WASHINGTON - The remains of The Department of Education announced today that it is introducing a sweeping new portfolio of income-driven repayment plans to replace the SAVE program, which sunsets July 1. The flagship offering, provisionally titled "The Indenture," represents a bold pivot in federal student lending philosophy—moving away from income-based calculations and toward what DOE officials describe as "a more holistic collateral framework," a phrase that never appeared in policy papers before 9 a.m. today.
Under the Indenture plan, borrowers must assemble what the department calls a "repayment tribunal." The tribunal comprises a notary public, a certified public accountant, and—and this is crucial—a state-licensed spiritual medium who will conduct a preliminary séance to "establish metaphysical clarity" regarding the borrower's debt capacity. The medium's fee is not covered.
"The Indenture is fiscally responsible," said Dr. Arnie Lipton, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Debt Actualization at the DOE, speaking from his office in the Ronald Reagan Building. "Previous programs attempted to measure debt burden through crude metrics like 'income' and 'ability to repay.' We've moved beyond that. The Indenture measures debt through a more sophisticated instrument: binding intergenerational entanglement."
The plan's centerpiece is a set of naming rights. In exchange for a 0% interest rate—currently the lowest available in the federal portfolio—borrowers cede the perpetual right to name their firstborn child. The DOE retains this right indefinitely and may assign it to the government contractor responsible for loan servicing. Early projections suggest the servicer will name approximately 47,000 children annually, primarily variants of "FEDLOANS" (FedLoan, Fed-Loans, Feddie, and the unisex "Servicer") to establish brand recognition in the demographic cohort known as "The Splurge Generation."
The most popular variant of the Indenture plan—the "Standard 40," which caps repayment at 40 years—includes additional requirements: quarterly blood samples (collected by a DOE-authorized phlebotomist; costs subsidized), a signed affidavit attesting that the borrower has "reflected deeply and with honest self-reckoning" on their undergraduate major, and a biannual survey in which borrowers rate their regret on a scale of 1 to 10. A score below 6 triggers additional paperwork.
"We found that regret data correlated strongly with on-time payment," explained Michelle Satterfield, Chief Economist for the Student Loan Portfolio Division. "The more regretful a borrower is about their educational choices, the more motivated they are to pay the federal government money. It's a virtuous cycle. We have a dashboard named that."
The Indenture plan also includes a novel provision known as "equity participation." In exchange for deferred interest accrual during months 1–24, borrowers grant the federal government a 3% minority stake in their net worth as of age 65, adjusted for inflation. A DOE calculator—available on the renovated StudentLoans.gov website, which now requires three-factor authentication (PIN, retinal scan, and a voice sample of the borrower reading the sentence "I understand this is legally binding") — allows borrowers to estimate the present value of their future selves.
"People ask me, 'Gus, isn't this basically indentured servitude?'" said Dr. Lipton at the press conference, which was held via Zoom in a room with no windows that looked like a bunker. "And I say: no. Indentured servitude involved a defined end date. This is much more flexible."
The repayment tribunal requirement has already generated anxiety among borrowers trying to understand eligibility. A spirit medium contacted by this newsdesk—who identified herself only as "Cassandra," charged $250 for a 15-minute consultation, and would not accept Venmo—explained that the tribunal is meant to prevent "spiritually unready" borrowers from over-leveraging themselves.
"The séance serves a gatekeeping function," Cassandra said, waving a bundle of sage over a crystal. "We're here to make sure the Indenture is truly binding. In the mystical sense. The government reimburses nothing."
The Indenture plan has attracted attention from financial advisors, who generally regard it as a lateral move at best.
"Look," said Brett Cornelius, Senior Wealth Strategist at Pinnacle Advisory Group in Manhattan. "If you're making $60,000 a year and carrying $120,000 in student debt, the Indenture might actually save you money compared to the old income-driven plans. You get 0% interest. The naming rights thing—most people don't have kids. The equity stake is complicated, but if you die before 65, the government doesn't collect. It's a bet, basically. On you not getting rich." Cornelius added: "The blood tests are annoying, but that's where we are. I had one client who tried to game it with a dog. They knew. They always know."
Wall Street's reaction to the Indenture announcement was muted but not hostile. The student loan servicing sector—a sleepy corner of the financial markets dominated by three mega-firms and a handful of smaller players—experienced a 40-minute rally after the DOE's 10 a.m. press conference. Servicers, who stand to inherit naming rights to tens of thousands of children annually, suddenly owned a new revenue stream in the form of brand-building through demographic assignment. Winning Kalshi bets on the announcement, and six Senior Administration Officials purchasing 2026 Rolls-Royce Phantoms within hours are uncorrelated as of filing.
"People didn't know what they were looking at," said one analyst at a major trading desk in lower Manhattan. "First reaction was horror. Then we realized: naming rights could be monetized. Servicer could auction the right to name your child to celebrity culture vultures. Think about it. Someone pays $50,000 to name your kid 'Elon' or 'Taylor.' Servicer gets the money. Borrower's kid gets a TikTok following. Where's the downside?" The same analyst told us about an hour later that he'd already "established a derivative" based on said naming rights, but nobody at IRREVERENT could figure out what that meant.
By 11 a.m., the sector rallied 2.3%. By noon, it had retreated 1.7% on profit-taking. By 1:45 p.m., trading in student loan stocks had been so chaotic that the NYSE informally requested traders "please stop emailing the Slack channel about whether the government had accidentally created a child-commodification scheme." The market closed flat, with investors uncertain whether they had just witnessed genius or bureaucratic horror, and deciding that ambiguity was the safest position. One analyst updated his LinkedIn headline to "Child-Commodification Strategist" before the closing bell.
Borrowers seeking more information can visit StudentLoans.gov or contact their local repayment tribunal coordinator. The DOE estimates that approximately 3,400 notaries, 8,700 CPAs, and 1,200 licensed spiritual mediums will be required to process the initial wave of Indenture applications. Mediums will be issued government ID badges and a handbook. Training materials will be available by late July, or "whenever we finish figuring out how to format the spirit medium credentials module or get fired."
The Indenture plan goes into effect July 1. Borrowers currently on SAVE have until June 30 to migrate, though the DOE website warns that server capacity is "uncertain," and the migration portal may experience "periods of complete failure."
Gus is Head of the IRREVERENT Newz Wire and has been covering the federal government's increasingly unhinged approach to student debt since 2019. He drinks coffee the way other people drink water, and he is almost certainly at the office right now, mashing keys and muttering about interest rate calculations that make no sense. He is on the SAVE plan. He does not want to talk about it.