The economic and psychological literatures have demonstrated that early investments (private and public) in children can significantly increase cognitive outcomes in the short and long term and contribute to success later in life. One of the most important of these inputs is maternal time....

Individuals differ not only by gender and hair color, they also exhibit heterogeneities in various probably not fully genetically determined dimensions as personality, preferences and skills. Moreover, individuals live in different social environments and yield unequal life outcomes as health or...

Female labor market participation rates have increased substantially in many countries over the last decades, especially those of mothers with young children. This trend has triggered an intense debate about its implications for children's well-being and long-term educational outcomes. The...

This paper estimates sibling correlations in cognitive and non-cognitive skills to evaluate the importance of family background for skill formation. Based on a large representative German dataset including IQ test scores and measures of non-cognitive skills, a restricted maximum likelihood model...