Understanding Differences in State Support for Higher Education across States, Sectors, and Institutions: A Longitudinal Study

Do Factors Associated With the Increases in Higher Education Costs Affect Average Net Price at Four‐Year Public Institutions?

“…As a result, those schools that have primary tuition‐setting authority were controlled for. Finally, the political control of a state's legislature affects higher education funding (McLendon, Hearn, & Mokher, ; Weerts & Ronca, , ); as such, this study controlled for the political affiliation of both the governor of each state and the legislature.…”

Support for Performance‐Based Funding: The Role of Political Ideology, Performance, and Dysfunctional Information Environments

“…First, I use the percentage of state legislators who are Democrats, collected from Klarner's () data set on partisan balance, to capture the partisan makeup of the state. Given that Republican lawmakers are often associated with less support for public spending on higher education (Archibald and Feldman ; Tandberg ; Weerts and Ronca ; Zumeta et al ), we might expect university presidents to perceive that accountability efforts in more conservative states are often thinly veiled attempts to move toward privatization or reduce state support for higher education. Thus, in states with more Democratic legislators, university presidents may be more likely to see performance management as a less threatening attempt to make a good‐faith effort at improving governance and rewarding better performance.…”

Gender, legislative experience, and party affiliation: Examining the relationship between state legislator attributes and funding for higher education

“…In line with the balance wheel hypothesis, several studies have found that healthy economies, as signaled by higher levels of gross state product (GSP) per capita and median household income, lead to increased state higher education funding (Tandberg, 2010a;Tandberg, Fowles, & McLendon, 2017;Toutkoushian & Hollis, 1998). Conversely, indicators of poor economies, such as growth in populations in poverty and unemployment rates, both place constraints on state resources and increase demands on states to provide other social supports, which make state policymakers more inclined to cut funding for higher education (Dar & Lee, 2014;Kane, Orszag, & Hunter, 2003;Li, 2016;McLendon et al, 2009;Rizzo, 2005;Tandberg et al, 2017;Toutkoushian & Hollis, 1998;Weerts & Ronca, 2012).…”

“…Although several studies have found that Democratic control of state legislatures and governors' offices indeed foster increased fiscal support of postsecondary education (Archibald & Feldman, 2006;Dar & Lee, 2014;Kane et al, 2003, McLendon et al, 2009Tandberg, 2010a), a few more recent studies have challenged this notion, instead finding that the increased representation of Republicans in state legislatures is related to higher levels of spending (Chatterji, Kim, & McDevitt, 2018;Weerts & Ronca, 2012). As of yet, no studies have attempted to reconcile these findings, although Dar (2012) speculated such divergences might be due to differing operationalizations of expenditures, with some studies normalizing funding according to demand or a state's ability to pay and others using absolute dollars.…”

“…Hence, given that stark differences exist between twoyear and four-year institutions, support for higher education by political party may differ based on institutional sector. Dar (2012) and Weerts and Ronca (2012) contended that both Republican and Democratic policymakers are generally supportive of financing community colleges, albeit for different reasons. Democrats are typically supportive of community colleges because they believe these institutions provide higher education access and improved social mobility for lowincome populations.…”