Given the increasing expectation that students should bear most of the college-cost burden, loans have been the largest form of financial aid since 1982, a shift that has been particularly hard on needy students. Loan-aversion has contributed to the access problem for these students, while facilitating more privileged students' ability to attend more expensive four-year colleges then they could otherwise afford. As the debt load of matriculated poor and minority students rises, so too do their dropout rates. The student-loan program prevents loan-burdened four-year-college graduates from reaping equal returns on their education as classmates who graduate debt free--not simply because of loan payments but because of a differential capacity for capital accumulation.