Did you go to college? 

Then you probably have student debt. 

We all have student debt. This is a fact of life that we have long since accepted.

Sallie Mae is the wicked witch from every fairy tale that demands the princess' first born. In exchange for financing our degrees, Sallie Mae will come around every month to steal our sh*t. For 20 years.

America!

This might seem dramatic but if you feel like you're drowning in student debt too– you are. We are all literally drowning in student debt. 

According to Gothamist, the nationwide average borrower owes $29,000, but the average New Yorker owes $32,000. 

If you're a Manhattanite and you're wondering why you owe significantly more than that, don't worry; the average loan debt in Manhattan is $44,500.

Essentially, student loan debt has basically lapped inflation doubling in the last decade. NYC holds the title of being the most royally screwed, but New York State's debt has skyrocketed to $82 billion, so we're really all in this together. YEAH! *freeze frame*

This is in part to do with obviously, rising tuition costs and the fact that four of the United States' most expensive colleges are in New York– Columbia, NYU, Sarah Lawrence, and Bard. 

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As an example, Gothamist uses NYU, where the average cost is $70,000 a year and the average need-based scholarship for an incoming freshman was $28,179, so they are leaving its poorest students saddled with the worst federal loans.

In 2013, it was also revealed that NYU was using tuition money to pay off favorited professors' mortgages, and buy administrators' vacation homes. It's also worth noting, however, that corruption within this specific private school doesn't tell the whole story, neither does debt averages. 

As aforementioned, the Manhattan average student debtor owes $16,900 more than the average debtor in the Bronx, which is $27,600.

However, the Bronx has a 19% rate of borrowers who have delinquent loans, meaning they are 90 or more days late on payments. It's the only borough where the delinquency rate is higher than 16.2%– the national rate.

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Specifically, the system leaves students who attend proprietary schools for-profit trade schools particularly disadvantaged. 96% of proprietary school grads are paying off student loans and the majority of for-profit trade school students are minorities from low-income families.

This leaves our generation, specifically, in a pretty sh*tty place, considering it's not a great time for finding jobs to pay back these mountains of loans, especially in NYC. Especially since we can't do very much about national institutions that seem hell-bent on keeping us down.

Well, hopefully, this doesn't put too much of a damper on your day but hey, we're getting one step closer to laying the "lazy and entitled" millennial thing to rest. 

Then we'll be the "disenfranchised and broke AF" millennials– as it should be.