Does simplifying the college financial aid process matter?

Ayushi Narayan

Economics of Education Review, 2020, vol. 75, issue C

Abstract: The IRS Data Retrieval Tool, a financial aid simplification tool accessed by 7 million students (nearly 40% of FAFSA filers) a year, was suddenly removed during the middle of the 2017 application cycle. Exploiting variation in 1,600 institutional deadlines influencing the amount of time students lacked access to the tool, I find a null effect of its paperwork reduction properties on college access outcomes. Form simplification alone seems unlikely to have the same beneficial impacts as personal assistance in the college financial aid setting, calling into question the notion that small hassle costs by themselves meaningfully deter program take-up.

Keywords: Educational economics; Student financial aid (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I22 I23 I28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecoedu:v:75:y:2020:i:c:s027277571930531x

DOI: 10.1016/j.econedurev.2020.101959

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