policies be modified to help fix this problem? i think so. how you fix that, how you , i'mf, that kind of phobia not aware of any magical solution. i have heard that similar processes are at play.

french muslims in british muslims need to more forcefully condemn terrorism, benefit from that solidarity that is created. a couple of books i have read from women, i can't think of her last name. she was part of the dutch parliament for a while. these two authors i am thinking very vividly describe what it is like for women in islamic ,ountries, general mutilation all of that, really tough to read, and i think the start of an underground group of women

that are tuning into this then extrapolate to islam broadly, and i think that has not been, at least i'm not aware of it being countered or if it could be countered. women the attacks against by -- >> how harshly islam in their expense treats women. >> i should say i am not an expert in islam abroad. cases, suchf many as saudi arabia and iran, where there is clear evidence of discrimination against women. it is also worth noting that many of the heads of state in the world are muslim women. certainly one hears of these egregious, particular he among

isis, the reason new york times how they areen and treated by isis is just terrifying. how can't really speak to real that threat is. i can however say that many of the most promising muslim-american leaders are women. the former leader of the islamic , there of north america are dozens of people leading advocacy groups, some of the best and brightest minds are muslim-american women. if anybody can fight that fight, it is these folks. thank you all for coming. mentioned, ingrid will be coming to campus in about a

month. if you are interested, look us -- i don't remember what it is, sorry. we tweet about all of these events as well as islamic studies. if you have anymore questions, please let us know. thank you for coming. have a good day. [applause] how did i do? ok.

c-span, we are featuring programs on the increase of drug abuse in america and the situation with the current supreme court vacancy. today at 7:00 p.m. eastern, with the abuse of prescription drugs and hair when on the rise, we look at the government's handling of the issue from health experts, attics, and the senate, including comments from president obama and presidential candidate ted cruz. was certainly not be washington, d.c. that steps in and solves these problems. be friends and family, churches, charities, loved ones, treatment centers, people working to help those who are struggling those trying to

overcome the drug addiction. drug addiction is a disease. we released our first national control strategy. 2011lowed that up in with the drug prevention plan. communitiesg with to prevent drug abuse, reduce overdose deaths come and help people get treatment. >> with an apparent impasse, the over house and republicans the next of in court justice, we look at what leaders in the past have said about the nomination and confirmation process of individuals to the supreme court. view, confirmation hearings, no matter how long, fruitful, thorough, can provide a sufficient basis for determining if a nominee merits a seat on our supreme court. >> the senators should realize

that any benefits of barring an ideological opponent from the to outweight likely the damage done to the courts institutional standing. on, ideological opposition to a nominee from one into the political spectrum is likely to help generate similar opposition to later nominations from the opposite end. >> those are some of the programs featured this week on c-span. tonight on c-span two, it is book tv in prime time with a look at books and authors on military and national security issues. on c-span three, recent symposium on the life, career, and legacy of president abraham lincoln, books and history tonight in primetime, starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2 and c-span3. >> tonight on c-span, the

supreme court cases that shaped our history come to life with the c-span series, landmark cases, historic supreme court decisions. our 12 part series explores constitutional dramas behind some of the most significant decisions in american history. >> john marshall said this is different, the constitution is a political document, sets up political structures, but it is also a law. if it is a law, we have the courts to tell what it means. apart isets dred scott that it is the ultimate anti-presidential case. it is exactly what you don't want to do. >> who should make the decisions about those debates. in lochner versus new york, the supreme court said it should make those decisions. the slaughterhouse cases

tonight at 10:00 p.m. eastern. next, two experts on student debt issues discussed whether there is a student debt crisis in the united states and who is most affected by the problem. school the gerald ford of public policy at the university of michigan, this is 20 minutes. host: good afternoon and welcome. i would like to thank the

codirectors for planning our event today, which i know you have been looking forward to. i would also like to acknowledge the charles and susan gessner for their generous support of today's program. we are grateful for all of those engagements. today, we will address a very important question -- is there a student debt crisis? many of us are well aware of the ever-expanding student loan market and the latest estimates are that nearly 40 million americans are laden with $1.3 trillion worth of student debt. one in four of the borrowers is either in delinquency or default. last year's graduating class had an average of $35,000 in student debt. the obama administration recently announced two policy changes and presidential candidates have focused on a variety of alternatives of ways to lower the debt burdens.

today's speakers are two leading voices. rohit chopra was recently named special adviser to the u.s. department of education. he previously served as the assistant director of the consumer financial protection bureau. the secretary of treasury named him as the agencies first loan ombudsman.d

he has frequently testified before congress on alleviating student debt burdens and private student loan performance. susan is a colleague. she is a professor of education, public policy, and economics at the university of michigan. susan is one of the countries top advocates for accessible higher education. she has testified before congress on education and tax policy and is widely consulted on student aid reform, including a federal reserve, the department of education and treasury, and with the department of economic advisories. she also writes with a new york times and if you are on twitter, i encourage you to follow her for an informative and witty commentary. first, a word about today's format. each of our panelists to getting with susan will kick things off with three opening remarks. i will then have the pleasure of moderating a conversation with our experts. i will start with a few questions of my own before opening things to the audience. please write your questions on the notecards you received and we will have volunteers circulating to collect them from you during the program. if you are watching online, please send us your questions on twitter.

let's get started. susan, the floor is yours. ms. dynarski: thank you, everyone. i'm going to start with the data. i want to start by talking about if there is indeed a crisis in student debt, where is it? there at a university in a a university in a school of public policy so we should be addressing this question with data as opposed to say introspective and thinking about our own experiences or those of our friends or colleagues. also, instead of maybe just reading the latest dramatic piece in the news about a distressed borrower, but rather by analyzing the data. data has been a problem in this context. anecdotes have filled the void. if there is not a good data on the problem, the arising and

theorizing and anecdote will fill the void. department of education, which is responsible for the federal loans in this country, has not been terribly forthcoming and releasing to the public information about who borrows, who defaults, their experiences. that is changing a bit and as of this past fall, we have some excellent data on debt to default for people who have borrowed since the late 1990's or so up until the present. what i'm going to say here is based on the analysis of that data. what does the data say? they say you should erase from your mind -- if you are thinking of who the face of the student debt crisis is, you should erase it from your mind the image of a yale graduate or nyu graduate or columbia graduate or even a um graduate.

anyone who graduate with a ba is relatively likely to default. people who graduate have a low default rates. the default rate drops in terms of the school's selectivity. for schools like um and harvard and columbia, about 5% is what the default is. that is what it was before the recession. that is what it was during the recession. people who graduate from elite schools are pretty well buffered from economic distress. not everybody. we're talking about averages. so you should also not think of folks who are going to graduate school. people who graduate -- i know you don't like debt but it is whether it is the face of the country.

than pay for it. that is an economic sense principle. [laughter] grad students a borrowed the least likely to default because they make good money compared to other folks. graduates -- people who borrow for graduate school are unlikely to default. graduates of select schools like um might borrow $30,000 total. but they tend to make a good money so they can support a debt of $30,000 and pay it off. that is who it is not. one thing to note -- the profiles of the people who are focused on in the media. when the media focuses on student debt crises, the people they profile -- people at columbia, nyu, people with graduate degrees.

this week am a graduate of connecticut college spoke about their experience with $200,000 in debt. that is a vanishingly unlikely amount of debt. few people have that much debt and people who graduate with graduate degrees tend to not default. there was a lovely article in the new york times that enraged me into writing several of shot short posts from a guy who graduated with three degrees from columbia university and subsequently defaulted on all of them and was urging others to follow his example and setting it up as a leader of a student loan revolt. these are not the victims of the crisis. who is? the face of student loan distress is a dropout from a nonselective college. a person who spent a year or two at a for-profit college or community college or

nonselective four-year college. this is all based on the data. they are first-generation college students. they entered college late to improve their job market schools. many were running away from the weak job market of the recession and went to one of these schools to get a better job. they borrow relatively little because they spent relatively little time in school. they dropped out after a year or six months. maybe $5,000 to $10,000 a year -- total. in total, they borrowed $5,000 to $10,000. they are treated with low earnings. they enter poor, they left poor.

the typical loan in default is less than $10,000. $5,000 is the typical loan in default. nearly a third of students who borrowed to attend a community college or for-profit college during the recession defaulted within five years. for the people attending a selective ba institution, it's a 5%. the problems are at the community college and at the for-profit institutions. so, this is who i haven't firmly in mind when i think about victims of a student debt crisis. low income, first-generation students attending community college or a for-profit college. students of corinthian colleges were defrauded into borrowing for a nonexistent education. a person laid off in their job who tries to pick up some skills at the local community college and borrowed to do so and is exiting with low earnings.

in my opinion, if there is a crisis of any sort, it's a crisis of lower earnings in our country. we lack a safety net. we have a very large number of people earning very low earnings and who cannot handle even $5,000 in debt as a result. mr. chopra: thank you for having me and thank you to all of you for being here. i have recently joined the department of education and just a few days into the job. i often get the question why do we have student loans? i always answer -- it's important to remember we have student loans for a very good reason, and that is to ensure that people who might not be able to afford to go to college can make that investment into themselves, which can payoff very big when done right.

but, things have changed so much in the past 10 years that it's helpful to think through that. many people concerned about student debt might come from the education world. i probably come from the other stepchild of this world, which is thinking about it from a consumer financial markets perspective and those of us -- from our lens, we are really colored and shaped by the foreclosure crisis we saw in the past several years. for those of you from michigan, you probably know very well that problems in the mortgage market absolutely devastated parts of michigan, and this was not unlike other parts of the country. today, we have a mortgage market that is very different but i

think less discussed were some events that really changed the student loan market also. to the financial crisis, there is no question that the financial crisis had two real big effects. one is that it really eroded family well. actually, trillions of dollars in household wealth of that he waited in the form of home equity, retirement savings. many families felt more stressed. at the same time, the financial crisis hit state budgets very hard and there was some very substantial cuts to public higher education. i want to echo something sue said. the biggest group is those who attend public colleges.

the mix of families feeling more financially stressed and higher tuition, which by the way is not just something that is recent. i understand that 40 years ago, undergraduate tuition at the university of michigan was $800. inflation-adjusted, that's about four or five times higher. the tuition for undergraduates is well more than 4or 5 times higher than $800. the crisis really pronounced that effect and i think we have seen substantial increases in reliance on student loans. the secretary of education has noted that student loans became kind of the norm at a certain point. what else happened i think is important context and i think that we forget there is a lot of

talk about the rescue of the financial system due to gambling on wall street. but there is also a huge change in our federal student loan system, which was a law that essentially led to the government purchasing a huge amount of federal student loans. most federal student loans before 2010 were originated by financial institutions stamped with a government guarantee. now much of them are owned by the government, and in 2010, the president got a law passed to essentially end this bank subsidy program and now when you borrow, it's all directly through the department of education. all of this put together more

borrowers, more students relying on pell grants, student loans combined with the government taking the unprecedented action really has in some ways created a lot of opportunities that the policy makers and the research community are thinking about all of the different tools that can really be used to make improvements to the system. i think that we are at a place where we need to keep helping people go to college but we need to remember that the macro environment as well as some poor performing programs are leading to people, many people being in very high levels of distress. i can't tell you enough -- what i would push you to remember is when somebody is delinquent on their student loans, it is often just one sign of a broader array of shocks happening in their life. fighting to keep paying rent, struggling to make payments on their car loans, and thinking

through that as an whole consumer about the trauma that they are managing is something we always have to keep in mind. that said, there is a lot policy being pursued to not only address the borrowers who are struggling, but also to the affordability of college a few of them i will , mention. there is now new repayment plans. this is a broad expansion of affordable loan modifications and free payment plan that allow borrowers to pay a reasonable amount of income to manage those times of distress. my understanding is there's about 5000 people enrolling in that per day on average. we have to figure out how we can keep them in there and manage through that. there are new ways for borrowers to get out of default on their

federal loans. new rules have been put into place allow borrowers to get back on their feet through loan rehabilitation, and we need to make sure borrowers are not hiding and they know there are options for them. of course there has been a lot of interest and activity on enhancements to student loan servicing. student loan servicers are the companies that help collect payments and manage your loans. there is a lot of work to do to make that process work better. the president enacted a student aid bill of rights that called for a number of potential improvements to student loan servicing and that might be an important way. there is good work being done to help borrowers go through that process. going forward, we have to think

about how to inoculate future generations to not be deterred by low prices. a few of them, ending those bank subsidies for the old federal loan program created money to invest in the pell grant program. a lot of people taking a look at the role of the creditor and state oversight agencies. mentioned, the collapse of corinthian colleges has raised a lot of questions about the role of how we do oversight and many of you might have heard of the administration gainful employment initiatives, which is essentially a regulatory framework to prevent schools from graduating or even not graduating students with unaffordable levels of debt. there is a broader conversations all over.

about making community college free or more affordable. i think i would encourage all of you as you think about this issue that there is not one initiative that will be a cure-all. it is a series of tools to fight a discrete set of problems. focusing on just college affordability won't really fix issues for people struggling today. the reverse i knowledge is true as well. lots of hard problems to tackle , but big solutions are needed. >> thank you very much for helping to frame this very complex and nuanced set of issues. they are of vital importance and i say that both from my perspective as a dean of a policy school and as a parent of two college students.

there are many, many issues on the table. i will ask a couple of questions first to start things off but i encourage you to use the no cards for us to open things up to the audience participation. perhaps the place to start is to more of a sense of just how worried should we be about this crisis anyway? you spoke about the mortgage loan crisis at the beginning of your remarks and certainly some have suggested that what is happening with student loans is a bubble that could be as concerning as the mortgage crisis was as we all well know. how worried should we be about what is happening in student loans and with student debt? >> coming from the view of someone who is more of a financial services practitioner, i have a very stringent definition in my mind of what a

debt crisis is. a debt crisis like you see in europe or puerto rico a very different animal. it is where there is an immediate precipice upon which there will be some systemic change that will cause mass devastation very quickly. the term "bubble" denotes an economic term that something will pop and be quick and dramatic. i do not think what we're seeing in student loans is one that will create rapid, systemic risk because there is really not close interconnectedness with big financial institutions that could reverberate through the economy. that being said, those are technical terms. there are many people in our

country and that it is a personal crisis for them that they cannot manage in this debt. i will say i totally respect what sue has a shared with the data, but i wonder, are some of the borrowers who don't borrow very much but are in default, are they actually in the debt on a lot of other instruments? did they finance their education in other ways that may not show up in the student loan data? how i would answer that is maybe it's not a doomsday that we thought with the collapse of some of the large financial institutions but on a personal level, i think we have to ask ourselves how can somebody who default on the student loan really recover and become someone who can participate in the economy and not be

discouraged and frankly not to feel like a failure? i don't want to debate over the word about what the status is but i think we can all agree , there's so much we can improve for individual borrowers and we need to know more about what the potential impacts are on the rest of the economy. there may not be something immediate but there is more to learn there. ms. dynarski: i agree with everything you just said. a bubble emerges when an asset can get flipped over and over again and it's pricing gets inflated. think of the tulip crisis in holland, think of a house that gets flipped and the price increases. you cannot flip human capital. you cannot get the same kind of crazy inflationary. what we do have is a lot of suffering.

i wanted to make some concrete observations about what it means when we have 8 million people in default. what does that actually mean for individual lives? for someone in default, they have a enormous of the blot on their credit record. what does that mean? many landlord's now do credit checks before somebody can rent so they are shut out of parts of , the housing market. if they want to buy a car to get to work because they are living in a neighborhood that is not where the jobs are, they are shut out of getting a reasonably reasonably priced loan for their car and they have to get a 25% interest rate loan, which presses on their finances.

many employers now check credit records. they will miss out on job opportunities. of course add to that the psychological stress of someone calling your cell phone or your home phone, your relatives on a daily basis to harass you about your debt. and there is a lot of suffering and that's bad. i think that is what the crisis is. we had people who went to school to improve themselves at our encouragement. we provided a lot of subsidies and told people the right thing to do was improve your self in school. as a result, they are suffering and it's a man-made crisis. that is what i think of as the student debt crisis. >> in terms of the magnitude, the mortgage crisis at the peak, the lending was -- the magnitude of the debt was close to two thirds of u.s. gdp. magnitude is not at that level, correct? mr. chopa: there is approximately 14 trillion outstanding mortgage debt.

in the subprime mortgage lending context, there was a set of risky features as part of those loans that led to some potential cataclysmic events. there was in fact a subprime private student loan market that really blossomed in the years of just one subprime mortgage lending. most of the lending that is occurring is in the federal loan market where fortunately people have access to these income driven repayment plans. i think that understanding how the mortgage market unraveled is important, but there are also important differences, and i think an important lesson is looking at servicing.

how in my old role at the cfpb we regulated both mortgage servicers and student loan servicers. i was quite struck particularly with the private student loan servicers at the same type of deficiencies. servicing is a tough business , but when it goes wrong for a borrower, it can really be quite devastating and it can lead to some suffering. i really encourage that there is a lot of interest in doing more to improve that piece of the puzzle. host: it sounds like both of you actually agree that this is not in the realm of the mortgage crisis in that sense. however, perhaps in addition to concerns about the impact on individuals, there are broader economic impacts in terms of economic growth. certainly some of the things you are suggesting, each of you, pointed to the fact there are

possibility that there might be more aggregate consequences we should be worry about. i wonder if each of you can comment on that. ms. dynarski: on that front, there is one fact i didn't explicitly put out there which is that the people who had the largest loans are the least likely to default on their loans. it is a straight-line relationship where the smallest loans are the ones most likely to default. the narrative tends to be loan debt is going up. it is $1 trillion, one $.2 $1.2 trillion. defaults are going up. it must be that one leads to the other. the fact is the debt most likely to default are like $5,000. these are not the numbers we think of when we say people now can't get married and can't buy homes because of this debt. people who have the most debt

are the people who are currently the winners in our society, people who graduate with a ba, masters degrees. they are the only people whose earnings have been growing steadily for the past decade. earnings of others folks have been dropping or flat. there is a set of people, these low skill, low income folks with fairly small debts who are suffering, but they have other debts as well. so we have a very large group of people who have terrible employment prospects. we don't have a sufficient safety net. they are a problem. their problems are the important ones. the student debt may have been the needle that broke the camels back. it's not the burden that is causing the main problem. mr. chopa: though i think your

analysis is right on who is hitting the default, but i think there are reasonable people who have asked questions. the extent to which people are graduating with higher levels of debt even if they are not defaulting, many of those graduates may actually be located in metro areas where cost-of-living, rent has gone up quite a bit. query as to whether -- are they paying higher student loan payments, higher in rent, maybe actually not experiencing a huge amount of wage growth, and does that interaction, which we don't know too much about, does that have an impact on their ability to hit some of the other milestones? some of the survey data of public opinion suggests having a lot of student debt might change the way people think about saving for a down payment, buying a home. we don't really know the

specifics of it and i think as , you have mentioned so many times, having better data about student debtors will help us really understand their problems , but i agree, i think mostly about the people who have defaulted. kind of like i think about the people not too far from here where there were very high levels of foreclosures. people need to recognize that yes, crisis from an economic term, maybe it's not there. but what happened to people and in their foreclosed -- when they lost their homes and happens to default from they this personal tragedy and , dealing with that is something we have to tackle.

ms. dynarski: every dollar someone is putting into a student loan is a dollar they cannot use to save. in that sense, it all has to add up in some way. the new york fed among others had been sort of developing, putting on a narrative that really pushed the idea that loans were reducing homeownership rates, for example. from this newer data that we have got, what looks like is going on is that more and more poor people are taking out loans. you see among most people who have loans, the homeownership is going down. this is a compositional effect. people who never could afford loans, the people who always used to borrow, their borrowing rates have not changed. it is a shift in the composition of the borrowers that includes a lot of people as opposed to the of the student

borrowers home owning. this data has given us a much clearer picture about what is going on. we have a good snapshot now of what happened from the late 1990's to the present. how are we going to make sure that we keep seeing this information as time goes on and this door were not close again? mr. chopa: part of the things many of my colleagues and i are thinking about are how can we be more transparent about the release of data and information? which we do with mortgages, and frankly the college scorecard , includesreferred to -- i encourage anybody who is interested in meditation to look at the college scorecard because it actually gives you a much more detailed view.

not only about debt, but about earnings. that is another side of the equation that can really help us think about what is the next level of analysis beyond not only where do i go to college, but where will that payoff? you are right that there is an increasing need to make data available and that scorecard was , a big piece of that and i think we will do more. host: i am always happy to contribute to a plug for the importance of data but the , important of helping people understand what the data is telling them so they can influence their own decisions in those ways. a number of your comments have really highlighted the interactions among dimensions of people's lives. the interactions among the different groups who are participating in the loan

markets is part of that complexity. in addition to student borrowers and various lenders, we have the colleges and the universities. some have said, and i believe there is actually research, including by the fed, that finds that as availability of student aid in student loans went up, colleges simply raise their raised their prices. that may be a kind of challenging dimensioned and i would like to hear from each of you your views about whether that is simply how things would unfold. support for the student aid went up and universities and colleges simply raise their prices so that doesn't really help us address the challenge. mr. chopa: i am not ultra-familiar with the literature on it, but my understanding is there is some disagreement and a mixed view about whether the impact of

additional aid and loans on the price of college. i will say though that it is important to remember that the published tuition and fees out there is not actually what a substantial portion of lower income people pay. i think with more aid, the net price for several years now has actually stabilized among many sectors of higher education. i don't know the answer to it , but it's obviously one that you would want to know. but i want to make sure it's clear that -- what is really the answer, we have to tailor the program's so they meet the policy goals and the policy goal is for people to be able to go to college and advance ahead. i think it goes to the question of the importance of research

and analysis is just increasing every single day. because frankly sometimes when you release more information, new questions arise. ms. dynarski: my read of the best evidence at this point is that for-profit colleges indeed raise their prices when grant aid and loans go up. their sticker price -- they don't give their own aid to people. they're not giving scholarships to people and their prices do go up when aid gets more generous. 80% of students attend public institutions. at those institutions, what drives price? how much money the states are giving to them. if you look at how much public institutions are spending per student, it has been pretty flat. what has changed is less of the money is coming from the states and more is coming from the students. it looks like cost is going up

, but it's who pays for it is now the students rather than the state taxpayers. there is some evidence that schools that provide their own scholarships when the pell grant goes up will scale back on their scholarships and ship them to other people who aren't eligible for those scholarships. the main action appears to be in the for-profits. host: thank you. let me shift gears just a little bit. i think that each of you have have talked about the proposals implemented inns order to address some of the aspects of the student loan crisis. in particular you have mentioned , the income-driven repayment plans and those allow borrowers to repay in installments and often over longer time periods. there have been proposals and susan, you have been want to propose this, of a management repayment plan through payroll

withholding and i would like to ask each of you how much of the problem do those kinds of policies really fix? mr. chopa: i personally think that in a world where borrowers can pay as a percentage of their income, it's not a cure-all to college affordability and the student debt, but it's an important weapon that a borrower can use to fight delinquency and default and avoid it by getting an affordable payment. i actually think that is a pretty good weapon and i want to , make sure that for anybody who you think a struggling about it, they should know about that and it's important they are able to easily enroll and reenroll each and every year. there have been some -- the president has directed the agencies to look into multi-year

certification of income-driven repayment plans. i would say for the purpose of tackling delinquency, it is powerful, and i urge people to figure out are they learning about it and give ideas about how to improve it. are there services telling them about it? if they are not, we need to fix that. ms. dynarski: the very fact we have one million people in default and the ranks continue to grow indicates that the system of income contingent loan repayment programs we have is not working. none of those people should be defaulting. if they are very low income, $18,000 a year, for example, they basically would be paying nothing at all. it comes back to where the

rubber hits the road. how do we actually implement these programs? and servicing sounds like such a boring topic, like loan servicing, boring. how do you work with borrowers to get them into a program that works for them? the very same issue came up with the mortgages. there is a big push for the mortgage companies to restructure loans. restructure the mortgages so people would have more reasonable payment plans and , where it fell apart was the implementation of it, getting the servicers to actually do it. that is happening right now as well. frankly i think that the big problem is the department of enormous owns this in portfolio of loans. it's essentially one of the biggest banks in the country. it's not a financial organization. it is very good at giving money to students and getting people to college and that is what it should be doing. it should not be in the service

servicing a trillion dollar portfolio of loans. i don't think the department of education knows how to do that. and i don't think that i want the department of education turning into an organization whose focus is collecting money from people. i think this business should be moving out of the department of education. what do you think of that? [laughter] mr. chopa: well -- [laughter] mr. chopa: i will say though that the issues of engaging borrowers and getting the incentives right is hard. especially when using private firms. there will be their own economic incentives. also, i would add that borrowers -- the process to walk through that, many borrowers need that

individualized counseling that i think sometimes is just hard to deliver. many companies may not be set up to do that. i don't really know what the right answer is. there have been -- ms. dynarski: they are not paid to do it. they have a contract with the department of education and if it's not paying them enough for the time that it takes to walk someone through an enrollment in an income-based program, that is a contracting failure. mr. chopa: what we saw in the mortgage market was that many of those servicers were working for other financial institutions or trust, and it did not work so well. so figuring out how that works -- but related to your point about payroll deductions maybe , there are ways to streamline the repayment issues and i know , you have done some work on

automating how that might work. i think those are all concepts that we have to really think about it what i want to make sure is very clear is when a borrower is having a tough time on their student loans, there may actually be bigger issues that they are dealing with financially speaking that might have more immediate consequences. for example, getting their car repossessed or making rent. we always have to remember that once people are in trouble, it's like a treadmill that sometimes gets faster and faster and faster. so figuring out how to deal with all of these mini explosions in your life is hard and that is why getting those repayment plans clear and that people know about it and can easily enroll in it is just critical. ms. dynarski: even if we had my dream of a payroll-based

progressive system, it would not deal with fraud. if there are institutions out there that are selling a product, charging people tuition, getting them to take out loans, but not actually educating them, that will not get fixed by this. the regulation of the for-profit colleges in particular will not be fixed by there being an income-based program. but how do we make sure people are getting the education they are paying for? that is a separate issue that cannot be dealt with by income-issued repayments. mr. chopa: just today, the ftc and the department of education took enforcement action related to the devry. so of course there are issues -- you are right. those repayment plans won't solve it. i guess that the other thing i

think is important to remember, there is the sense that everyone with student loans is having a tough time and i think that is , just not true. for many people who graduate, make good money, sign up for auto debit on their loans, they have a good experience with repaying. but there are -- ms. dynarski: it makes me very happy to pay my loan every month. [laughter] mr. chopa: the sense that they feel like they know what to do , whereas i think when people are really struggling, that is where it gets tough. host: we are now ready to go to the audience. the first question is actually from twitter. we have actually had a nice segue to it. we have been talking a lot about the repayment approaches and mentioned that that is not going to fix everything. this question is is it possible

to produce guidelines such as borrow no more than x dollars if you are getting a degree in a particular field or getting an associates degree? what are your views about that? [laughter] mr. chopa: i went first to last time. ms. dynarski: we essentially do have some of that in that we have annual limits for undergraduates. we have some caps on it. we don't have caps on other loans such as the parent plus loan. pretty much, parents can borrow the entire contribution that the formula says they are supposed to be making and that has been causing lots of problems. ditto with grad plus loans. should we do that? and would government to do it?

do it? i think it would be great if student to better information about what the payoff is to say a degree in education or social work or in fine arts that would guide them and how much they in how much they would borrow for that degree. on average, it's worth it to borrow to go to medical school and not so much for some other degrees. is the government going to do that? i think that is kind of what the college scorecard is intended to do. if the government ever going to have a hard caps? you are getting a degree in animation, not going to lend to you. i don't see it happening. we don't have that degree of regulation in our country. so i could see a sort of informal advising system trying to get that information. do i think practically that we could have major by major, school by school loan limits? i don't see it happening. mr. chopa: a lot of people

answer this through rules of thumb about you should roughly not borrow more than this. i think the challenge about doing that when it comes to a degree type -- bachelors versus associates -- there are significant variations in earnings within those degree types. so i think -- this is my own quick thinking -- when it comes to vocational training, certificates, where there is pretty clear understanding of what the type of job you might earn afterward -- i'm sorry, the salary you might earn based on that occupation, it may be simpler to come up with what they write a amount to borrow it borrow so it's comfortable to afford. i think when it comes to a number of undergraduates, particularly four-year bachelor degree, we have to acknowledge so many people don't really know what kind of profession they will pursue several years later.

that just makes huge complications in developing rules of thumb or regulating it. host: the second question, related to data, is what does the data tell us? what do we know about differences by race and what is the impact related to the hbcu? mr. chopra: i do not have that off the top of my head. some ofstanding is that the survey data suggests minorities, particularly african americans, borrow higher rates and more. the percentage of people borrowing and the average level of borrowing is higher.

that being said, my understanding is that there is not a similar framework like there is for mortgages, where we have much more granular information on how much people are borrowing and low-level data by race and ethnicity. now, that is as i understand. there is a long g andry of racial redlinin so forth, and there are requirements that race is included. describing that gave the insight we now have comes from administrative data the department of education has on student loans, including the fafsa. there is nowhere on their -- there for race.

nothing about race. is, you cancan say try to piece it together. if you look at who attends for profit institutions and community college, disproportionately are going to be non-white. hispanic, african-american. much populations also have lower wealth flows. for a given number of income, comparing an african-american family and a white family, they will have lower wealth. you need to have not only your parents but your parents' parents to have good incomes for many years. to not have had it seized and misappropriated in the institutional ways it has been in the u.s. mr. chopra: we know there are

disparities according to government data on what college areuates who are minorities earning after college versus white counterparts. there is a lot of mixture that raises serious questions about how we look at this in a nuanced way if we believe education is a vehicle the social mobility. host: clearly more work to be done to understand the gaps. corinthian,lure of what is the role of the government shutting down institutions versus letting the market take care of low performing schools? mr. chopra: when i was at the i was heavily involved in a lawsuit against corinthian which alleged a number of types of misconduct related to private loans.

obviously, they have shut down. and i think it has raised some questions about how does oversight in higher education work? this is a history of oversight referred to as "the triad." the federal government of all play and states role in doing so. legitimatebeen some questions asked about corinthian being credited to the very end. what is the appropriate role of each? ist of what i am working on thinking about the appropriate role of the state in protecting consumers from closures. i think you are asking a different question about the market closing it. are schools that do fail because of whatever it

may be -- financial mismanagement, not being able to provide good programs. i do worry there are some programs, particularly where there might not be the level of transparency we would like, honesty and how they represent programs to students, that some of them may live longer than the market would typically allow if students really new the whole truth about what the program would deliver. if you have an image in your mind of the for profit college industry as being a competitive private market, you are wrong. because they get 90% of their income from student aid programs, through loans from the government and grants from the government. there is something called the means they which

cannot get more than 90% of income from student aid. they tend to be right at the margin. they can get more money from people getting veterans benefits. that does not count in the 90-10 rule. that is one of the few ways we regulate the for profits. the idea that market forces will compete them out of existence, i do not think is accurate. the rule is a way to make sure institution cannot offer student aid, but it is a weak regulatory tool. one of the things i have been closely following for years is we cannot deny the fact that there are a number of people, post 9/11, who have

returned from service and have a appropriately deserved g.i. bill. i think because what you have rule, 90 ishe 90-10 only related to programs part of the higher education act. money from the g.i. bill and military-related programs do not count. the obama administration has actually supported closing that is, i think,use it leading to the targeting of those individuals. i think the last thing we want to do is have someone use their benefits on a program that is not going to help them get ahead. after world war ii, the g.i. bill was actually a key instrument of transitioning those from service into productive civilian life.

it was partbelieve of the engine of growing the economy, of getting people in jobs that pay. i think we have to fix that. host: ok. it is virtually impossible to discharge student loan debt through bankruptcy. that make the situation worse than the market crisis in some ways? what are your thoughts on that set of challenges? mr. chopra: the main area i have as it relates to changetcy is the 2005 which treated private student loans like federal student loans. federal student loans do have income-driven repayment. i am not a lawyer, but it is kind of like a chapter 13 repayment plan. private loans do not have that. in a study published by the

department of education, the cfpb showed that the change in the code did not lead to lower did it lead to expanded access to loans. because of that, it probably did not meet its intended goals. it is something that needs to really be looked at again as to whether it was an appropriate change. , i thinky, though bankruptcy is very well-known that it is not dischargeable. before about about many young people, even if they could not file, the otherbecause of effect it might have on credit. when it comes to federal student

loans, i would like to see that people are really able to get into the programs that help them avoid the liquids a. -- deliquency. mr. chopra: you cannot get -- ms. dynarski: you cannot get into an interest german plan for your mortgage. driven plan for your mortgage. you can do that with student loans by getting into an income-driven program. the rationale behind them not being discharged through bankruptcy is that in another five or 10 years, you have a good year. you have the education and at some point could be doing fine. a society, we want to make sure that people doing fine are contributing so they can be helping other people get access to college, right? we have a pool of money that comes from people who win and it works out.

let them contribute their money in taxes and long payments. pay that forward to the next generation to educate them. i would not want to see people doing strategic bankruptcies. where it is just a mechanism for the next deal. we want to make sure people are paying their fair share towards the commonwealth. host: this question, also from the audience, follows up on the comments you are making about how you want to encourage people to move forward into higher education in ways that really improve their opportunities for the future. how do weon is prevent students from over borrowing without discouraging students from enrolling in college in ways that improve their economic future? that is a delicate balancing

act. what are your thoughts about ways to get it right? ms. dynarski: i would say that for the students, the borrowers that i expressed concern about, the traditional access points for first-generation students, low income students, has been community colleges. public institutions. we protected students against high risks in making a bet on college is making those very cheap. we keep them cheap so people do not have to go into debt and can afford to experiment. they are not left with a big hangover they cannot afford later on. with the state pulling back on funding for public institutions, even public colleges have become more risky. because you have to borrow some.

returning to community colleges as being an essentially free access point for education is an important way to make sure that low income, first-generation folks can experiment with college. it is not going to fix everything. there will be people that go to private institutions and for profit institutions who are going to borrow. we still have to be thinking about how do we deal with repayments? how do we make a functioning loan system? having a vibrant, well functioning community college system is one way we keep that promise. , thehopra: to be clear completing of not or, you know, going to a community college and it not

asking out is not as grave if you borrowed a lot for a different type of school. in some ways, they provide a lower risk gateway for people to not borrow much but also, frankly, get that credential. pursue further study, they are able to get the wage increase. ms. dynarski: one dynamic we saw during the recession was people going to community colleges. they are being underfunded and oversubscribed. people cannot get into classes they want to take, the nursing program they want. for profits took advantage of that. we have strong evidence that when community colleges are underfunded, for profits grow. that is a problem that can be undone. the next time we have a recession or an event that pushes more people into school,

it will happen all over again. u.s. university system is often compared to systems in our counterparts in other industrial countries. frankly, the u.s. is a wealthier country than some of the countries that have not faced repayment challenges the u.s. is grappling with. what are the lessons? are there lessons we should be drawing from those experiences in terms of how to finance secondary educations? mr. chopra: i have not studied the international comparisons, viewy perhaps ill-informed is that most of the difference in borrowing and financing is the percentage of family income is much lower in other countries.

there were many countries, particularly in industrialized europe, that have universities that are federally funded in ways that keep tuition very affordable. in somew that countries, that has shifted quite a bit. i do not know the exact answer. it is possible the simple answer might explain a bunch of that. u.s. postki: the secondary system is a land of second and third chances. if you did not do well in high school, you can do well in community college. , there is, france restricted access to university. based on how you are performing in middle school, you will go to a high school that does or does not prepare you for university. the share of people going on to university is much lower.

peopleeeting with other from the higher ed group. we went to england and talked to our counterparts. -- graduation rates are astoundingly high because they restrict the number of people that can go to university. the best students go and graduate. it is less risky for the government to invest in them. it also means we are not taking a risk on the same number of people. that is the other structural difference. we give people the opportunity to take a risk. then we place all the risk on them. , what we aredly hearing is that it goes very badly. need to provide more in the way of insurance against things going badly. one way is to make it free. if you do not and up with a strong salary, you do not pay. functioning a well

income-based repayment plan would do. is howhe next question much of the problem is that the interest rates are just too high? has proposedren student loans at much lower interest rates. what do you think? that,opra: i understand from before 2012 or something, the rates were fixed at, i believe 6.8% was a common interest rate. , new federal student loans are tied to market conditions. lower.oday are much look, the interest rates are set by congress. if congress wants to lower or increase the rates, that is their prerogative.

people, interest accrual is a substantial part of what they repay. badly, theyruggling are not close to not just paying the interest but ever getting near the principal portion. it is one of the many issues about loan repayment that either , butes to default issues , andhave made the argument interest rates during the obama administration went down. people felt that was a more fair outcome, to be tied to the broader interest rate environment. ms. dynarski: i would say that lowering interest rates cuts costs for borrowers. that is undeniable. does it deal with default in a targeted way?

no. distress right now and you are saying, ok, over 10 years, i will reduce payments by $20 a month. that is not the most targeted way to help someone struggling right now with payments. $20,000ne has a debt of and you charge them 6.5% versus 4%, it will make a difference of $20 a month in repayments. it is not targeted. it will benefit everybody, including the people who have $100,000 in debt and are earning good money. they will see the benefits of that cut as well. itis not targeted in that does not get people to money when they are struggling or to the people that need it the most. a lot of the money goes to the people doing just fine. main concern about using that as a tool to reduce

distress in default. again, it reduces the total on that you pay over the life of a loan, which people want. ms. dynarski: it makes people happy to pay less for things. a controversial economic principle. host: unfortunately, this will be our last question. it is a different type of option to address the broader challenge. if we are worried about access to college and see student loans as an obstacle, why not make college free? taxes will increase, but wouldn't we be better off as a society? whychopra: i think that is there is an effort to make community college available and free or near free, to be that gateway. if we believe as a society that getting that credential is critical for that person's future, that is part of it.

you always have to think about the distributional effect. how do you make it free and who do you make it free for? but there is no question that the increase in college tuition has been something that feels like a real impediment to so many people to get ahead. they arefeel like putting a lot on the line and risking it and there is really no other option for them because going to college is the way to ensure against poverty for many people in the labor force. with is a tough -- dealing college costs is very personal to people because they felt like they were able to go to school. people say, 40 years ago, it was only $800. when you go to school, it feels like such a gateway to your life

, how you chart out your career. not only does it give you more earnings, but maybe it gives you more options in what you choose to pursue. , overan economist educationing higher is not just about a ticket to higher wages. it shapes how we are as citizens. mba thing. it is an [laughter] mr. chopra: i do feel that, though. it is more than just purchasing. it is not like buying a factored -- factory that produces a certain amount of widgets. it is who we are as citizens. host: i certainly want susan to n, but i will push you a little bit.

if i pull out one of the things you said at the beginning, it was that you would answer we should not make college free because of the distributional -- mr. chopra: for people who are lowerlly -- who income, the cost should not necessarily be an impediment. onould ask, and again, i am the financial server-side, would making college free come at the of limiting the ability to go? would it lead to lower pell grants? what is the trade-off? in actual policymaking, those are things you have to weigh. what are you losing by doing that? ck, but theivot ba data-driven approach to the right intervention to meet all sorts of goals, i think the

world we live in is not just philosophical. it is also about implementing costs and benefits. ms. dynarski: historically in the u.s., community college was free. in the 1960's and 1970's, tuition was nominal. asdeparted from that history the states have disinvested. free community college could be a return to where we were. should we make four-year institutions free? it would be expensive and poorly targeted. community colleges are where low income first-generation students go as their first entry point. that would be a way to target resources on the people who most need education as a form of economic mobility. host: unfortunately, we are out

of time. i am sorry we did not get to all the questions. i want to thank all of you for coming and participating by offering such a wide range of questions to our panelists. i would like to thank our panelists for a informative and wide-ranging set of perspectives. please join me in thanking both of them further comments. -- for their comments. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] this week on c-span, we are featuring programs on the increase of drug abuse in america and the situation of the current supreme court vacancy. eastern, with the abuse of prescription drugs on the rise, we look at the handling of the issue from health experts, senate,ddicts, and the

including comments from president obama and ted cruz. >> it is certainly not going to the washington dc that solve this problem. be friends and family, churches, charities. loved ones, treatment centers. people working. to help those who are struggling overcome addiction. i made this aa: priority for my administration. we released our first national drug control strategy and followed that up in 2011 with the abuse prevention plan. we are implementing those plans and partnering with communities to prevent drug overdose deaths and help people get treatment. >> thursday at 6:00, with an apparent impasse between

, andrats, the white house the congress over the supreme court nomination, we look at the process of nomination to the supreme court. >> confirmation hearings, no ,atter how long, how thorough can only provide a sufficient basis for determining if a nominee merits a seat on the supreme court. >> a thoughtful senators should realize that any benefit of borrowing an ideological opponent from the court is not likely to outweigh the damage to the court's institutional standard. ideological opposition to a nominee from one end of the political spectrum is likely to opposition to later nominations from the opposite end. >> these are some of the

programs featured this week on c-span. booktv in on c-span2, primetime with a look at books on military and national security issues. , a recent symposium on the life and legacy of abraham lincoln. starting tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span2 and c-span3. c-span, then supreme court cases that shaped history come to life with "landmark cases: historic supreme court decisions," which explores constitutional dramas behind some of the most significant decisions in history. >> this is different. the constitution is a political document. but it is also a law.

if it is a law, you have the court to tell you what it means. anti-ps the ultimate recedental case. >> who should make the decisions? er versus new york, the supreme court said it should make the decision. we will look at the slaughterhouse cases. washington journal, the director for the human rights campaign and the director for the human rights partnership will discuss the perspective was sitting from lgbt opponents who have used such opponents dispute

opponents as the government target than alex rogers of national journal will be on to talk about gop presidential candidates' efforts to woo delegates. watch "washington a.m.al" beginning at 7:00 eastern thursday morning. join the discussion. >> earlier today, president obama and vice president biden delivered remarks at the annual white house easter prayer breakfast in the state dining room. this is half an hour. [applause]

vice president biden: good morning, everyone. this is one of our favorite events. and it's an honor to be with so many faith leaders and lay faithful this one last time for easter in the white house -- with us, anyway. audience: noooo -- vice president biden: well, i'll tell you what, it's been a great honor. [laughter] it's been a great honor. he's not bad to work for either, you know what i mean? [laughter] you know, my wife, jill, whenever she wants to make sure i get the message that she wants to deliver to me that morning, literally, she tapes it on the mirror while i'm shaving. [laughter] you think i'm joking -- i'm not joking. and about a year and a half ago -- a little longer, actually, almost two years ago -- she taped a quote on my mirror at home in wilmington which is still there, and it's a quote from kierkegaard.

he said, "faith sees best in the dark." faith sees best in the dark. and all of you know better than anyone that faith is a gift from god. because faith works best when you're the least. faith works best when you're most frightened, in my view. and faith works best when you're not exactly sure where to go. and i know there's a lot of fear and unease around the world. the president and i travel around the world a lot, and all you got to do is just look at the recent attacks in belgium and turkey and pakistan. and while fear is understandable, exploiting that fear is absolutely unacceptable. when innocent people are ostracized simply because of their faith, when we turn our backs on the victims of evil and persecution, it's just wrong.

so it's up to us -- and you've been the leaders in this country -- to recognize that fear, but also try to allay that fear, and to help people understand that what unites us is a lot more than what divides us. and it's embodied in just not what we believe but what we say. we all practice the same basic faith but different faiths. i happen to be a practicing catholic, and i grew up learning from the nuns and the priests who taught me what we used to call catholic social doctrine. but it's not fundamentally different than a doctrine of any of the great confessional faiths. it's what you do to the least among us that you do unto me. it's we have an obligation to one another. it's we cannot serve ourselves at the expense of others, and

that we have a responsibility to future generations. all faiths have a version of these teachings, and we all practice and preach that we should practice what we say. opening doors to the victims of war, as the president has been trying to do -- a war of terrorism and oppression. accepting people of all faiths and respecting their right to practice their religion as they choose, or choose not to practice any religion. resisting the urge to let our fears overcome what we value most -- our openness, our freedom, and our freedom to practice our faith. and a faith that sees and shines light in dark moments is what you've preached. and my favorite hymn in my church is based on the 91st psalm, mr. president -- it's "on eagle's wings." and it's my wish for all of you.

you may remember the refrain. it says he will raise you up on eagle's wings, and bear you on the breath of dawn. make you to shine like the sun, and hold you in the palm of his hand." that's my wish for all of you because we desperately need you at this time to reinforce a sense of confidence and faith in the american people, to appeal, as lincoln said, to their better angels. and i'm grateful to have stood by someone these last seven years who understands this -- and i mean this -- understands it to his core. it's stamped in his dna. it's who he is. i've served with eight presidents. i've never been with anyone who has more character than this man, and has faith. so, ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to my friend and yours -- the president of the united states, barack obama. [applause]

president obama: thank you. thank you so much. thank you. please, everybody have a seat. well, good morning, everybody. audience: good morning! president obama: welcome to the white house. it is so good to be with you again. we had to change up the format a little bit because i think i've got 30 world leaders for dinner tomorrow -- [laughter] in an effort to constrain the threat of nuclear materials getting into the wrong hand. so it's a good cause -- [laughter] but when you have folks over -- i'm sure all of you have the same experience -- you've got to clean up -- [laughter] do a little vacuuming, make sure that -- you know.

well, to those of you who have kids, make sure that they didn't do something when you weren't looking that the guests will discover. [laughter] some vegetables they didn't want to eat. [laughter] so we're not at our usual round table of fellowship, but the spirit is still here. and i know that i speak for all of you in feeling lucky that we've had such an extraordinary vice president in joe biden -- [applause] whose faith has been tested time and time again, and has been able to find god in places that sometimes, for a lot of us, is hard to see.

so i'm blessed to have him as a friend as well as a colleague. this is a little bittersweet -- my final easter prayer breakfast as president. so i want to begin by thanking all of you for all your prayers over the year -- i know they have kept us going. it has meant so much to me. it's meant so much to my family. i want to thank you most of all for the incredible ministries that you're doing all around the country, because we've had a chance to work together and partner with you, and we have seen the good works -- the deeds, and not just words -- that so many of you have carried out. and since 2010, this has become a cherished tradition. i know all of you have had a very busy holy week, and the week leading up to holy week, and the week before that. and i had a wonderful easter

morning at the alfred street baptist church -- and i want to thank pastor wesley for his leadership. pastor, outstanding sermon. [applause] he was telling a few stories of his youth, talking about going to the club. [laughter] i'm just saying. [laughter] and since he's also from chicago, i knew the club he was talking about. [laughter] but it all led to a celebration of the resurrection, i want to be clear. [laughter] it started with the club, but it ended up with the resurrection. [laughter]

and his outstanding and handsome young sons are with him here. and so we want to thank him for an outstanding service. here at the white house, we have not had to work as hard as all of you, but we did have to deal with the easter egg roll. [laughter] imagine thousands and thousands of children hopped up on sugar -- [laughter] running around your backyard, surrounded by mascots and muppets and shaquille o'neal. [laughter] for 12 hours. [laughter] that was my easter weekend. [laughter] so we set aside this morning to come together in prayer, and reflection, and quiet. [laughter] now, as joe said, in light of recent events, this gathering takes on more meaning.

around the world, we have seen horrific acts of terrorism, most recently brussels, as well as what happened in pakistan -- innocent families, mostly women and children, christians and muslims. and so our prayers are with the victims, their families, the survivors of these cowardly attacks. and as joe mentioned, these attacks can foment fear and division. they can tempt us to cast out the stranger, strike out against those who don't look like us, or pray exactly as we do. and they can lead us to turn our backs on those who are most in need of help and refuge. that's the intent of the terrorists, is to weaken our

faith, to weaken our best impulses, our better angels. and pastor preached on this this weekend, and i know all of you did, too, as i suspect, or in your own quiet ways were reminded if easter means anything, it's that you don't have to be afraid. we drown out darkness with light, and we heal hatred with love, and we hold on to hope. and we think about all that jesus suffered and sacrificed on our behalf -- scorned, abandoned, shunned, nail-scarred hands bearing the injustice of his death and carrying the sins

of the world. and it's difficult to fathom the full meaning of that act. scripture tells us, "for god so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." because of god's love, we can proclaim "christ is risen!" because of god's love, we have been given this gift of salvation. because of him, our hope is not misplaced, and we don't have to be afraid. and as christians have said through the years, "we are easter people, and alleluia is our song!" we are easter people, people of hope and not fear. now, this is not a static hope. this is a living and breathing hope.

it's not a gift we simply receive, but one we must give to others, a gift to carry forth. i was struck last week by an image of pope francis washing feet of refugees -- different faiths, different countries. and what a powerful reminder of our obligations if, in fact, we're not afraid, and if, in fact, we hope, and if, in fact, we believe. that is something that we have to give. his holiness said this easter sunday, god "enables us to see with his eyes of love and compassion those who hunger and thirst, strangers and prisoners, the marginalized and the outcast, the victims of oppression and violence." to do justice, to love kindness -- that's what all of you

collectively are involved in in your own ways each and every day. feeding the hungry. healing the sick. teaching our children. housing the homeless. welcoming immigrants and refugees. and in that way, you are teaching all of us what it means when it comes to true discipleship. it's not just words. it's not just getting dressed and looking good on sunday. but it's service, particularly for the least of these. and whether fighting the scourge of poverty or joining with us to work on criminal justice reform and giving people a second chance in life, you have been on the front lines of delivering god's message of love and compassion and mercy for his children. and i have to say that over the last seven years, i could not have been prouder to work with you. we have built partnerships that have transcended partisan affiliation, that have transcended individual

congregations and even faiths, to form a community that's bound by our shared ideals and rooted in our common humanity. and that community i believe will endure beyond the end of my presidency, because it's a living thing that all of you are involved with all around this country and all around the world. and our faith changes us. i know it's changed me. it renews in us a sense of possibility. it allows us to believe that although we are all sinners, and that at time we will falter, there's always the possibility of redemption. every once in a while, we might get something right, we might do some good, that there's the presence of grace, and that we,

in some small way, can be worthy of this magnificent love that god has bestowed on us. you remind me all of that each and every day. and you have just been incredible friends and partners, and i could not be prouder to know all of you. i thank you for sharing in this fellowship. i pray that our time together will strengthen our souls and fortify our faith and renew our spirit. that we will continue to build a nation and a world that is worthy of his many blessings. and i want to remind you all that after a good chunk of sleep when i get out of here, i'm going to be right out there with you doing some work. [laughter] so you're not rid of me yet, even after we're done with the presidency.

but i am going to take three, four months where i just sleep. [laughter] and i hope you all don't mind that. so with that, i would like to invite reverend doctor derrick harkins for our opening prayer. [applause] rev. harkins: thank you, reverend dr. president. [laughter] shall we pray? o what manner of love has been given on to us that we would be called the children of god. god of grace and god of glory, o how we thank you for the privilege of being gathered together this morning. faith leaders from across this

nation humbly coming before you in prayer. in this house, the center of so much that is powerful, we remember that uses the power of mercy and compassion. yours is the power of loving justice and reconciliation. indeed, our world is burdened by bothnce, pain, and sorrow, in far-flung places and nearby city streets. but by your strength, o god, by the promise made real that life is s able to overcome death that the gloom of freddie gives way to the joy of sunday, we may be strengthened to break the yoke of oppression and satisfy the needs of the af flicted. that we may hear

those that have been ignored, those pushed into the shadows and margins of life. embolden our voices so that our course of hope is more resonant than the rising, harsh strains of discord and intolerance. strengthen our hands that we would be repairers of the breach. dy ourudy our feet -- stea fee for the yet unfolding journey. to do theace, o god, deed that we know christ to be done. continue to hold our president barack obama, our vice president joe biden, and their family in your sustaining, loving, and protective embrace. of we ask it all in the name jesus the christ, the one in whom we live and move and have our being, the one who was broken every barrier, every wall, down.

and that the people of god say -- audience: amen. gentlemen, howard gospel choir. [applause] ♪

prayer.r, this is our ♪ fall on me come on, is that your prayer this morning, that he will let some drops now fall. and we say even me. ♪

♪ [applause] >> this week on c-span we are featuring programs on the increase of drug abuse in america and the situation of the current supreme court vacancy. today at 7:00 p.m. eastern, with the abuse of prescription drugs and heroin on the rise, we look at the government's handling of the issue, from health experts

and former addicts, and the u.s. senate, including comments from president obama and presidential candidate ted cruz. is certainly it not going to be washington, d.c., that steps in and solve these. be friends and family, churches, charities, loved ones, treatment centers, people working to help those who are struggling to overcome their addiction. pres. obama: i have made this a priority for my administration. in 2010 we released our first national drug control strategy. we follow that up in 2011 with a prescription drug abuse prevention plan. we are implement in those plans and partnering -- implementing