A Promise Worth Keeping? Impacts of Free Community College on Degrees and Earnings

Paige Schoonover, Jonathon Attridge, Celeste Carruthers and Jilleah G. Welch

No 35226, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We study Tennessee Promise, Tennessee’s tuition-free community college program, which preceded similar programs in over twenty states and multiple federal proposals. We examine how Promise affected college enrollment and early adult outcomes as the program expanded from a single-county pilot to statewide eligibility. Promise increased college enrollment by 5.4 percentage points among 19-year-olds, increased transfers from two-year to four-year schools, increased associate’s degree attainment by 2.9 percentage points among 21-year-olds, imprecisely increased bachelor’s degree attainment by age 24, and weakly increased income from age 21. We estimate that the program pays for itself under reasonable assumptions about returns to college.

JEL-codes: D04 I22 I23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-05
Note: ED
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