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Study and Training Support Loan data (HELP, AASL, VSL)

Source: R/help.R
ato_help.Rd

Returns aggregate statistics on Australia's three main education-loan schemes:

  • HELP (Higher Education Loan Program, ~3m borrowers, AUD 80bn+ outstanding debt)

  • AASL (Australian Apprenticeship Support Loans, previously Trade Support Loans)

  • VSL (VET Student Loans, vocational education loans)

Usage

ato_help(scheme = c("help", "aasl", "vsl"))

Source

Australian Taxation Office Study and Training Support Loans statistics. Licensed CC BY 2.5 AU.

Arguments

scheme

One of "help" (default), "aasl", or "vsl".

Value

An ato_tbl. All dollar values in nominal AUD.

Details

Headline covers: new loans by income range, outstanding debt by age and gender, repayment rates, median debt on entry. Used by Treasury (PBO costings of HELP indexation changes) and education policy researchers.

References

Commonwealth of Australia. Higher Education Support Act 2003; VET Student Loans Act 2016.

Australian Department of Education (annual). Higher Education Statistics: HELP statistics collection.

Norton, A. and Cherastidtham, I. (2018). Mapping Australian higher education. Grattan Institute. Methodology reference for HELP repayment projections.

See also

Other discovery: ato_catalog(), ato_charities(), ato_cite(), ato_download(), ato_excise(), ato_fbt(), ato_irpd(), ato_payg(), ato_rdti(), ato_sme_benchmarks(), ato_tax_gaps(), ato_top_taxpayers(), ato_vttc()

Examples

# \donttest{
op <- options(ato.cache_dir = tempdir())
try({
  help <- ato_help(scheme = "help")
  head(help)
})
#> ℹ Downloading <https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/ce4c58ec-c930-4a05-8a37-f244d96…
#> ✔ Downloading <https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/ce4c58ec-c930-4a05-8a37-f244d96…
#> 
#> # ato_tbl: ATO HELP statistics
#> # Source:   https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/ce4c58ec-c930-4a05-8a37-f244d960e5f8/resource/0661912a-d114-4155-8b42-63ab1417adea/download/help-statistics-2024-25.xlsx
#> # Licence:  CC BY 2.5 AU
#> # Retrieved: 2026-08-23 17:35 UTC 
#> # Snapshot: 2026-04-24
#> # SHA-256:  70c7ebc3840087c7...
#> # Rows: 6  Cols: 9
#> 
#>        year total_incurred_debt  indexation compulsory_repayments
#> 1 2024 - 25        125251399147 21763364029           52074318471
#> 2 2023 - 24        117375745777 22738937830           47159248822
#> 3 2022 - 23        110986721147 19414461563           42268924994
#> 4 2021 - 22        104208138430 14626155953           37502763659
#> 5 2020 - 21         96045556864 12095461165           33341893327
#> 6 2019 - 20         89776126934 11801063634           29694321686
#>   os_levy_compulsory_repayments voluntary_repayments_made_no
#> 1                     349395427                      9171881
#> 2                     332870086                      8083651
#> 3                     318659937                      6713781
#> 4                     302333633                      5213288
#> 5                     236119824                      4443015
#> 6                     163554681                      3775400
#>   voluntary_repayments bonus_on_voluntary_repayments value_of_debts_writen_off
#> 1          11822045033                     342171959                 238859490
#> 2          10829889333                     342171864                 240857626
#> 3           8866027613                     342171864                 234307019
#> 4           5965448979                     342172108                 227504659
#> 5           5185902618                     342171567                 167630700
#> 6           4647376988                     342171043                 159810005
options(op)
# }