The role of fees in foreign education: evidence from Italy

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• Article - Journal of Economic Geography
• Economix Working Ppaer

Résumé

Cet article étudie les déterminants de la mobilité des étudiants internationaux au niveau universitaire, en se concentrant plus particulièrement sur le rôle des frais de scolarité. Nous dérivons un modèle de gravité à partir d’un modèle de maximisation de l’utilité aléatoire du choix de localisation des étudiants internationaux en présence de contraintes de capacité des établissements d’accueil. Le dernier niveau du modèle (choix de l’université) est estimée à l’aide de nouvelles données sur les flux migratoires des étudiants au niveau universitaire pour l’Italie. Nous contrôlons l’endogénéité potentielle des frais de scolarité par une approche IV classique basée sur le statut de l’université. Nous obtenons un effet robuste et négatif des frais d’inscription sur la mobilité internationale des étudiants, avec une élasticité d’environ -0,8. Les estimations confirment également l’impact positif de la qualité de l’enseignement et soutiennent le rôle important de variables supplémentaires spécifiques à la destination, telles que la capacité d’accueil, le rendement attendu de l’enseignement, le coût de la vie et l’existence de programmes d’enseignement en anglais.

Abstract

This article studies the determinants of international students’ mobility at the university level, focusing specifically on the role of tuition fees. We derive a gravity model from a Random Utility Maximization model of location choice for international students in the presence of capacity constraints of the hosting institutions. The last layer of the model is estimated using new data on student migration flows at the university level for Italy. We control for the potential endogeneity of tuition fees through a classical IV approach based on the status of the university. We obtain evidence for a robust and negative effect of fees on international student mobility, with an elasticity around −0.8. The estimations also confirm the positive impact of the quality of the education and support an important role of additional destination-specific variables such as host capacity, the expected return of education, the cost of living and the existence of education programs taught in English.

Citation

Beine, Michel, Delogu, Marco and Ragot, Lionel, (2020), The role of fees in foreign education: evidence from Italy, Journal of Economic Geography, 20, issue 2, p. 571-600, https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:jecgeo:v:20:y:2020:i:2:p:571-600.

@ARTICLE{RePEc:oup:jecgeo:v:20:y:2020:i:2:p:571-600.,
title = {The role of fees in foreign education: evidence from Italy},
author = {Beine, Michel and Delogu, Marco and Ragot, Lionel},
year = {2020},
journal = {Journal of Economic Geography},
volume = {20},
number = {2},
pages = {571-600},
abstract = {This article studies the determinants of international students’ mobility at the university level, focusing specifically on the role of tuition fees. We derive a gravity model from a Random Utility Maximization model of location choice for international students in the presence of capacity constraints of the hosting institutions. The last layer of the model is estimated using new data on student migration flows at the university level for Italy. We control for the potential endogeneity of tuition fees through a classical IV approach based on the status of the university. We obtain evidence for a robust and negative effect of fees on international student mobility, with an elasticity around −0.8. The estimations also confirm the positive impact of the quality of the education and support an important role of additional destination-specific variables such as host capacity, the expected return of education, the cost of living and the existence of education programs taught in English.},
keywords = {Foreign students; tuition fees; location choice; university quality},
url = {https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:jecgeo:v:20:y:2020:i:2:p:571-600.}
}