This study investigated the effects of divorce on educational gaps in mothers’ economic resources. The results shed new light on two opposing theoretical positions that have informed research on social inequality in the consequences of divorce. Recent extensions of the “diverging...

This study presents descriptive and causal evidence on the role of social environment for the formation of prosociality. In a first step, we show that socio-economic status (SES) as well as the intensity of mother-child interaction and mothers' prosocial attitudes are systematically related to...

This study considers life satisfaction in relation to the empty nest syndrome, which is a situation where there are feelings of loss or loneliness for mothers and/or fathers following the departure of the last child from the parental home. In particular, the investigation considers the...

Mit dem im Zuge der Hartz IV-Reform 2005 eingeführten Kinderzuschlag sollte vermieden werden, dass Familien von ALG II und Sozialgeld abhängig werden, deren Einkommen zwar zur Deckung des elterlichen minimalen Lebensstandards, nicht aber für das Existenzminimum des Kindes bzw. der Kinder...

In developed countries, obesity tends to be associated with worse labor market outcomes. One possible reason is that obesity leads to less human capital formation early in life. This paper investigates the association between obesity and the developmental functioning of children at younger ages...

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...

Complementing prior research on income mobility and educational transmission, we provide evidence on the intergenerational transmission of cognitive abilities using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study. Our estimates suggest that individuals' cognitive skills are positively related to...

Empirical analyses on the determinants of life satisfaction often include the impact of the number of children variable among controls without fully discriminating between its two (socio-relational and pecuniary) components. In our empirical analysis on the German Socioeconomic Panel we show...

Overindebted private households have created economic and political concern. Using measures of relative (over-) indebtedness which relate household income and debt services to different concepts of subsistence levels, this paper investigates whether severe household indebtedness is driven by...

This paper investigates the association between maternal life satisfaction and the developmental functioning of two- to three-year-old children as well as the socio-emotional behavior of five- to six-year-old children. We use data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP), which allows...