Why do apprenticeship schemes work well in some countries, like Germany and Austria, but less so in others, like the UK? This paper argues that a necessary prerequisite for apprenticeship schemes to be successful is the enforceability of the apprenticeship contract, most notably the firm's...

Eine große Zahl ¨okonometrischer Studien, hat die Auswirkungen zentraler Abschlusspr¨ufungen auf die Leistungen von Sch¨ulern untersucht und immer wieder einen positiven Zusammenhang gefunden. Dieser Aufsatz soll dazu beitragen, den Begriff zentrale Abschlusspr¨ufung zu konkretisieren,...

This paper analyses the impact of replacing unskilled or semi-skilled employees by apprentices on establishment performance. We use representative matched employer–employee panel data and correct for different sources of estimation biases. We show that an increase of the proportion of...

Central exams have been discussed as an incentive to improve educational outcomes. In our paper we study the impact of central exams on labor market outcomes. We explain the quality choice of schools under central and non-central exams and model the resulting students’ schooling decisions and...

Diese Arbeit untersucht Unterschiede in den Schulleistungen zwischen Jungen und Maedchen sowie moegliche Ursachen, die sich aus Charakteristika der Eltern und institutionellen Rahmenbedingungen ergeben. Hierzu werden die Daten der Schulleistungsstudie PISA 2000 mit einer Drei-Ebenenanalyse...

This paper uses regional variation in labor markets, the industry structure and the educational system to explain the training decisions of firms. Using a representative firm-level data set, the results show that firms are less likely to offer training if the number of competing firms situated...

Empirical research has given cause to fear that the demographic ageing in industrialized countries is likely to exert a negative impact on educational spending. These papers have linked the share of the elderly with the per capita or per pupil spending on education at the local, state-wide or...

Although participation in continuing vocational training is often found to be associated with considerable individual benefits, a puzzlingly large number of people still do not take part in training. We argue that in order to solve the puzzle it is important to take selection effects into...

The objective of this paper is to model and estimate the impact of labour training financed by the firm on labour demand in Belgium, introducing training potential productivity and cost effects. To model this influence, we assume profit maximizing firms producing under a short run monopolistic...

Demographic change in industrial countries will influence educational spending in potentially two ways. On the one hand, the decline in the number of school-age children should alleviate the financial pressure. On the other hand, the theoretical/empirical literature has established that the...