Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/331518 
Year of Publication: 
2025
Series/Report no.: 
IFN Working Paper No. 1538
Publisher: 
Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN), Stockholm
Abstract: 
Many countries have established new local colleges to increase access to education for disadvantaged populations. However, many of these expansions have not reduced educational inequality. Drawing on evidence from a large-scale college expansion initiative, we find that increased college availability did not lead to a differential increase in attendance among students from parents with less education. Rather, the expanded access primarily benefited students with marginal academic ability. These results suggest that higher education enrollment is largely determined by inherent scholastic ability and that the expansion of higher education tends to attract students at the upper margin of this ability distribution.
Subjects: 
Intergenerational correlations
university expansion
access to education
higher education
JEL: 
I23
I24
I28
J24
J62
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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