Results

CEP occasional paper

The full returns to higher education in the UK

University education is known to generate significant earnings returns, but its full value may be understated without considering its wider effects on individual wellbeing. This paper estimates the complete lifetime retu...Read more...

Blog

Economics Observatory:

University degrees: how should we assess their value?

Evaluating university degrees on the basis of the job prospects they provide for graduates has led to some being seen as 'low value' or 'low quality'. But, in reality, their worth is hard to measure. Closing such courses...Read more...

Blog

LSE Inequalities:

The spiralling costs of higher education are hitting stay at home students harder

Since the pandemic, a new divide has emerged in higher education between commuter students, on the one hand, and on-campus students, on the other. Reporting on the findings of a new student money and wellbeing survey, Le...Read more...

Journal article

British Education Research Journal:

The path increasingly travelled: Vocational entry qualifications, socioeconomic status and university outcomes

Many countries have introduced flexibility in their admissions equivalents for tertiary education, allowing students to apply with vocational rather than academic qualifications at upper secondary level. However, entrant...Read more...

Journal article

Economics of Education Review: Forthcoming

Gender gap variation across assessment types: explanations and implications

Using Swedish population data, we document that girls outperform boys by a third of a standard deviation in school grades, whereas a gap of similar magnitude but opposite sign persists in SAT scores in the sample of non-...Read more...

Journal article

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics:

Neighbors' effects on university enrollment

This paper provides causal evidence that close neighbors signigicantly influence potential applicants' decision to attend university. I create a unique dataset combining detailed geographic information and individual edu...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Social policy gone bad educationally: unintended peer effects from transferred students

What is the impact of an increase of lower-ability students in a university class? We examine a natural experiment from Greece in which students from large, low-income families had the chance to transfer to academic prog...Read more...

Blog

Economics Observatory:

How would minimum entry grades affect opportunities in higher education?

The UK government is consulting on the introduction of minimum eligibility requirements for access to student loans. Claire Crawford and Gill Wyness argue that if such a reform is introduced, it is likely to prevent many...Read more...

Blog

Higher Education Policy Institute:

Why highly selective universities need to demystify admissions for student applicants

In light of Covid-19's impact on A-level results, Lee Elliot Major and Kieran Tompkins dispel misconceptions around university admissions, such as the number of students drawn from private and state schools at Russell Gr...Read more...

Journal article

Education Economics:

Minority report: the impact of predicted grades on university admissions of disadvantaged groups

We study the UK's university application system, in which students apply based on predicted examination grades, rather than actual results. Using three years of UK university applications data we find that only 16% of ap...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Should I stay or should I go? Neighbors' effects on university enrollment

This paper investigates whether the decision to attend university depends on university enrollment of close neighbors. I create a unique dataset combining detailed geographic information and educational records from diff...Read more...

Journal article

Journal of Technology Transfer:

Academic inventors: collaboration and proximity with industry

This paper addresses a number of fundamental research questions on university-industry (U-I) collaborations. Are U-I collaborations intrinsically different from other forms of collaboration, such as inter-firm or inter-u...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Studying science: the impact of school curriculum on degree choice

An educational reform in England in 2004 that entitled higher ability school students to take the so-called ‘triple science’course contributed a third of the increased share of STEM graduates in England 2005-10. That is ...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

STEM graduates and secondary school curriculum: does early exposure to science matter?

Increasing the number of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) university graduates is considered a key element for long-term productivity and competitiveness in the global economy. Still, little is known abou...Read more...

Journal article

Economics of Education Review:

Student satisfaction, league tables and university applications: Evidence from Britain

We investigate the impact of information about student satisfaction on university choice, using data from the UK's National Student Survey (NSS) and on applications to undergraduate degrees. We show that NSS scores have ...Read more...

CEP election analysis

Paying for Higher Education

The UK Higher Education sector has changed radically as a result of Coalition Policies – most obviously through the dramatic increase in the tuition fee cap from £3,375 to £9,000 per year. However, the greatest issue ari...Read more...

SERC/Urban and Spatial Programme Discussion Paper

Student Satisfaction, League Tables and University Applications

We investigate the impact of information about student satisfaction on university choice, using data from the UK’s National Student Survey (NSS) and on applications to undergraduate degree courses. We show that the NSS h...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

The Impact of Tuition Fees and Support on University Participation in the UK

Understanding how policy can affect university participation is important for understanding how governments can promote human capital accumulation. In this paper, we estimate the separate impacts of tuition fees and main...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Spreading the Word: Geography, Policy and Knowledge Spillovers

Using new data on citations to university patents and scientific publications, we study how geography affects university knowledge spillovers. Citations to patents decline sharply with distance up to about 150 miles and ...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Quality Matters - the Expulsion of Professors and Ph.D. Student Outcomes in Nazi Germany

I investigate the effect of faculty quality on Ph.D. student outcomes. To address the endogeneity of faculty quality I use exogenous variation provided by the expulsion of mathematics professors in Nazi Germany. I find t...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

University Quality and Graduate Wages in the UK

We examine the links between various measures of university quality and graduate earnings in the United Kingdom. We explore the implications of using different measures of quality and combining them into an aggregate mea...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Peer Effects in Science - Evidence from the Dismissal of Scientists in Nazi Germany

This paper analyzes peer effects among university scientists. Specifically, it investigates whether the number of peers and their average quality affects the productivity of researchers in physics, chemistry, and mathema...Read more...