Who deserves student finance? Results from a survey experiment in six advanced capitalist economies

Higher-education policy is increasingly politicised across advanced western democracies, one important point of contention being the treatment of immigrant students, who are often portrayed as a ‘burden’ on higher-education systems. A second issue, made salient during the ongoing cost-of-living crisis, is students’ ability to make ends meet and the extent to which governments should provide them with financial support. While these issues are gathering scholarly attention, little is known about the demand side at the intersection of the two, namely, under which conditions immigrants are considered deserving of financial aid. We address this gap using data from original survey experiments conducted in six countries. Our main findings are twofold: First, immigrant students are generally evaluated as less deserving of financial aid than native students but can overcome this if they are top performers. Secondly, we find that this penalty for immigrant students is driven disproportionately by right-wing voters.