CERP3 contributors: Jason Jabbari and Somalis Chy
Jabbari, Jason; Habiba, Ibrahim; Despard, Mat; and Chy, Somalis (2026) “Intersectional Inequalities in College Savings and Educational Outcomes across Race/Ethnicity, Immigrant Status, and Gender: A Quant-Crit Analysis,” Journal of Student Financial Aid: Vol. 55 : Iss. 1 , Article 4.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.55504/0884-9153.1864
As families use savings to further their children’s education, education serves as both a key driver of wealth and an artifact of wealth itself. Despite these cyclical relationships and the ways in which education and wealth are stratified across gender, race/ethnicity, and immigration, there is little intersectional research exploring these relationships. We employ a quantitative critical approach and leverage the first nationally representative longitudinal survey that includes information on high school achievement, college savings, borrowing, college enrollment, and major of study. We first demonstrate how race-gender and immigrant-gender intersectional groups experience disadvantages in college savings and in educational outcomes. We then demonstrate how college savings relate to educational outcomes. Finally, through structural equation modeling, we demonstrate how intersectional disadvantages in college savings relate to disadvantages in educational outcomes. Across college savings and educational outcomes, we find unique intersectional disadvantages for Black and Hispanic women and men and first-generation women and men.