College Students Paying Up

WASHINGTON, D.C.: A crackdown on delinquent student loans seems to have paid off: the Education Department reported Thursday that the 1994 default rate was 10.7 percent, a 40 percent drop from the year before President Clinton took office. The Administration was swift to take credit, and used the opportunity to press for further education tax breaks. It was the President, after all, who had proposed such tough measures as dropping trade schools with high default rates from national student aid programs, garnishing the wages of delinquent students and withholding their tax refunds. Meeting with six college students in the Oval Office, Clinton pointed out that government student loans helped him get through college and law school. "America needs these tax cuts to help America pay for college," he said. No word on whether the Republican-led Congress will embrace that school of thought.