IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/qed/wpaper/1154.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Grants Or Loans? Theoretical Issues Regarding Access And Persistence In Postsecondary Education

Author

Listed:
  • Lorne Carmichael

    (Queen's University)

  • Ross Finnie

    (Queen's University)

Abstract

Most economic investigations of access to education treat an investment in college or university as if it were a financial investment offering a particular expected rate of return. Since the average measured rates of return are quite favourable, other factors such as lack of information, contrary parental influence, or "debt aversion" must be invoked to explain the unwillingness of some qualified students from poorer backgrounds to borrow money and attend. However, a model that recognizes the hardship associated with low levels of expenditure suggests that, ceteris paribus,poorer students will actually need a higher measured rate of return before they will decide to attend. The result holds even when there is an efficient student loan system. This approach can provide some normative guidance for decisions about the choice of grants or loans as vehicles for student aid, and has positive implications about the effects of grants and loans on access and persistence.

Suggested Citation

  • Lorne Carmichael & Ross Finnie, 2007. "Grants Or Loans? Theoretical Issues Regarding Access And Persistence In Postsecondary Education," Working Paper 1154, Economics Department, Queen's University.
    • Handle: RePEc:qed:wpaper:1154
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econ.queensu.ca/sites/econ.queensu.ca/files/qed_wp_1154.pdf
    File Function: First version 2007
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andrea Bassanini & Stefano Scarpetta, 2001. "Does Human Capital Matter for Growth in OECD Countries?: Evidence from Pooled Mean-Group Estimates," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 282, OECD Publishing.
    2. Sveinbjörn Blöndal & Simon Field & Nathalie Girouard, 2003. "Investment in human capital through upper-secondary and tertiary education," OECD Economic Studies, OECD Publishing, vol. 2002(1), pages 41-89.
    3. Moretti, Enrico, 2004. "Estimating the social return to higher education: evidence from longitudinal and repeated cross-sectional data," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 121(1-2), pages 175-212.
    4. Kenkel, Donald S, 1991. "Health Behavior, Health Knowledge, and Schooling," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(2), pages 287-305, April.
    5. Lance Lochner & Enrico Moretti, 2004. "The Effect of Education on Crime: Evidence from Prison Inmates, Arrests, and Self-Reports," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 155-189, March.
    6. H. Lorne Carmichael, 1999. "Restructuring the University System: What Level of Public Support?," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 25(1), pages 133-140, March.
    7. John Bishop, 1977. "The Effect of Public Policies on the Demand for Higher Education," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 12(3), pages 285-307.
    8. Hoenack, Stephen A, 1971. "The Efficient Allocation of Subsidies to College Students," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 61(3), pages 302-311, June.
    9. Johnson, George E, 1984. "Subsidies for Higher Education," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(3), pages 303-318, July.
    10. McPherson, Michael S & Schapiro, Morton Owen, 1991. "Does Student Aid Affect College Enrollment? New Evidence on a Persistent Controversy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(1), pages 309-318, March.
    11. Gary S. Becker, 1975. "Human Capital: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis, with Special Reference to Education, Second Edition," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number beck75-1, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Blomquist, Glenn C. & Coomes, Paul A. & Jepsen, Christopher & Koford, Brandon C. & Troske, Kenneth R., 2014. "Estimating the social value of higher education: willingness to pay for community and technical colleges," Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 5(1), pages 3-41, January.
    2. Dur, Robert & Glazer, Amihai, 2008. "Subsidizing Enjoyable Education," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(5), pages 1023-1039, October.
    3. Wohlgemuth, Darin Ray, 1997. "Individual and aggregate demand for higher education: the role of strategic scholarships," ISU General Staff Papers 1997010108000012571, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    4. Pedro Martins & Jim Jin, 2010. "Firm-level social returns to education," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 23(2), pages 539-558, March.
    5. Thompson, Fred & Zumeta, William, 2001. "Effects of key state policies on private colleges and universities: sustaining private-sector capacity in the face of the higher education access challenge," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 20(6), pages 517-531, December.
    6. Sylvain Dessy & Safa Ragued, 2013. "Whither the Progressive Tax?," Cahiers de recherche 1340, CIRPEE.
    7. C. O'Carroll & Colm Harmon & Lisa Farrell, 2006. "The economic and social impact of higher education," Open Access publications 10197/672, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    8. Wetzel, James & O'Toole, Dennis & Peterson, Steven, 1998. "An Analysis of Student Enrollment Demand," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 47-54, February.
    9. Gianni De Fraja, 2004. "Education and Redistribution," Rivista di Politica Economica, SIPI Spa, vol. 94(3), pages 3-44, May-June.
    10. David Greenaway & Michelle Haynes, 2003. "Funding Higher Education in The UK: The Role of Fees and Loans," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(485), pages 150-166, February.
    11. Christopher H. Wheeler, 2007. "Human capital externalities and adult mortality in the U.S," Working Papers 2007-045, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
    12. Emanuela di Gropello, 2006. "Meeting the Challenges of Secondary Education in Latin America and East Asia : Improving Efficiency and Resource Mobilization," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 7173, December.
    13. Cory Koedel, 2009. "Postsecondary Education Structure," Working Papers 0906, Department of Economics, University of Missouri, revised 04 Oct 2010.
    14. Ellis, Jimmy R. & Gershenson, Seth, 2016. "LATE for the Meeting: Gender, Peer Advising, and College Success," IZA Discussion Papers 9956, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. Philip Oreopoulos & Kjell G. Salvanes, 2009. "How large are returns to schooling? Hint: Money isn't everything," NBER Working Papers 15339, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. Carlos Cáceres & Carlos Chávez, 1995. "El Programa de Becas de Arancel Universitario MINEDUC: Antecedentes para una Evaluación," Latin American Journal of Economics-formerly Cuadernos de Economía, Instituto de Economía. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile., vol. 32(96), pages 165-198.
    17. Islam, M. Kamrul & Gerdtham, Ulf-G. & Gullberg, Bo & Lindström, Martin & Merlo, Juan, 2008. "Social capital externalities and mortality in Sweden," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 6(1), pages 19-42, March.
    18. Ellis, Jimmy R. & Gershenson, Seth, 2020. "Gender, peer advising, and college success," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    19. Grant Johnston, 2004. "Healthy, wealthy and wise? A review of the wider benefits of education," Treasury Working Paper Series 04/04, New Zealand Treasury.
    20. Francesco Ricci & Marios Zachariadis, 2013. "Education Externalities on Longevity," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 80(319), pages 404-440, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    postsecondary education; educational subsidies; student loans; equal access; hyperbolic preferences;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
    • I22 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Educational Finance; Financial Aid
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:qed:wpaper:1154. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Mark Babcock (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/qedquca.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.