Retirees' Social Security checks garnished for student loans

Joshua Cohen works with troubled student loan borrowers.
What's surprised Cohen lately is the increasing number of gray-haired people walking in his doors with a problem: A portion of their meager Social Security benefits are being taken by the government to pay for old student loans they had mostly forgotten about.

It's a growing national trend. Last year, 156,000 Americans had their Social Security checks garnished because of student loans they had defaulted on. It's tripled in number from 47,500 in 2006, before the Great Recession. That's according to analysis done by the U.S. Treasury for CNNMoney.

More at link:
http://money.cnn.com/2014/08/24/news/economy/social-security-student-debt/index.html?hpt=hp_t4

This is so sad.