学生贷款对大学生入学的影响外文文献翻译2019

学生贷款对大学生入学的影响外文翻译2019

英文

The effect of student loans on college enrollment: Evidence from

municipality panel data in Japan

Shinpei Sano

Abstract

This study examines whether the criteria expansion for student loan eligibility promotes the college enrollment of high school graduates in Japan. In 1999, the Japan Student Services Organization revised the eligibility criteria of the student loan system based on household earnings. Before the revision, the maximum allowable earnings for student loan applications differed across regions; some region’s had lower criteria than others. After the revision, the criteria for regions with lower maximum allowable earnings were adjusted upwards to match regions with higher ones. We conducted a difference-in-differences estimation by using municipal panel data from 1998 to 2003. We found that the expansion of eligibility for student loans improved the male college enrollment rate by around 0.5 to 0.7% points, while female enrollment was less sensitive to the expansion of student loan eligibility. The impact of the student loan eligibility expansion is larger for low income areas.

Keywords：College enrollment，Student loans，Difference-in-differences

Human capital accumulation (e.g., via higher education provision) is one of the most important approaches to improving productivity and bridging income disparities. In Japan, the demand for higher education has increased in the past several decades, with increased employability along with the consequent decreased unemployment rates for those with higher education. In 2010, approximately 45% of adults attained tertiary education, and the percentage of students continuing their tertiary education was an estimated 54.3%. The return to higher education is estimated to be around 5–10% in Japan (Sano and Yasui, 2009; Nakamuro et al., 2017; Kikuchi, 2017).

Investment in higher education is heavily dependent on private sources in Japan. For example, of the total amount spent on tertiary-level education, 50.7% came from household expenditures (OECD, 2012). Additionally, the OECD highlights that although tertiary tuition fees are high, and financial aid is limited, Japan remains one of the countries with the lowest levels of public expenditure on tertiary education against their GDP: 0.5% compared to the OECD average of 1.1%. Policy makers and education researchers advocate for an increase of student aid options for students in higher education (Kobayashi, 2009).

One of the major student aid sources in Japan is the student loans system offered by the Japan Student Services Organization (hereafter JASSO). The proportion of university students who are loan recipients

was 38.2% in 2012. The loan amount offered by JASSO would sufficiently cover almost all the tuition fees at national/public institutions and 80–99% of the fees at private universities. JASSO’s loan facilities aim to provide financial assistance to academically excellent students who are unable to pursue their studies due to financial reasons.

Understanding the mechanisms by which financial aid for household affects educational investment in higher education would have important policy implications. For example, in the case of imperfect financial market, if low-income households with financial constrains invest less in their children’s education than wealthier households, offering student loan by government can be justified on equity grounds. Evaluating the impact of student loan on investment in higher education offers the information about the design of student loan system such as the loan amount, the eligibility criteria for student loans.

While the study of the impact of student loans on tertiary enrollment remains important for researchers and policymakers, there are two challenges to identify the impact in Japan. Firstly, the challenge in attempting to identify the causal impact of student loan on college enrollment is the endogeneity of receiving a loan. Since student loans are received by students with better academic backgrounds, their student loan variable could reflect unobserved student characteristics that affect the decision to go to college. In a vast literature, researchers have tried to

eliminate the unobservable factors using experimental design. For example, Dynarski (2000, 2003), Cornwell et al. (2006), Singell et al. (2006), Winters (2012), and related literatures utilize exogenous variation in both birth cohort and birth place to evaluate State Merit Aid Program in US.1 It is not easy to find this situation, because Japanese student loan system is setting unitary.

Secondly, there is insufficient research to examine the effects of student aid in Japan due to the lack of a proper data set for analysis of the determinants of college enrollment. Previous research in Japan used aggregated data (Zani, 1989) or micro data with restriction. Nakamura (1993) used the Employment Status Survey and found a positive relationship between parental background and college enrollment only for co-resident high school student in metropolitan areas. Kobayashi (2009)also found a positive relationship between parental background and college enrollment for freshman using the Student Life Survey. Employment Status Survey, large sample cross-section data with rich information about household, can link the information between household situation and college enrollment only for co-resident college students after enrollment decision due to survey design. Student Life Survey has rich information about college students, but does not include information at the timing of enrollment decision. Neither previous study analyzed the effect of receipts of student loans prior to entrance into college on

decision to enroll the college due to data limitation.

In this paper, we focus on the JASSO reform in 1999 to identify the effect of student loans on college enrollment using municipality panel data to solve these problems. One of the most fundamental revisions of this reform was the change in the eligibility criteria for student loans based on household earnings depending on the recipient’s municipality of residence. Before the revision, the maximum allowable earnings for student loan applications differed across regions; the criteria for some regions were lower than others. After the revision, the criteria in the regions with lower maximum allowable earnings were adjusted upwards to match regions with higher ones. In other words, this meant that after the revision, more high school students living in regions with the lower criteria were eligible for JASSO college loans. This situation provided us with relevant and appropriate context for a natural experiment to identify the effect of eligibility expansion for student loans while controlling for unobserved factors that may affect the decision to enroll in tertiary education. Additionally, we use the municipality panel data based on the Basic School Survey. This survey, school-related statistics, includes number of college and university students enrolled from surveyed school, but does not include the household-related information. Aggregating school information by school-located municipalities and merging to other municipality data sets allow us to analyze the relationship between

household situation and enrollment decision.3

This study makes at least two contributions to the extant literature. Firstly, we offer the evidence about the causal impact of student loan on college entrance. Our paper is in the line with previous studies that have applied exogenous variations, such as natural experiments, to identify the impact of student aid on educational outcomes using variation in both birth cohort and birth place such as State Merit Aid Program in US (Dynarski, 2000, 2003; Cornwell et al., 2006; Singell et al., 2006; Winters, 2012; Sjoquist and Winters, 2015). In this study, we extend the literature on this topic by evaluating the expansion effects of student loan eligibility by utilizing exogenous and regional variation in Japan with unite system. Secondly, evaluating the impact of student loan on college enrollment in Japan is important for educational policy. Despite heavier burden of tertiary education on private sector, Japan is one of the highest shares of tertiary-educated adult of all OECD countries. This study offers the evidence about the design of student loan system.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follows.

The Japanese education system consists of six years of compulsory education (elementary and lower secondary education such as junior high school), three years of upper secondary education (typically high school),and higher education (ranging from two years for college and four years for university). As of 2000, there were 86 national universities, 95

public universities, and 597 private universities as well as 395 two-year colleges in Japan. University enrolments have been rising at an average rate of 1.4% per year over the last three decades. There were about 2.8 million students in university and 0.15 million in college in 2000.

The costs and benefits of attending college or university are as follows. Students prepare for the entrance examination to entry into a college or university, and students must pass the entrance exam between January and March before the semester commences in April. Tuition fees are the other direct cost of attending college or university. In 2000, the annual tuition fee was 520,800 yen for national universities and 817,952 yen, on average, for private universities. According to Japan’s Ministry o f Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), the ratio of tuition fees to family disposable income ranged from 1.5% to 2.7% in 2000. The benefit from graduating from college or university is high. The return to higher education is estimated to be around 5–10% in Japan (Sano and Yasui, 2009; Nakamuro et al., 2017; Kikuchi, 2017).

Student loans are one of the major sources of income for students and household. One of the most important student loan providers is JASSO. The proportion of university students that were loan recipients was 38.2% in 2012. Of these loans, according to the Survey of Student Aid, JASSO student loans accounted for about 70% of overall student financial aid given in 2003. JASSO loans cover almost all the tuition fees

at public universities and 80–90% at private ones. Although students can finance their college costs (e.g., tuition fees, living costs, etc.) through allowances from their families and earnings from part-time jobs, student loans remain crucial for a number of potential entrants. JASSO student loans consist of Category I (interest-free) and Category II (interest bearing) and can cover almost all annual tuition fees. JASSO selects loan applications based on the student’s character profile, health, academic achievements, and his/her family's financial situation (based on taxable earnings varied by family size and so on). Each year, there are two application periods: before entering university (around October,6 approximately 20% of loans) and after entering university (around July). For our research, we will focus on the pre-entry applications as they reflected enrollment motivation.

Since its establishment in 1943, JASSO has been reformed several times until 2003. The fundamental reforms were implemented in 1984 and 1999. This paper focuses on the reform implemented by JASSO in 1999. The background of 1999 reform was response to increasing demand for higher education and diversifications of students in the 1990s. MEXT tried to shift towards providing loans with emphasis on the degree of financial difficulty so that loans could be provided to students who wish to lend; shift from merit-based to need-based. To achieve this goal, MEXT planned to expand the quantity of recipients of Category II student

loans introduced in 1984. The expansion of Category II student loans was in line with the national policy of utilizing Fiscal Investment and Loan Program (FILP) addressing the falling birthrate and the aging population, because while Category I student loan was contributed from the general account, Category II was contributed from FILP (JASSO, 2006; Shirakawa and Maehata, 2012). This reform expanded the Category II student loans while relaxing the selection standards regarding the applicants’ academic achievements and financi al situation. At that time, household earnings criteria (the maximum allowable taxable earning for the provision of student loans) that depended on the recipient’s municipality of residence for not only Category II but also Category I were changed to meet the most generous conditions.

The figures on the horizontal axis are the fiscal year, with the observed year in brackets. The figures on the vertical axis are the maximum allowable annual taxable earnings, in million yen. The line with the diamond symbol is a time series pattern of the maximum allowable income for region A and the line with the square symbol is the same for region B. As illustrated in the graph, during the pre-reform period, the maximum allowable taxable earnings differed by region. However, in the post-reform period, the maximum allowable income was standardized for both regions following region A’s allocation. Note that taxable earnings are different from actual disposable income for a

household. The taxable earnings for an application are calculated from income, including wages, pension, and so on, minus the tax deduction, which varies depending on income class and number of dependents. The maximum allowable taxable earnings differ depending on whether the applicant is self-employed or not. It can be difficult for households applying for student loans to estimate their accurate taxable income. If taxable earnings on the application does not exceed the maximum allowable taxable earnings, there would be a high probability of receiving a student loan. The change in maximum allowable taxable earnings for student loan applications was exogenous for households. With regard to this, we compared the changing educational outcomes by region. Since a region is a set of municipalities, we implemented a difference-in-differences (DD) analysis using municipality panel data.

It is worth mentioning that no other education policies were implemented in 1999. The changes in educational policy from the 1990s to 2000s that could affect one’s decision to go to col lege other than the 1999 JASSO loan reform were the alleviation of College Setting Standard and the revision of the curriculum standard. The alleviation of College Setting Standard refers to the rules related to the establishment and expansion of colleges capacities. It was difficult for university establishments to expand college capacities, because the rules strictly regulated the quantity. After the alleviation of College Setting Standard in

1991, university establishments easily established and expanded their capacities. In fact, the college capacity per 10,000 high school students was 867.6 in 2000, compared with 493.3 in 1990. Although this alleviation occurred at the national level and not at a regional level, it could affect the enrollment decisions of high school students sensitive to the capacity changes in local areas. To deal with this problem, we employed the capacity of colleges per high school students in the prefecture per year as a control variable.

Another factors affecting enrollment decisions could be the curriculum standard revision. In Japan, materials taught and the teaching hours at elementary, secondary, and high schools are regulated by the curriculum standards issued by MEXT. The curriculum standards have been revised every decade since 1947. The revision after the 1989 revision was made in 1999, yet this revision did not affect the enrollment decision of high school students in 1999. The announcement was made in 1999; however, the implementation of the curriculum standards revision for high school students was implemented in 2003. Therefore, the announcement of the curriculum standard revision could not affect the enrollment decision.

中文

学生贷款对大学生入学的影响：来自日本市政府的数据

摘要

本研究探讨了扩大学生贷款的是否可以促进日本高中毕业生的大学入学率。1999年，日本学生服务组织根据家庭收入修订了学生贷款系统的资格标准。修订之前，各地区学生贷款申请的最大允许收入有所不同；一些地区的标准低于其他地区。修订后，向上调整了最高允许收入较低的地区的标准，以匹配具有较高最高允许收入的地区的标准。我们使用1998年至2003年的市政小组数据进行了差异估计。我们发现，获得学生贷款的资格的扩大使男性大学入学率提高了约0.5至0.7％，而女性入学率对扩大学生贷款资格。低收入地区学生贷款资格扩展的影响更大。

关键词：高校入学；学生贷款；差异

人力资本积累（例如，通过提供高等教育）是提高生产力和弥合收入差距的最重要方法之一。在日本，对高等教育的需求在过去的几十年中有所增加，随着就业能力的提高以及受高等教育者的失业率下降。2010年，大约45％的成年人接受了高等教育，而继续接受高等教育的学生比例估计为54.3％。据估计，日本的高等教育回报率约为5-10％（Sano和Yasui，2009年；Nakamuro等人，2017年；Kikuchi，2017年）。

高等教育投资在很大程度上取决于日本的私人来源。例如，在高等教育支出总额中，50.7％来自家庭支出（经合组织，2012年）。此