I didn't even go to college, I went to a technical school for automotive mechanics and I've been paying that loan off for more than twelve years. It had negatively affected my score, but my payments have been on time long enough that it's actually started helping. My loan was also less than the average loan described here. If it was at or above the average, I know it would have affected me more negatively. At some point, I believe, people will need to get over the obsession with college and higher education and get back to blue-collar, grassroots, apprenticeship style jobs. I spent all this money on my loan and I didn't even need any of the education (or additional expense) to get where I am in my field. As this and future generations accrue more and more debt the future of the economy is going to just snowball into a bigger and bigger mess.