Higher Education Finance

Laura Beamer

Lead Researcher

As the Lead Researcher on Higher Education Finance at JFI, Laura leads research design and implementation in higher ed at JFI. She completed her Masters Degree in International Finance and Economic Policy at Columbia University SIPA. Laura has produced extensive tools for understanding and comparing existing higher education financing models and the projected impacts of ISAs, among other options. On the topic of empowering public education, Laura has also written about funding sources in journalism. In our basic income work, Laura’s study on “Basic Income and Environmental Degradation” examines the intersection of cash transfers and energy consumption. Currently, Laura is the lead researcher for JFI’s Millennial Student Debt Project, a study of inequality in student access to higher education in the U.S.

Previously, Laura worked as a teaching assistant in quantitative analysis at SIPA. She also worked in asset management at Overseas Private Investment Corporation, where she created risk ratings for investment in several developing countries, and co-authored a report on the economic repercussions of the trade war in Sub-Saharan Africa. She graduated summa cum laude with a BA in Political Science from Georgia State University and grew up in Atlanta, GA.

Follow Laura on Twitter here.

Related Publication Series

Millennial Student Debt

The Millennial Student Debt (MSD) series unites credit bureau, Census, and IPEDS data to scrutinize changes in higher education policy across the US and US territories. Posts in the series focus on, among other topics, higher education access and school concentration; the impact of the Great Recession; the growth of non-repayment; and student debt trends over the last ten years, breaking down the data by location and demographic. The maps and reports allow a detailed view of the hardships of student debt, at both the granular level of ZIP codes, and at the highest level, the country as a whole.

Related Initiatves

Financing the Energy Transition

Higher Education Finance

Publications