Education systems can be viewed as complex systems, by considering that learning, teaching, cognition and education are phenomena resulting from interactions between the heterogeneous agents that compose such systems. Given the complex nature of education systems, new approaches seem relevant,...

This paper analyses the determinants of participation in higher education in West Germany. In particular, the role of social origin as well as of expectations regarding the labour market outcome of a higher education degree and of public educational policy are examined. The estimations are based...

That historical inequality can affect long run macroeconomic performance has been argued by a large literature on endogenous inequality using models of indivisibilities in occupational choice, in the presence of borrowing constraints. These models are characterized by a continuum of steady...

Curriculum tracking, the separation of secondary school students into academic and vocational tracks, correlates positively with pretracking achievement in both British and international data. I argue that this correlation is caused by the incentives emanating from the track placement decision....

Though the use of tracking policies to stratify students is commonplace, evi- dence concerning the effects of ability-based tracking on student performance is mixed. Using rich data from the Hungarian secondary school centralized assignment mechanism and a quasi-experimental framework, we find...

Incentives to invest in higher education are affected by both the direct wage effect of human capital investments and the indirect wage effect resulting from lower unemployment risks and shorter spells in unemployment associated with higher educated. We analyse the returns to education in...

Little is known about how socioeconomic characteristics of executive teams affect corporate governance in banking. Exploiting a unique dataset, we show how age, gender, and education composition of executive teams affect risk taking of financial institutions. First, we establish that age,...

This paper evaluates the effects of a high school curriculum reform that was introduced in one German state on high school dropout. The reform increased the standards of the curriculum by reducing the freedom of choice in course selection (amongst other things) resulting in an increase in the...

Career guidance assists students with the school-to-work transition. Based on a survey in secondary schools in Germany, we analyze career guidance activities and how these affect career plans. The take-up of career guidance depends upon the school track attended and upon the school and class...

The previous literature has shown that children who enter school at a more advanced age outperform their younger classmates on competency tests taken between kindergarten and Grade 10. This study analyzes whether these effects of school starting age continue into adulthood. Based on data on math...