The gainful employment rule enforces the Higher Education Act's requirement that all career education programs receiving federal student aid "prepare students for gainful employment in a recognized occupation." The rule uses debt-to-earnings ratios to assess whether career education programs at public, nonprofit, and for-profit colleges are leaving their graduates with reasonable debt burdens. Programs that exceed allowable thresholds--those consistently leaving their graduates with more debt than they can repay--must improve or lose eligibility for federal funding. The Department of Education has proposed rescinding the gainful employment rule completely, which would be costly for both students and taxpayers. In fact, a single round of the Department's data showed that more than 350,000 students graduated from the worst performing career education programs with nearly $7.5 billion in student loan debt. Those programs, rated as "failing" or "zone" in the existing gainful employment debt-to-earnings standard, would eventually lose access to federal financial aid if they did not improve. The the information provided in this table shows how much graduates borrowed to attend the worst-performing career education programs in each state. Details of the methodology and data limitations are included.