$37,172 is the average student loan debt accumulated.
21 years is the average length of payment on a loan.
5.7% is the average interest rate.

That’d average a $253 a month payment over 21 years, which comes to $3,036 a year or $63,756 over 21 years.

2.3 million dollars is the median lifetime earnings of college graduates.

Showing college over a lifetime would cost 2.7% of total earnings.

Factoring in a graduation age of 22 and retirement of 65, that would put those lifetime earnings into 43 years.

Paying that student loan debt in a period of 21 years, factoring it just as a raw breaking of 2.3 million over 43 years would mean an average income of $53,488 a year over 43 years.

If the goal is to pay back the $37,172 in debt over 21 years, with $3,036 a year in payments, that’d mean on a salary of $53,488, that’d mean those graduates are spending 5.7% of income yearly on student loans.

The reason for writing this isn’t actually to talk about student loans, but to actually talk about the salary for higher earning careers.

$203,000 is the average student loan debt for doctors.

To payback a student loan debt of $203,000 over 21 years, it’d take a payment of $1,300 a month and after interest, it’d be $348,000.

For a doctor to be able to stay at paying 5.7% of income to loans like other people, they’d over the course of 21 years need to make 6.1 million dollars or $290,000 a year.

Which is actually pretty close to the average doctor salary of $248,000.

Another example would be lawyers.

$160,000 is the average student loan debt of law school graduates.

$160,000
21 year loan
5.7% interest rate

$1,090 a month in payments.
$13,080 a year.
$274,000 to be paid in 21 years.

For a lawyer to have student loans only be 5.7% of their income, they’d need to make 4.7 million dollars over 21 years or $222,000 a year.

Comparing that, lawyers which have a visible degree inflation problem have a median salary of $126,000 per year in the US.

The point of writing this.

A lot of the time people get angry at some careers having such large pay gaps over others, where fields such as medicine and law pay much higher over almost any other job.

They don’t realize the initial investment to get there is much higher and it’s not just about paying off that debt, but about making enough money afterwards, the return on investment is the same or higher as lower costs/lower time degrees.