"A report released by the National Consumer Law Center highlights the problem faced by students and recent graduates: steep tuition increases force students to take on more and more debt from private lenders. Then, a tight job market makes it hard for them to pay the loans back," Minnesota Public Radio reports. "The private student loan market has exploded in the past five years and students are just now waking up to the long-term consequences, according to the center's staff attorney, Deanne Loonin. 'They're just not in the economic shape they hoped they would in. They're just not able to pay their loans. They have huge amounts of debt. It affects their credit. It affects their ability to build assets for the future,' she says. Private lenders are not required to release information about default rates. But student surveys indicate a growing negative trend, Loonin says. In addition to higher tuition and persistently low federal loan limits, sophisticated marketing has greatly increased private lenders' share of the market, she says."