‘If you thought about it every single day, you’d have a mental breakdown.’
That’s Melissa Meru, quoted in a much-discussed Wall Street Journal feature published Friday. She’s talking about her husband Mike’s student loans. All million-plus dollars’ worth.
By the Department of Education’s count, as reported by the Journal, Mike Meru, a Utah orthodontist, is in select company. Some 101 people in the U.S., according to the department, are a million dollars or more in federal student-load debt. The number owing at least $100,000 is nearing 2.5 million.
While studying at USC to become an orthodonist — dental school is among the costliest of all postgraduate curricula — Mike Meru, who’d had his undergraduate studies funded by his parents and part-time work as a waiter and graduated debt-free, took out $601,506 in student loans. This Wall Street Journal infographic tracks the debt’s accumulation and expansion:
The Wall Street Journal
It’s worth noting that the reaction in social media and in the Wall Street Journal comments was not entirely sympathetic, even as the Journal reported that the debt — on which the orthodontist is not even touching the principal with his $1,589.97 monthly payments — could expand to $2 million over time:
There's not a school on the planet that charges $100K a year for undergrad and dentistry. So he was charging, what, all of his living expenses for a decade? My pity meter is sadly broken. https://t.co/sqxSRJ72LN
— tim mullaney (@timmullaney) May 25, 2018
How utterly ridiculous to borrow that much money and then whine about having to pay it back.
— CJ 🚲 (@politichick_) May 25, 2018
This is entirely their fault.
— PunkRockConservative (@ThePunkCnsrvtv) May 25, 2018