Policy Forum: Five Reasons To Be Skeptical About the Repayment of Canada's Student Loans Through the Tax System

Abstract

Since the world's first tax-system-based income-contingent repayment system for the repayment of student loans was introduced in Australia in 1989, there have been suggestions that Canada should adopt a similar system. But there has been little discussion of the practicalities involved in introducing a new system where there is joint federal and provincial involvement and where the new system would replace a pre-existing and generous, if incomplete, form of income-contingent repayment (ICR). Joint federal and provincial involvement is a problem unique to Canada, and replacement of the existing system becomes problematic when that system is more generous than the proposed alternative. In this article, we identify five key stumbling blocks that make us skeptical about the prospects of switching to tax-system-based repayment of student loans in Canada: the need for intergovernmental cooperation; additional responsibilities for the tax authorities; potential costs to employers from further complicating the withholding system; challenges if the new system were to try to fit the current program parameters into the tax system efficiently; and the political challenge of gaining student support. While there are certainly benefits to administering ICR through the tax system, these need to be weighed against the costs.