orygunduck:

But if this continues for any period of time, I suspect there's going to be few private student loans available, with increased reliance on Stafford, Perkins and Plus loans

I think this is a good thing for students in general.  Too many of them get talked into mortgaging their lives to go to an expensive school when there is a perfectly fine state university they could attend for far less money.

If you are mortgaging your life to go to Harvard, fine, but I see kids taking on huge loans to go to some private, liberal arts college no one has heard of when they would get just as good of an education at a state school and be much less in debt when they got out.  Some private liberal arts college no one has heard of charging $30k a year in tuition won't get the kid a better job, won't give him/her a better education than a state school.

I think some of these schools may have to go out of business if private loans dry up, which is a good thing IMO.