Data and Code for: "College Financial Aid Application Frictions"

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) Emily G. Moschini, William & Mary; Gajendran Raveendranathan, McMaster University

Version:  View help for Version V1

Name File Type Size Last Modified
  NLSY97_extract 02/13/2026 02:08:PM

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary These files replicate the results from "College Financial Aid Application Frictions," by Emily G. Moschini and Gajendran Raveendranathan. Abstract: We document that 11 percent of recent US high school graduates did not apply for federal student aid due to difficulty in applying, mistaken beliefs, or lack of awareness. Not applying due to such application frictions negatively predicts college enrollment after controlling for other attributes. We represent application frictions as heterogeneous filing costs in a general equilibrium life cycle model of college enrollment. We find that eliminating these frictions generates modest gains on average because less than half of those affected would ultimately utilize aid. However, welfare gains are large for the affected few with high skill and poor parents.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms Application frictions; Federal student aid; Filing difficulty; Mistaken beliefs; Welfare costs
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage United States of America
Data Type(s):  View help for Data Type(s) program source code; survey data

Methodology

Data Source:  View help for Data Source
1. The 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY97) (Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, 2019)
2. High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 (HSLS:09) (National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, 2020a)
3. Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) (Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, 2022)
4. Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 2013)
5. Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement (CPS ASEC) (Flood et al., 2025)
6. Congressional Budget Office (CBO) (U.S. Congressional Budget Office, 2018a,b)
7. Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) (OECD, 2024a,b,c)
8. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) (Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Department of Commerce, 2022a,b,c)
9. National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) (National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, 2019, 2020b)
10. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) (Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, 2021)
11. US Department of Education, Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA) (U.S. Department of Education, Office of Federal Student Aid, 2021; Federal Student Aid, U.S. Department of Education, 2013)
12. College Board (Ma et al., 2020)
13. Social Security Administration (SSA) (Bell and Miller, 2020)
Geographic Unit:  View help for Geographic Unit United States of America

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Published Versions

V1 [2026-02-15]

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