their income goes on their self-assessment tax return.

Only those who have not done degrees in the past can take out tuition fee loans.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “This Government is committed to breaking down barriers to opportunity and boosting economic growth by ensuring we have a workforce with the skills needed for the 21st century. This includes supporting older students who wish to undertake higher education for the first time in order to reskill.

“We are also committed to maintaining a sustainable student finance system which is fair to students and to the taxpayer.”

Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Thousands of over-60s take out student loans they are ‘unlikely’ to ever repay )

Also on site :

• Barbra Streisand Reveals Jaw-Dropping Details of Scandalous Proposal from Hollywood Icon!
• In Q1 2025, enterprise SaaS M&A deal count hit 210, according to PitchBook
• Uno de los médicos acusados ​​de suministrar ketamina a Matthew Perry acepta declararse culpable, según muestra el documento