I couldn't resist crunching more numbers from the Federal Reserve's data set on student loan delinquencies that I had posted about here. Before diving into the details, here are a few quick points:
- Overall, more than half of U.S. counties (56%) had more than 10% of their active student loan borrowers delinquent more than 90 days as of June 30, 2009.
- Message to state and federal politicians: If you haven't heard from your constituents about their student loan struggles, you might expect to shortly.
- Looked at on a state-by-state basis, four states (Kentucky, Arizona, Mississippi and Delaware) had more than 90% of their counties with a double-digit number of active student loan borrowers more than 90 days delinquent. (Note that Delaware has only three counties and had delinquency rates between 10%-12%).
- Looked at on a regional basis, the South seems to have the most counties with high student borrower delinquency rates, with 13 of the 15 states at the bottom of the list from that region.
- Ideally, the Fed data would have included the gross numbers used to calculate the delinquency rate (for example, 1,000 delinquent loans out of 10,000 active loans for a 10% delinquency rate) to enable a more robust state-by-state analysis.
Here is a table which shows the percentage of counties in each state with a given delinquency rate (For example, in North Dakota, 96% of the counties in that state had active student borrower delinquency rates of less than 10%, while 4% of the counties had a delinquency rate between 10 and 19%):
| State | Region | Under 10% | 10% to 19% | 20% to 29% | 30% to 39% | 40%+ |
| Connecticut | Northeast | 100% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| North Dakota | Midwest | 96% | 4% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Massachusetts | Northeast | 93% | 7% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Minnesota | Midwest | 93% | 7% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| New York | Northeast | 92% | 8% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| New Jersey | Northeast | 86% | 14% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Wyoming | West | 85% | 15% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Washington | West | 83% | 17% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Rhode Island | Northeast | 80% | 20% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Wisconsin | Midwest | 80% | 19% | 0% | 1% | 0% |
| Maine | Northeast | 75% | 25% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| South Dakota | Midwest | 75% | 19% | 6% | 0% | 0% |
| Hawaii | West | 75% | 25% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Nebraska | Midwest | 71% | 29% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Iowa | Midwest | 70% | 28% | 2% | 0% | 0% |
| Pennsylvania | Northeast | 70% | 28% | 1% | 0% | 0% |
| Illinois | Midwest | 70% | 29% | 1% | 0% | 0% |
| Vermont | Northeast | 64% | 36% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Idaho | West | 64% | 36% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Oregon | West | 64% | 36% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Maryland | South | 63% | 38% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Kansas | Midwest | 62% | 35% | 3% | 0% | 0% |
| Nevada | West | 62% | 31% | 8% | 0% | 0% |
| New Hampshire | Northeast | 60% | 40% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| California | West | 59% | 41% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Alaska | West | 58% | 37% | 5% | 0% | 0% |
| Virginia | South | 52% | 41% | 6% | 1% | 0% |
| Michigan | Midwest | 50% | 48% | 2% | 0% | 0% |
| Utah | West | 46% | 50% | 4% | 0% | 0% |
| Colorado | West | 44% | 50% | 6% | 0% | 0% |
| Indiana | Midwest | 43% | 57% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Montana | West | 42% | 55% | 3% | 0% | 0% |
| Ohio | Midwest | 42% | 58% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| North Carolina | South | 31% | 65% | 4% | 0% | 0% |
| Oklahoma | South | 30% | 64% | 6% | 0% | 0% |
| Missouri | Midwest | 29% | 62% | 7% | 1% | 1% |
| Georgia | South | 27% | 65% | 7% | 1% | 0% |
| West Virginia | South | 25% | 64% | 11% | 0% | 0% |
| Louisiana | South | 20% | 63% | 17% | 0% | 0% |
| Texas | South | 20% | 68% | 11% | 2% | 0% |
| Florida | South | 18% | 72% | 6% | 3% | 1% |
| Tennessee | South | 16% | 76% | 6% | 1% | 1% |
| Alabama | South | 15% | 66% | 18% | 0% | 0% |
| New Mexico | West | 14% | 68% | 18% | 0% | 0% |
| Arkansas | South | 13% | 63% | 23% | 0% | 1% |
| South Carolina | South | 11% | 83% | 7% | 0% | 0% |
| Kentucky | South | 7% | 62% | 30% | 2% | 0% |
| Arizona | West | 7% | 93% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Mississippi | South | 6% | 67% | 22% | 4% | 1% |
| Delaware | South | 0% | 100% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
If you are interested in the counties with the highest and lowest 90 day student loan delinquencies by state, here is that list:
| State | County Name | High Rate | County name | Low Rate | ||
| Alabama | Greene | 27.22% | Fayette | 3.85% | ||
| Alaska | Wade Hampton | 22.03% | Nome and Yukon-Koyuku | 0% | ||
| Arizona | Apache | 18.30% | Greenlee | 6.35% | ||
| Arkansas | Woodruff | 41.38% | Madison | 2.20% | ||
| California | Amador | 17.63% | Mariposa | 4.79% | ||
| Colorado | Bent | 25.74% | Lake | 2.04% | ||
| Connecticut | New Haven | 9.09% | Tolland | 5.36% | ||
| Delaware | Kent | 12.15% | New Castle | 10.14% | ||
| Florida | Hamilton | 40.66% | Lafayette | 4.44% | ||
| Georgia | Evans | 38.24% | Fannin | 3.57% | ||
| Hawaii | Kauai | 15.52% | Maui | 7.57% | ||
| Idaho | Benewah | 17.27% | Clearwater | 1.47% | ||
| Illinois | Alexander | 20.83% | Gallatin | 0.00% | ||
| Indiana | Jasper | 16.07% | Ohio | 2.17% | ||
| Iowa | Davis | 21.77% | Howard | 1.23% | ||
| Kansas | Greenvood | 21.43% | Clay | 1.08% | ||
| Kentucky | Knox | 34.96% | Elliott | 4.35% | ||
| Louisiana | Madison | 29.88% | Cameron | 5.61% | ||
| Maine | Piscataquis | 15.46% | Franklin | 4.86% | ||
| Maryland | Kent | 16.49% | Carroll | 5.20% | ||
| Massachusetts | Nantucket | 12.35% | Hampshire | 4.91% | ||
| Michigan | Lake | 22.60% | Alger | 1.52% | ||
| Minnesota | Mahnomen | 14.67% | Rock | 1.38% | ||
| Mississippi | Quitman | 53.33% | Greene | 5.81% | ||
| Missouri | Douglas | 45.45% | Ozark | 0.00% | ||
| Montana | Big Horn | 21.21% | Valley | 2.31% | ||
| Nebraska | Stanton | 17.93% | Holt | 0.71% | ||
| Nevada | Pershing | 20.93% | White Pine | 5.36% | ||
| New Hampshire | Belknap | 14.72% | Grafton | 6.65% | ||
| New Jersey | Essex | 12.12% | Hunterdon | 3.52% | ||
| New Mexico | Mora | 22.45% | Los Alamos | 0.82% | ||
| New York | Bronx | 13.07% | Saratoga | 5.06% | ||
| North Carolina | Gates | 25.00% | Perquimans | 1.32% | ||
| North Dakota | Mountrail | 16.81% | Benson | 0% | ||
| Ohio | Pike | 18.13% | Monroe | 2.58% | ||
| Oklahoma | Latimer | 24.66% | Alfalfa | 2.60% | ||
| Oregon | Linn | 14.29% | Wallowa | 2.25% | ||
| Pennsylvania | Sullivan | 29.23% | Snyder | 3.70% | ||
| Rhode Island | Providence | 10.12% | Washington | 5.25% | ||
| South Carolina | Allendale | 28.57% | Saluda | 6.15% | ||
| South Dakota | Shannon | 29.66% | Hutchinson | 0.69% | ||
| Tennessee | Meigs | 50.00% | Hancock and Van Buren | 0.00% | ||
| Texas | San Augustine | 39.13% | Franklin | 1.64% | ||
| Utah | Kane | 24.32% | Morgan | 4.69% | ||
| Vermont | Essex | 13.59% | Grand Isle | 5.00% | ||
| Virginia | Covington | 30.51% | Clarke | 1.38% | ||
| Washington | Ferry | 12.82% | Adams | 4.52% | ||
| West Virginia | Hardy | 26.67% | Pendleton | 3.03% | ||
| Wisconsin | Waushara | 34.29% | Lincoln | 1.91% | ||
| Wyoming | Fremont | 17.63% | Sublette | 1.53% |
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