The effects of tuition fees in higher education

高等教育经费日益成为国内外热议的话题。特别是，学生是否以及在多大程度上应该自付教育费用的问题受到了强烈的关注。在过去的二十年里，一些国家引入或提高了学费（如德国、英国和美国），一些国家取消了学费（如爱尔兰和前面提到的德国），而另一些国家从未引入学费（如北欧国家）。在此背景下，拟议的项目将研究在德国引入和取消学费的影响，包括对未来的学生（“广泛的边际”）和在引入或取消学费时已经入学的学生（“密集的边际”）。该项目将结合差异中的差异方法，对德国所有学生使用行政层面的个人数据。这种计量经济学方法利用了德国的环境，从2006年开始部分引入收费，随后在2008年至2014年期间分批取消收费，这提供了一个独特的自然实验。该项目将在三个重要维度上扩展现有关于高等教育私人成本的文献。首先，该项目将考虑引入和取消收费的影响，这并不需要对称。其次，该项目将研究广泛的不同结果，包括入学、结业、持续时间、学科选择、最终成绩和移民到其他州。费用可能对其中一些结果产生预期的影响，而对另一些结果产生不希望的影响。第三，该项目将研究广泛性边际效应和集约性边际效应，而不是单独研究其中一种边际效应。这一点尤其重要，因为现有文献表明，广泛和密集的边际效应可能走向相反的方向。总的来说，这个项目旨在提供学费在所有利润率和各种结果的影响的概述。这种全面的分析是必要和相关的——无论是从国际和国家的角度，还是从科学和政策的角度。

Higher education funding is increasingly a topic of heated national and international debate. In particular, the question if, and to what extent, students should contribute privately to the costs of their education has received intense attention. Over the past two decades, a number of countries introduced or raised tuition fees (e.g., Germany, England, and the USA), some abolished fees (e.g., Ireland and the aforementioned Germany), while others never introduced fees (e.g., the Nordic countries).Against this backdrop, the proposed project will examine the effect of the introduction and abolishment of tuition fees in Germany, both for prospective students (“extensive margin”) and for students who were already enrolled when tuition fees were introduced or abolished (“intensive margin”). The project will use administrative individual-level data for all students in Germany in combination with a difference-in-differences approach. This econometric approach exploits the German setting with the partial introduction of fees starting in 2006 and the subsequent staggered abolishment of fees between 2008 and 2014, which offers a unique natural experiment. The project will expand the existing literature on private costs in higher education in three important dimensions. First, the project will consider both the effects of introducing and abolishing fees, which need not be symmetric. Second, the project will study a broad range of different outcomes, including enrollment, completion, duration, subject choice, final grades, and migration to other states. Fees might have desired effects on some of these outcomes and undesired effects on others. Third, the project will study both extensive as well as intensive margin effects and not just one of them separately. This is particularly important because the existing literature suggests that extensive and intensive margin effects might go in opposite directions. Overall, this project aims to provide an overview of the effects of tuition fees at all margins and for various outcomes. Such comprehensive analysis is necessary and relevant - both from international and national perspectives, as well as from scientific and policy perspectives.