Bibliography: p.43-44

Empirical evidence that access to higher education is constrained by credit availability is limited and usually very indirect. This paper provides direct evi- dence by comparing university enrollment rates of South African potential stu- dents, depending on whether they get a loan or not to cover their registration fees, in a context where such fees are high. We use matched individual data from both a credit institution (Eduloan) and the Department of Education. Based on a regression discontinuity design using the fact that loans are granted according to a credit score threshold, we can estimate the causal impact of loan obtainment. We _nd that the credit constraint is substantial, as it decreases the enrollment rate into higher education by more than 20 percentage points in a population of student loan applicants.