May 2002

IZA DP No. 503: Public Funding and Enrolment into Higher Education in Europe

Rudolf Winter-Ebmer, Aniela Wirz

In this paper we provide evidence for the impact of public funding on enrolment of students in college. We use a panel for European countries and apply instrumental variables techniques to find that public funding for schooling – regardless at what level – does increase college enrolment alike with an elasticity of about one. A second issue concerns the impact of tuition fees, which are found to reduce college enrolment.