The problem extends far beyond the much-vaunted federal debt. The power of debt extends to nearly every aspect of modern life. Our homes, schools, roads, bridges, highways, utilities, businesses, and virtually every product and asset produced and sold depend on debt. By some estimates, up to 30 cents of every dollar we spend goes towards paying interest on the debt accrued to produce and sell everything we buy. (For example, of the $6.5 billion in private business income in 2012, 36.8% went to interest payments.) Student debt has become the next territory for Wall Street to occupy. Once again, this required reversing successful practices of the past. From World War II until the mid-1970s, public higher education was virtually free, driven first by the GI Bill of Rights and then by the robust tuition-free higher education systems of California and New York. As the chart below shows, virtually no student loan debt existed until the late 1980s. But as money for the public sector dried up (largely due to tax breaks for the wealthy), public financial support for higher education lagged behind tuition costs. Wall Street has filled the gap and student debt