Does the House Always Win? An Analysis of Barriers to Wealth Building and College Borrowing

The racial differences in student loan debt must be interpreted through a lens of wealth building inequality. Black individuals in particular are negatively affected by official and unofficial policies that create barriers to building wealth. Financial aid policies then exacerbate this inequality with an Expected Family Contribution (EFC) formula that protects the majority of family assets from being used as required educational contributions. Using the 2011-12 National Postsecondary Student Aid Survey (NPSAS:12) , we examined differences in student loan debt based on wealth building barriers (students’ access to banks, father’s education, and mother’s education). Our ANOVA models show cumulative loan debt is highest amongst students who experience barriers to wealth building (students who do not have bank accounts, students whose fathers have less than a Bachelor’s degree, and students whose mothers have less than a Bachelor’s degree) (p \u3c .05). In addition, a greater percentage of black students than white experience these wealth building barriers