Credit card debt has been a major burden for the average American for years. One of the leading indicators of financial trouble is a growing credit card debt balance. Now, though, last year's economic statistics show that student loan debt has outpaced credit card debt for the first time. Student loan debt is probably going to surpass the trillion-dollar mark in 2011.

Student loan default rates are going up, especially for people who went to for-profit colleges. As an example of how things have changed, in 1993 less than half of bachelor degree recipients left school with debt. By 2008, more than two thirds matriculate with a debt that averages $24,000.

There are observers who foresee the day when children are going off to college, and their parents will still be paying off their own student loans.

Students are expected to borrow even more in the coming years, as tuition rates climb and help for low-income students, such as Pell grants, are likely to be cut.

Lauren Asher, president of the Institute for Student Access and Success, says of the student-loan-debt-soaked future, "If you have a lot of people finishing or leaving school with a lot of debt, their choices may be very different than the generation before them. Things like buying a home, starting a family, starting a business, saving for their own kids' education may not be options for people who are paying off a lot of student debt."

Student loan debt is even getting to be known as an "anti-dowry," since debt slows down graduates' ability to move on with the major events in their lives.

Many economists see student loan debt as a positive investment, much better in the long term than purchases on a credit card. However, Fort Lauderdale credit card debt attorneys note that if more and more students are paying off student loans, that will have a dragging effect on the economy in the long term as well.

Source: New York Times "Burden of College Loans on Graduates Grows" 4/11/2011