Back before I became a Senator, I studied why people filed for bankruptcy. One of the main reasons that people would say they filed for bankruptcy was to just stop the constant barrage of phone calls from the debt collectors.

But student loan debt is different. Student loans are one of the few types of debt that you can’t get rid of in bankruptcy. So if your parents couldn’t afford to write a check to send you to college and then you get into trouble on a student loan – if yo...u can’t find a job, or if you get sick – then there’s no end in sight.

Last week, Aetna – one of the nation’s largest health insurers – unexpectedly announced that it would reevaluate its participation in the Affordable Care Act health care exchanges. Aetna has always had concerns about Obamacare, but as recently as April, the company said its ACA business was "a good investment." In May, Aetna announced plans to expand to more states. Last week, Aetna reported second-quarter earnings that beat expectations.

So what changed? In July, the Justice... Department announced that it would sue to block Aetna’s merger with another health insurance company because it would create monopoly-like conditions that reduce competition and drive up insurance costs. Aetna says this change of tone about the Affordable Care Act has nothing to do with the merger – but some analysts have suggested that Aetna might "use its future participation in the exchanges in bargaining over its purchase of Humana."

Last week, Aetna – one of the nation’s largest health insurers – unexpectedly announced that it would reevaluate its participation in the Affordable Care Act health care exchanges. Aetna has always had concerns about Obamacare, but as recently as April, the company said its ACA business was "a good investment." In May, Aetna announced plans to expand to more states. Last week, Aetna reported second-quarter earnings that beat expectations.

So what changed? In July, the Justice... Department announced that it would sue to block Aetna’s merger with another health insurance company because it would create monopoly-like conditions that reduce competition and drive up insurance costs. Aetna says this change of tone about the Affordable Care Act has nothing to do with the merger – but some analysts have suggested that Aetna might "use its future participation in the exchanges in bargaining over its purchase of Humana."

Last year, I wrote to the Brookings Institution – a Washington, DC research and policy think tank – regarding their policy on pay-for-play academic studies. One of their scholars, Robert Litan, had testified as an expert witness at one of my Senate committee hearings on a new conflict of interest rule for retirement advisers. Dr. Litan had a study that said requiring retirement advisers to do what’s in their customers’ best interest would be terrible for retirees – a finding ...way out of line from other research. It turned out that the sole funding for Dr. Litan’s report was a company with a huge financial interest in making sure that rule would never see the light of day. The company was even allowed to review and comment on the report throughout the whole process.

For years, Exxon and other big oil companies have claimed their products have little or no impact on the earth’s environment. But what did Exxon actually know about climate change? And when did they know it?

Reasonable questions, particularly if Exxon misled its investors about the long-term prospects of Exxon’s business model or if the company fooled consumers into buying their products based on false claims. So the MA and NY Attorneys General are investigating to see if Ex...xon violated state fraud laws.

Wage theft is a big problem all across this country, and Washington needs to get tough on employers who don’t pay their low-wage workers for all of their work. We can start right here in the United States Senate – with the company that runs the Senate cafeteria.

The Department of Labor just finished an investigation of Restaurant Associates, the company contracted to run the Senate cafeteria. DOL found that despite soaring profits, RA and its multibillion dollar food servic...es owners have cheated Senate cafeteria workers out of over $1 million in wages.

Yesterday, the Education Department announced new standards to hold the companies that administer federal student loans more accountable and to improve the customer service for over 40 million Americans with federal student loans. These new standards have the potential to help millions of borrowers get into the right plan and avoid the consequences of default — that's good for borrowers, and that's good for the economy.

For years, the Department's student loan bank has given ...kid glove treatment to these companies, even though they have harmed borrowers, broken the law, and overcharged members of the military. I look forward to working with Secretary King to clean up the Department's student loan bank because the next steps will be crucial. These new customer service standards will be a game-changer for student loan borrowers only if the student loan bank is serious about reforms that borrowers desperately need.

Want to see how giant corporations try to rig the system in their favor? Look at what ExxonMobil is doing to try to intimidate Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey.

The Massachusetts Attorney General's Office is one of several AGs who are investigating whether ExxonMobil broke state consumer and investor protection laws by knowingly misleading people about climate change since the 1970s. She’s doing what state AGs do: investigating fraud. ExxonMobil first tried to kil...l the investigation a few weeks ago by suing AG Healey in a Texas court and attacking her integrity because she’s doing her job.