Redhead for research purposes only <| sep |> They wouldn ' t fuck over the people paying the money back directly , it ' s far to politically dangerous as they would automatically alienate the richer and more politically engaged half of society in one go and would be unlikely to win another election again . You would also be pissing off lawyers , business people , bankers , and other professionals , who have the time , money and connections to go find a punctuation error and make a case out of it . They would likely set it up so nothing about the repayment changes , maybe interest increases , but after 20 years the state makes up the difference between projected and actual repayment . That way a good number of the people who made the choice would have retired or died , and it would automatically become a problem for the government in office at that time who can then blame it on the past . Government gets a lump of cash today , and politically only take a minor hit as the impact will be largely unnoticeable .