This article focuses on the connection between financial aid systems in higher education and the development of inequalities in access to higher education. Although the student financial aid system is just one of a number of factors that influence a person's chances of studying in higher education, its role in a person's decision to pursue higher education may be of fundamental significance for those with lower socio-economic status. Therefore, the authors of this article focus on the effect of the financial conditions of study on the chances that individuals from families with low socio-economic status have obtained higher education. The analysis looks at developments in the Czech Republic and the Netherlands, because Czech and Dutch student financial aid systems have been evolving in very different directions over the last two decades, while their secondary school systems continue to share very similar features. The analysis reveals that student financial aid based primarily on direct financial support (as in the Netherlands) was accompanied by a decline in inequalities in access to education, even though students had to pay tuition, while a system of financial aid primarily involving indirect support (as in the Czech Republic) applied over the same period did not inhibit increasing inequalities, despite the fact that during the period under observation students were not required to pay tuition.