‘That’s How Bad Colleges Are’: Ramsey Slams Degrees Before Couple’s $87,816 Payoff
Dave Ramsey cited a damning college completion statistic to argue against student loans, then his own show's debt-free stage told a very different story about borrowed credentials and six-figure income jumps.
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On the August 27, 2026 episode of The Ramsey Show, Dave Ramsey took a swing at higher education while arguing against student loans: “Only 57% of the people that start college finish. That’s not even half right. That’s how bad colleges are.” Twenty-four hours later, the same show’s debt-free stage featured Ben and Natalie from Peoria, Illinois, who paid off $87,816 in 18 months. The debt was all student loans from Natalie’s physical therapy doctorate, and that borrowed degree is precisely what took their household from $35,341 in their first year of marriage to $152,000 by payoff. If you take Ramsey’s completion-rate line as a reason not to borrow, you risk skipping the single financial move that funded the story his own show applauded.
Verdict: The Completion Stat Is Half the Equation
The 57% figure is a real number, but treating it as a case against student debt drops the variable that matters most: what finishing is worth. Borrowing for a credential is an expected-value calculation that multiplies your odds of finishing by the income lift the credential produces, then compares that to the loan cost.
Run Ben and Natalie’s math. Household income moved from $35,341 to $70,000 once Natalie started earning as a licensed physical therapist, then to $152,000 by the time the loans were gone. That is roughly a six-figure annual income jump attributable to the doctorate. Against a principal of $87,816, a single year of the post-degree income lift more than covers the balance on a pre-tax basis. They cleared it in 18 months by living on Ben’s paycheck alone and throwing all of Natalie’s income at the debt.
Compare that to Ramsey’s alternative pitch from the day before. He told a newly credentialed welder earning $18 an hour she was “dramatically underpaid, like half of what she should be paid in welding” and could “make this at Target stacking boxes without any education.” Even at double that hourly rate, annual pay lands well below where Natalie’s household now sits. The trades pitch works on its own terms. It fails as a universal substitute for a credential that unlocks a licensed clinical wage.
The Variable That Flips the Answer
The factor that determines whether student debt pays is the wage differential the specific credential produces, weighted by your realistic odds of finishing that specific program.
Two scenarios make this concrete. Scenario A: a general-studies bachelor’s from a program with a low completion rate, financed with $60,000 in loans, that leads to a job paying $42,000. The lift over a high-school-only wage might be $8,000 a year. Loan servicing at that gap can take a decade or more, and dropout risk means many borrowers carry the debt without the wage. Scenario B: a licensed clinical doctorate like Natalie’s, where program completion rates for accepted students typically run far above the national average and the post-license wage is roughly triple the pre-degree wage. At $87,816 borrowed against an $82,000 household income jump from her earnings alone, the payback window is measured in months, not decades.
For context on the stakes across the whole borrower pool, the CFPB reports total outstanding student loan balances of $1.73 trillion in credit records, plus $108 billion in defaulted federal loans as of June 2025. That aggregate hides enormous variance in outcomes. Averages will not tell you whether your specific loan is Scenario A or Scenario B.
What to Do Before You Sign the Promissory Note
- Pull the program’s actual completion rate, not the national 57% figure. Use the Department of Education’s College Scorecard for the specific school and major. A program at 85% completion is a different bet than one at 40%.
- Look up median earnings for graduates of that program on College Scorecard, then subtract the wage you would earn without the credential. That gap, not the tuition sticker, is the number you are financing.
- Cap borrowing at roughly one year of expected post-graduation income. Ben and Natalie’s $87,816 sat below Natalie’s licensed annual earning power, which is why the 18-month payoff worked.
- Model the payoff on one income if you are married or planning to be. The couple wiped the balance by living on Ben’s income and directing Natalie’s paycheck entirely to the loans, all while taking in a foster daughter, then her sister in July, with a biological son due in October.
The completion-rate warning is worth hearing as one input among several. Borrow for a credential whose wage lift clears the debt inside a defined window, or do not borrow at all.
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