Marginal Effects of Merit Aid for Low-Income Students
Abstract
Financial aid from the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation (STBF) provides comprehensive support to a student population similar to that served by a host of state aid programs. In conjunction with STBF, we randomly assigned aid awards to thousands of Nebraska high school graduates from low-income, minority, and first-generation college households. Randomly assigned STBF awards boost bachelor’s (BA) degree completion for students targeting four-year schools by about 8 points. Degree gains are concentrated among four-year college applicants who would otherwise have been unlikely to pursue a four-year program. Degree effects are mediated by award-induced increases in credits earned toward a BA in the first year of college. The extent of initial four-year college engagement explains differences in impact by target campus and across covariate subgroups. The projected lifetime earnings effect of awards exceeds marginal educational spending for all of the subgroups examined in the study. Projected earnings gains exceed funder costs for urban students and for students with relatively weak academic preparation.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
The Buffett Scholarship increased bachelor's degree completion rates by 8 percentage points among students who had applied to four-year schools, with the largest effects among lower achieving students.
“The authors find that the scholarship increased bachelor's degree completion rates by 8 percentage points among students who had applied to four-year schools, with the largest effects among lower achieving students.”
From College Costs, Financial Aid, and Student Decisions (2022) · cites this paper as Angrist, Autor, & Pallais, 2021
The private Buffett Scholarship increased degree completion primarily by shifting applicants to enroll in and complete more credits in four-year colleges instead of two-year colleges, with no effect on overall postsecondary enrollment.
“the private Buffett Scholarship program appears to have increased degree completion primarily by shifting applicants to enroll in and complete more credits in four-year colleges instead of two-year colleges (Angrist, Autor, & Pallais, 2021), even though it had no effect on postsecondary enrollment (at any institution) overall.”
From College Costs, Financial Aid, and Student Decisions (2022) · cites this paper as Angrist, Autor, & Pallais, 2021
Several studies find larger effects for lower-achieving students.
“Several studies find larger effects for lower-achieving students (including Angrist, Autor, & Pallais, 2021;Carruthers, Fox, & Jepsen 2020;Bettinger et al. 2019)”
From College Costs, Financial Aid, and Student Decisions (2022) · cites this paper as Angrist, Autor, & Pallais, 2021
The evidence on heterogeneity by students' incoming academic performance and race/ethnicity is not entirely consistent, but is suggestive of possibly larger effects for lower-achieving and/or minoritized groups.
“The evidence on heterogeneity by students' incoming academic performance and race/ethnicity is not entirely consistent, but is suggestive of possibly larger effects for lower-achieving and/or minoritized groups.”
From College Costs, Financial Aid, and Student Decisions (2022) · cites this paper as Angrist, Autor, & Pallais, 2021
Cites
Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion
Angrist, J. D., & Pischke, J.-S. (2009) · doi:10.1515/9781400829828 · Cited by 9,467 · see citing works
Self-citationIdentification of Causal Effects Using Instrumental Variables
Angrist, J. D., Imbens, G. W., & Rubin, D. B. (1996) · Journal of the American Statistical Association · doi:10.1080/01621459.1996.10476902 · Cited by 4,230 · see citing works
Self-citationIdentification and estimation of local average treatment effects
Imbens, G. W., & Angrist, J. D. (1994) · Econometrica · doi:10.2307/2951620 · Cited by 4,101 · see citing works
Self-citationStudent engagement with school: Critical conceptual and methodological issues of the construct
Appleton, J. J., Christenson, S. L., & Furlong, M. J. (2008) · Psychology in the Schools · doi:10.1002/pits.20303 · Cited by 1,956 · see citing works
A unified welfare analysis of government policies.
Hendren, N., & Sprung-Keyser, B. (2020) · The Quarterly Journal of Economics · doi:10.1093/qje/qjaa006 · Cited by 571 · see citing works
Student Loans: Do College Students Borrow Too Much—Or Not Enough?
Avery, C., & Turner, S. (2012) · Journal of Economic Perspectives · doi:10.1257/jep.26.1.165 · Cited by 385 · see citing works
Cohodes, S. R., & Goodman, J. S. (2014) · American Economic Journal: Applied Economics · doi:10.1257/app.6.4.251 · Cited by 359 · see citing works
The Impact of Price Caps and Spending Cuts on U.S. Postsecondary Attainment
Deming, D., & Walters, C. (2017) · doi:10.3386/w23736 · Cited by 181 · see citing works
Impact of Student Financial Aid on Access
Hansen, W. L. (1983) · Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science · doi:10.2307/3700892 · Cited by 165 · see citing works
The Long-Run Impacts of Financial Aid: Evidence from California’s Cal Grant
Bettinger, E., Gurantz, O., Kawano, L., Sacerdote, B., & Stevens, M. (2019) · American Economic Journal: Economic Policy · doi:10.1257/pol.20170466 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
Losing HOPE: Financial aid and the line between college and work
Carruthers, C. K., & Özek, U. (2016) · Economics of Education Review · doi:10.1016/j.econedurev.2016.03.014 · Cited by 79 · see citing works
Fighting for Education: Financial Aid and Degree Attainment
Barr, A. (2019) · Journal of Labor Economics · doi:10.1086/700191 · Cited by 40 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Student Loans: Do College Students Borrow Too Much—Or Not Enough?
Avery, C., & Turner, S. (2012) · Journal of Economic Perspectives · doi:10.1257/jep.26.1.165 · Cited by 385 · see citing works
College Costs, Financial Aid, and Student Decisions
Dynarski, S., Page, L., & Scott-Clayton, J. (2022) · National Bureau of Economic Research · doi:10.3386/w30275 · Cited by 56 · see citing works
Beyond degrees: Longer term outcomes of the Kalamazoo Promise
Hershbein, B. J., McMullen, I., Pittelko, B., & Timmeney, B. F. (2021) · doi:10.17848/wp21-350 · Cited by 2 · see citing works
- Authors
- Angrist, J., Autor, D., & Pallais, A.
- Affiliations
- National Bureau of Economic Research (US)
- Venue
- The Quarterly Journal of Economics
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2021-12-20
- Volume
- 137
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 1039-1090
- ISSN
- 0033-5533 (ISSN-L)
- 1531-4650
- OpenAlex
- W4205416619
- Cited by
- 69
- References
- 12
- Citations by year
- 2026: 12 · 2025: 15 · 2024: 16 · 2023: 18 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 5
- FWCI
- 18.45
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- academic.oup.com/journals/pages/open_access/funder_policies/chorus/standard_publication_model (vor)
- Locations
- The Quarterly Journal of Economics (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- STBF
- MIT
- SEII seed fund
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Education › Higher Education Research Studies
- Social Sciences › Education › School Choice and Performance
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Intergenerational and Educational Inequality Studies
- Keywords
- merit aid, low-income students, college degree completion, first-generation college students, minority students, four-year college enrollment, college credit, lifetime earnings, education funding, urban students, academic preparation
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
