Ongoing clashes between the Trump administration and elite universities threaten to discourage or even outright bar international students from coming to the U.S. to further their schooling. As I discussed in my recent Chalkboard post, cutting international college students out of the American economy would strike a heavy economic blow (estimated to cost around $44 billion), add much to the trade deficit, harm many college budgets, and badly damage businesses in many college towns.
Today’s follow-up question is where would the damage strike most heavily? Are just a few parts of the country at great risk, or would the damage be spread relatively evenly? Would just a few colleges see massive enrollment hits, or would enrollment hits be spread widely?
Based on my analysis of national data on the topic, I conclude that a handful of blue states would see large drops in spending by international students, but past that, the drop is spread roughly evenly across the country. Relatively few colleges would lose a large share of their undergraduate enrollment, but those at the highest risk are heavily concentrated among private rather than public colleges. Most of the more vulnerable colleges are not very large and have a special focus, such as art, music, or business. Also, colleges affiliated with Christian churches would be disproportionally affected. One suspects this was not the Trump administration’s intention.
Read more at Brookings.
