Here’s one of the worst problems with federal student loans: The government makes it easy for kids who don’t belong in college to borrow money to attend schools that merely pretend to educate them. Sometimes those schools used dodgy tactics to get the students to enroll. Should the government let those students out of having to repay, thus sticking the taxpayers with the loss?

That has become quite a heated controversy in Washington, and I write about it in this Martin Center article.

When this erupted under Obama, following his Education Department’s crusade against some of those dodgy for-profit schools, officials curried favor with students by taking a very liberal approach. Under Trump, however, Betsy DeVos has chosen to adopt a different approach, one that looks at students individually. Even if they attended a school accused of fraud or misrepresentation, they haven’t necessarily suffered any damage. The Democrats and activist groups are up in arms, calling her effort at minimizing the loss to taxpayers an attack on hapless students.

I think that DeVos has made another brave move, as she did by rescinding the Obama-era Title IX “guidance,” but a better “borrower defense” rule doesn’t solve the underlying problem. That problem is federal student lending itself. The government has no incentive to make only those student loans that make sense. It ought to get out of this business and leave it to people who are playing with their own money.