The prevalence and importance of children's physical health problems have been increasingly recognized in recent years. Physical health problems of children such as obesity, motor impairment and chronic diseases cause social costs. Further, they can lead directly to adult physical health...

In this analysis, we compare the determinants of the first-level and the second-level digital divide for private internet use in Germany. Our work offers three important innovations. First, we use the exact weekly duration of internet use to explain inequalities in internet intensity, explicitly...

Many children grow up with parents working abroad. Economists are interested in the achievement and well-being of these home alone children to better understand the positive and negative aspects of migration in the sending countries. This paper examines the causal effects of parents' migration...

Based on a 1% sample of the German population, we study how fertility rates in the country of origin-a proxy for cultural imprint-influence the fertility outcomes of first- and second-generation female immigrants. We use both total fertility rates in the year of migration and a new measure of...

We estimate a structural life-cycle model of fertility and female labour supply and use it to evaluate the effects of a number of key family policy measures based on data for Germany. Parental leave benefits, child benefits and subsidized childcare are found to have substantial fertility...

The effects of childbirth on future labor market outcomes are a key issue for policy discussion. This paper implements a dynamic treatment approach to estimate the effect of having the first child now versus later on future employment for the case of Germany, a country with a long maternity...

Based on a structural model of fertility and female labour force supply with unobserved heterogeneity and state dependence, we evaluate the 2007 reform of parental leave benefits in Germany, which replaced a flat, means-tested benefit by a generous earnings-related transfer. The model predicts a...

According to school entry regulations in most countries, the composition of school entrance cohorts is determined by a fixed cutoff date. This procedure creates inter-cohort differences in age and development which can severely influence educational trajectories. Developmental examinations at...

This paper examines the impact of parental investments on the development of cognitive, mental and emotional skills during childhood using data from a longitudinal study, the Mannheim Study of Children at Risk, starting at birth. Our work offers three important innovations. First, we use...

In dieser Studie werden anhand einer experimentellen Datenerhebung im Rahmen der deutschen Längsschnittstudie Sozio-oekonomisches Panel (SOEP) mögliche Determinanten des Belohnungsaufschubs im Alter von fünf bis sechs Jahren untersucht (im Folgenden als "Geduld bei Kindern" bezeichnet)....