Sec. 2. Findings
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Congress finds the following: The public service loan forgiveness program under section 455(m) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 ( 20 U.S.C. 1087e(m) ) was created in 2007 to attract individuals to public service by forgiving an individual’s Federal loans under part D of title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 ( 20 U.S.C. 1071 et seq. ; 20 U.S.C. 1087a et seq. ) after 10 years of employment in areas of national need. These public service careers, which include employment in military, emergency management, government, public safety, law enforcement, public health, education, child care, social work, services for individuals with disabilities, services for the elderly, public interest legal services, and library sciences, pay substantially less than similar careers in the private sector.
The public sector also repeatedly experiences workforce shortages, especially following the COVID–19 pandemic. An undergraduate degree, certification, or advanced degree is a prerequisite to enter or advance in these public service careers. Yet, research suggests that the prospect of several decades of student loan payments often deters individuals from pursuing careers in public service. The public service loan forgiveness program has substantially failed. In 2018, 99 percent of the borrowers who applied for relief under the program were denied due to improper type of loans, employment, or repayment plan, or the number of payments that they had made.
Advocates and enforcement agencies, including 38 State Attorneys General and the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, have repeatedly found that all of the major Federal student loan servicers provided inaccurate information to borrowers who were interested in or relying upon the public service loan forgiveness program. They also found that servicers repeatedly steered borrowers away from public service loan forgiveness into higher monthly payments and into deferment and forbearances.
This has caused millions of public servants irreparable economic harm, including preventing them from buying a home, opening a small business, starting a family, or retiring, because of their student debt. Despite the recent actions of President Biden's administration to improve the public service loan forgiveness program, these actions are limited and will not fully atone for the repeated, pervasive, and systemic actions by Federal student loan servicers to prevent public servants from fully benefitting from this program.
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