Americans are divided on the Biden administration’s recently announced student loan forgiveness plan—and on the federal government’s responsibility in general for the cost of higher education. 

Our Research and Insights team looked at recent polling on the issue and found: 

• One-third of voters (31%) think President Biden’s plan to cancel $10,000-$20,000 of student loan debt is very unfair, 13% think it is somewhat unfair, 20% think it is somewhat fair and 28% think it is very fair. 

• 44% of Americans think the federal government has a responsibility to address student loan debt, while 38% think it does not and 18% are unsure.

• 30% of Americans say they are very concerned student loan forgiveness will make inflation worse, while 28% say they are somewhat concerned, 23% say they are not so concerned, and 15% say they are not concerned at all.
  • 81% of Republicans indicate concern over inflation, while 57% of Democrats say they have little to no concern about it. 

• Half of Americans (50%) strongly support the Biden administration developing a plan to lower the cost of higher education, while 26% somewhat support it, 5% somewhat oppose it and 9% strongly oppose it.
  • 86% of Democrats indicate support for lowering the cost, while 69% of Republicans do.

• More than half of Americans (61%) blame colleges and universities a lot for the increase in student debt, while 18% blame them a little and 8% don’t blame them at all.