<prompt> Human: My fiance has 326,000 in student loans with an average interest rate of about 7. Can you believe that? She got that from Veterinary schooling and will have to start payments this year. She qualifies for income based repayment. Her salary will probably be around 60,000 when she starts work. I make 50,000 right now, but when I finish my residency in the next 3 years, I will make 110,000. Should we file joint taxes so that we can contribute to a Roth IRA while we both make less of a combined salary? this would increase monthly payments but allow us to contributeOr should we file separately to decrease her monthly payments? EDIT: Yeah... I know. Shocking. Still looking for someone who knows whether it would be advantageous to file taxes separately based specifically on knowledge of the income based repayment plan.  <response>: If I were you, Id talk to a CPA or some other professional accountanttax person sometime late in 2013, or at the latest when you finish residency and start making 110k. 326k is enough debt that even little mistakes or oversights would really screw things up for you. 