If this doesn’t make people angry nothing will. From the NCPA:
Congress may let student loan interest rates double July 1, but some federal workers and congressional staff likely are protected from the impact by a taxpayer-funded benefit that provided more than $20 million last year for them to pay down their college debts, says USA Today.
- Congress created the benefit more than 10 years ago to make government jobs more appealing to job candidates who could get higher-paying jobs in the private sector.
- Meanwhile, a 2007 law that cut student loan interest rates in half will expire July 1, and Congress has been unable to reach a deal to extend it.
- Federal agencies spent about $72 million in 2011, the last year for which data are available, to pay down student loans for 10,134 federal workers.