As in many other countries, government policy in the UK has the objective of raising the participation rate of young people in higher education, while increasing the share of the costs of higher education paid by students themselves. A rationale for the latter element comes from evidence of a...

Estimates of a high average return to a degree for UK graduates have provided a policy rationale for increasing the share of the costs of higher education borne by UK students over recent decades. We use evidence from a cohort of people born in 1970 to estimate hourly wage returns to a...