The surge in credit and house prices that preceded the Great Recession was particularly pronounced in ZIP codes with a higher fraction of subprime borrowers (Mian and Sufi 2009). We present a simple model of prime and subprime borrowers distributed across geographic locations, which can...

In this paper, I provide an economic perspective on policy issues related to student debt in the United States. I lay out the economic rationale for government provision of student loans, summarize time trends in student borrowing, describe the US loan market, then turn to topics central to the...