The development of welfare for young people in university was essential for putting forward the dual logic described in Chapter 1, as this was the key policy convincing middle- and low-income groups to go into HE. Together with these ‘carrots’ (the development of new systems of student support), the system of HE presents other ‘sticks’ underlined by Trow, namely, the fact that while the elite system of HE was paradoxically very generous to the privileged young people who joined it, student support for the expanded HE system could not have been equally generous for reasons of financial sustainability (unless, of course, it involved expanding the welfare state, which was not a popular idea in the 1990s). For example, in the UK in the 1970s, the system of student support was far more generous than the current system given its provision of grants, housing support and coverage of fees for the privileged young people going into HE. In other words, they were the symbol of middle-class welfare, funded by the taxpayer to support (mostly) middle-class young people. The modern systems for student support had to support another goal – they had to be generous enough to convince those from the middle and lower classes to engage in HE, but also not be so costly as to be unsustainable. So how have systems of student support struck this balance across Europe? And how has austerity changed these systems?

Comparing ‘welfare mixes’ in England, Italy and Sweden

Two strategies have been followed across Europe to convince people to join engage in HE and to maintain a financially sustainable system: first, increasing public funding of universities and charging relatively low fees; and second, charging higher fees, but offering grants and loans.