Re: "nationalized the student loan program."
^Banks would get ALL of the loan money from the government, charge a higher interest rate to students, skim nearly $70B for their own profit, and the government would cover all defaults!^
This is horse manure. The loans were private funds guaranteed by the government, with a small subsidy thrown in to keep interest rates below market levels. The FFEL used to loan out about $57 million a year, which implies that the $61 billion over ten years in subsidy savings by nationalizing the program reflects a subsidy rate of about 10 percent.
I recommend looking up the FFEL program and how it worked.