@EdWorkingPaper{ai23-727,
title = "Are Four-Year Public Colleges Engines for Economic Mobility? Evidence from Statewide Admissions Thresholds",
author = "Whitney Kozakowski",
institution = "Annenberg Institute at Brown University",
number = "727",
year = "2023",
month = "February",
URL = "http://www.edworkingpapers.com/ai23-727",
abstract = {Four-year public colleges may play an important role in supporting intergenerational mobility by providing an accessible path to a bachelor’s degree and increasing students' earnings. Leveraging a midsize state’s GPA- and SAT-based admissions thresholds for the four-year public sector, I use a regression discontinuity design to estimate the effect of four-year public college admissions on earnings and college costs. For low-income students and Black, Hispanic, or Native American students, admission to four-year public colleges increases mean annual earnings by almost $8,000 eight to fourteen years after applying without increasing the private costs of college. The state recovers the cost of an additional four-year public college admission through increased lifetime tax revenue. Expanding access to four-year public colleges may be a particularly effective way to improve the economic outcomes of low-income students and Black, Hispanic, or Native American students.},
}