The U.S. Senate reaffirmed on Thursday that Congress is still at a stalemate over how to pay for a temporary freeze on the interest rate for federally subsidized student loans.
Unless Congress acts, the interest rate on new subsidized Stafford loans to undergraduate students will double, from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent, on July 1. As Democrats and Republicans court student voters in an election year, both parties have said they want to find a way to extend the lower interest rate for a year. But they disagree over how to offset the approximately $6-billion cost.
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