Eric, recently graduated with an undergraduate degree from a large university with significant student loans, received two offers for employment:...

Eric, recently graduated with an undergraduate degree from a large university with significant student loans, received two offers for employment:

Offer #2: A $47,000 annual salary, with an additional annual $3,000 paid toward Eric's outstanding loans student loans. Alternatively, Eric may choose from other tax free fringe benefits in lieu of the payment toward his student loans, but he may not elect to accept the $3,000 in taxable compensation. Health, dental, and other tax free fringe benefits without the additional $3,000 option are comparable to offer #1.

I need help finding the tax section indicating how a taxpayer would treat the $3,000 in payments toward his employee student loans for federal income tax purposes.