Dear Mom, Dad: Please Send Bailout

The families of many debt-laden college graduates are pondering bailouts of their own as the job market sours, the Wall Street Journal reports. With the average student loan now $22,000, parents of some struggling grads face a tough choice—to let their kids learn a lesson about credit the hard way, or to give them a helping hand and a lecture.

Some parents are helping out their adult children for the sake of preserving their credit ratings for later in life, while others who have co-signed on loans have little choice but to pick up the slack. Finance experts recommend that if parents are going to help out kids who took on too much debt, is should be done in a structured way that teaches accountability.
(More debt stories.)