A Comparative Study On Systems Of Chinese & American Student Loans In Higher Education

Student loans are one of the most important tools of cost sharing in higher education. Since 1999, the Government- subsidized Student Loan Scheme (GSSLS) has been put into practice and played an important role in the reform and development of higher education in China. It has become the primary type of student aid. However, the influence of GSSLS is not as good as expected. Also, United States has State-supported Student Loans for more than a half century. With the complicated social background, it had suffered more difficulties in history, but came over successfully. It has become the most efficient and developed Student Loan system in the world. Many countries try to imitate it, and so does China. The paper aims to provide some information to assist in the development of future policies of GSSLS. The research mainly consists of the following 4 parts.First are theories of Student Loan. This part gives the rationale for Student Loans. They are human capital theory, education equity theory, and cost-sharing theory.Second is the comparison of Student Loan policies in the two countries. The research investigates backgrounds of these policies and tries to find the historical differences of the Student Loan scheme in the two countries.Third is the comparison of the running systems of Student Loan Scheme of two countries. The research tries to analyze the running system and finds some ways to solve the problems of our own.Fourth, getting useful experiences from America, are the suggestions to improve the running system of GSSLS.