Does it Pay to Attend a Prestigious University?

Abstract

This paper provides evidence of heterogeneity in the returns to higher education in the UK. Attending the most prestigious universities leads to a wage premium of up to 6% for males. The rise in participation in higher education also led to a greater sorting of students and an increase in the returns to quality. These results somehow justify the recent introduction of top-up fees. Additionally, identification strategy matters and OLS estimates may be severely biased. However, our estimates, based on propensity score matching, are imprecise due to the thinness of the common support.

Keywords: higher education quality, tuition fees

JEL Classification: I20, I22