This paper investigates the relationship between kindergarten attendance and secondary school track choice in West-Germany. Our analysis is based on a panel of 12 to 14-year olds with information from age two on, drawn from the German SocioEconomic Panel (GSOEP) 1984?2005. We estimate binary...

There is an increasing economic literature considering personality traits as a source of individual differences in labor market productivity and other outcomes. This paper provides an overview on the role of these skills regarding three main aspects: measurement, development over the life...

There is an increasing economic literature considering personality. This paper provides an overview on the role of these skills regarding three main aspects of economic analysis: measurement, theoretical modeling, and empirical estimates. Based on the relevant literature from different...

This paper assesses the effects that an introduction of the French family splitting mechanism would have on German families' labour supply and intra-household consumption behaviour. We use simulated real world microdata created by means of a 'deterministic' collective labour supply model. The...

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...