Deregulation of for-profit colleges led to a precipitous rise in enrollments from 1990 to 2010. Since 2010, regulation, investigations, and sanctions have led to enrollment declines in for-profit postsecondary institutions. Initially barred from receiving Title IV federal funds, in the form of Pell Grants and Stafford Loans, for-profit colleges gained access to Title IV funds in 1972 on the grounds that these institutions were educationally equivalent to, or more economical than public and non-profit institutions. This paper examines Beginning Postsecondary Student longitudinal data from 2012/17, utilizing regression analyses to determine whether the for-profit college sector produces similar educational outcomes and student loan debt compared to the public higher education sector. Findings indicate that degree-seeking students enrolling in 2-year programs at for-profit colleges have approximately half the odds of degree attainment as demographically similar students at public colleges; students entering 4-year, for-profit programs have approximately a quarter the odds of achieving a bachelor's degree as their public college counterparts. Students at for-profit colleges, moreover, take on significantly greater student loan debt than demographically similar students at public colleges. Federal funds might better be spent subsidizing under-funded, overcrowded public colleges than enabling America's most disadvantaged students to incur debt at for-profit colleges that are neither educationally nor economically equivalent.