Michael S. Kofoed

To Apply or Not to Apply: FAFSA Completion and Financial Aid Gaps

In the United States, college students must complete the Free Application for Student Federal Aid (FAFSA) to access federal aid. However, many eligible students do not apply and consequently forgo significant amounts of financial aid. If students have perfect information about aid eligibility, we would expect that all eligible students complete FAFSA and no aid would go unclaimed. Using data from the National Postsecondary Student Aid Survey, I estimate a multinomial logit model which controls for all variables that contribute to aid eligibility and other student characteristics that may deter FAFSA completion. I find that students who are lower middle income, white, male and independent from parents are less likely to complete FAFSA even when they are eligible for aid. Using propensity score matching, I find that each year applicants forgo

For-Profit and Traditional Colleges: Institutional Control and Financial Aid Allocation

9,741.05 in total aid (including grant and loan aid) which includes

The Effect of Same-Gender and Same-Race Role Models on Occupation Choice: Evidence from Randomly Assigned Mentors at West Point

1,281.00 of Pell Grants,

A Neighborly Welcome?: Charter School Entrance and Public School Competition on the Capital Margin

2,439.50 of the balance subsidized student loans,

Does Time to Work Limit Time to Play?: Estimating a Time Allocation Model for High School Students by Household Income

1,986.65 of the balance of unsubsidized student loans, and

Employer-Sponsored Education Assistance and MBA Quality: An Application of the Alchian-Allen Substitution Hypothesis

1,016.04 of institutional grants. These aid totals aggregate to

THE EFFECT OF THE BUSINESS CYCLE ON FRESHMAN FINANCIAL AID: EFFECT OF THE BUSINESS CYCLE ON FINANCIAL AID

24 billion annually.

The Effect of the Business Cycle on Freshman Financial Aid

I examine differences in the competitive behavior between for-profit and traditional universities by modeling how these institutions allocate financial aid packages and set net cost according to differing objective functions. I test the implications of the model using data from the 2003-2004 and 2007-2008 waves of the National Postsecondary Student Aid Survey. I use an exponential regression model and correct for self-selection of students into institutions to estimate differences in pricing behavior. For-profit universities annually offer

For-Profit Higher Education Responsiveness to Price Shocks: An Investigation of Changes in Post 9-11 GI Bill Allowed Maximum Tuitions

819.69 less in institutional aid, while their students take on

The Consequences of Lead Poisoning

1,978.45 more in unsubsidized student loans and pay a higher net price of