UC Riverside

In this three-paper dissertation, I explore the relationship between student debt and political behavior, attitudes, and public perceptions in the United States. In my first paper, I examine how the salience of personal debt affects political behavior and attitudes among student debtors. Through two online survey experiments, I find little evidence that heightening debt salience significantly impacts support for redistributive policies or participation metrics. However, I reveal some negative participatory effects among less financially precarious debtors, suggesting that the political consequences of debt may differ from those associated with general financial precarity. My second paper investigates the impact of the Biden Administration's 2022 student loan debt cancelation policy on debtors' political attitudes and behaviors. Utilizing observational data from a survey conducted when the cancelation application portal opened and experimental data from a 2024 question order experiment, I find minimal evidence of significant changes in debtors' attitudes toward the Biden administration. I observe some inconsistent effects on ideological perceptions of Biden, highlighting the complex nature of policy reception among beneficiaries. In my third paper, I shift focus to public perceptions of student debtors and attitudes toward debt cancelation. Through two survey experiments with informational treatments, I reveal that both socioeconomic and racial characteristics of debtors influence public opinion. Notably, I find that first-generation student debtors garner more sympathy from the general public, while Republican subjects show greater willingness to support debt relief for white debtors. The papers are, with one exception, self contained. In the second paper I reference tests conducted in the first paper, so as to avoid repeating the same analysis twice in this document. Collectively, this project contributes to our understanding of the political implications of student debt in the United States, and suggest that the literature on inequality, socio-economic stress and political participation should expand to consider stressors such as student debt, in addition to those traditionally considered.