Podbit · Planet Money
Robert Kelchen studied business, medical, and law schools nationally and found no evidence of the Bennett Hypothesis. His reason: programs like medicine aren't profit centers — it costs up to $1 million to produce one medical degree. Schools can't easily cut prices because they're not inflated to begin with.
Where this was said
At 16:16 · chapter starts 16:15
The study that defenders of the loan cap policy point to first was conducted in Texas, tracking what happened to graduate school prices after the Grad PLUS program launched in 2006. Economist Jeff Denning at UT Austin and his colleagues pored through administrative data covering enrollment, graduation rates, and financial aid across Texas grad programs [1] — Jeff Denning "A study of Texas graduate programs found that when federal Grad PLUS loans allowed unlimited borrowing in 2006, schools raised prices by 64…" 13:50 . Their finding was striking: for every additional dollar of federal loan access, graduate schools raised their prices by about 64 cents — nearly two-thirds of a dollar. Denning describes this as a causal relationship, not mere correlation. When asked to characterize the magnitude, he repeats 'meaningfully up' twice. It's powerful evidence. But it's also evidence from one state, and other researchers looking at different fields nationally found something very different.
Robert Kelchen's national study of business, medical, and law schools found no evidence that unlimited federal loans caused those programs to raise prices.
Robert Kelchen estimated it can take $1 million of institutional resources to produce a single medical degree, meaning loan caps cannot easily reduce those costs.
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