Currently there is more than a trillion dollars worth of outstanding student loan debt, and that's not a sum set to shrink anytime soon: an article in Marketwatch says that, in fact, this figure grows by $3,055 per second. An article in CNBC, meanwhile, says this spiraling debt is beginning to affect other parts of the economy that keep it humming along smoothly: for instance, said CNBC, people are less likely to start a new business, purchase a new home, or have children if they are mired in student loan debt, which then carry their own spiraling effects on yet more key economic drivers. CNBC notes that, for example, 57 percent of first-time homebuyers said debt was significantly impeding their ability to save money, which tracks neatly with another statistic showing that 34.6 percent of people under 45 own their own homes, versus 43.3 percent ten years ago. High amounts of debt is also starting to drive students into higher paying fields like technology and finance, leaving shortages in other critically important, but lower-paying, professions such as early childhood education, said CNBC. While this may not necessarily be the start of a new financial crisis just yet, policy makers fear that, at the very least, it will be a drag on the economy that impedes long term growth, said CNBC.