Scholarships can get more women into engineering, but they are totally useless in fields that are already balanced.
April 14, 2026
Original Paper
Paying for Progress? The Causal Effect of Financial Incentives on Female STEM Enrollment
SSRN · 6282579
The Takeaway
Financial incentives successfully increased female enrollment in male-dominated Engineering programs but had zero effect on Basic Sciences. This reveals that money can break down barriers in extreme environments, but cannot close the "final gap" in fields that have already achieved relative parity.
From the abstract
Policymakers worldwide seek to reduce gender gaps in STEM through targeted interventions, yet evidence on effective policy tools remains limited. We evaluate Italy's MUR Decree No. 1320 (2021), which introduced a 20% scholarship bonus for female STEM students. Using administrative data from 2011-2024, we find a significant 6.0 percentage point increase in female Engineering enrollment among international students (p < 0.01). In contrast, ICT and Basic Sciences show precisely estimated null effec