<Anchor>

There is a system that allows young people who have had a high school loan to pay low interest rates in the past. However, it is not a benefit that all young people can receive, so it is quite common to hold high interest rates 10 years ago.

Reporter Song In-ho reports.

<Reporter> A

young man in his 30s who received a 15-year student loan from the second year of university in 2008.

In the wake of the recent corona, the burden of repaying student loans that resulted from the loss of a job has increased.

[Scholarship Foundation General Repayment Student Loan: I'm unemployed, and I have a long way to go. If the interest rate itself is applied at the same rate in the future, it will be a burden.] In

2008, the first student loan received at 7.8% interest rate could be changed to 2.9% interest rate in 2014, but the problem is from the 2010 loan.

Over the past two years, I have received six additional fixed rate loans, with interest rates ranging from 4.9% to 5.7%, more than three times the current 1.85%.

The Scholarship Foundation is converting existing high-interest student loans to low-interest rates, but since 2010, when variable rate products were introduced, lenders have been excluded from conversion.

[Korea Scholarship Foundation officials: I think the resources are limited. At that time, friends from low-income households (with variable interest rates) were able to carry out loans with'student repayment after employment'… .] More

than 1.17 million young people received relatively high interest student loans between 2010 and 2012.

Of these, more than 130,000 are still paying off loans with high interest rates.

[Scholarship Foundation General Repayment Student Loan: You can't ask for the right to cut interest rates, you have to pay the next 5 years with a fixed rate 10 years ago... .] With the

prospect that the corona aftermath will be prolonged, additional measures by the education authorities are needed to reduce the burden on the youth.