Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/147302
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
Hohenheim Discussion Papers in Business, Economics and Social Sciences No. 14-2016
Publisher: 
Universität Hohenheim, Fakultät Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Stuttgart
Abstract: 
A growing body of research suggests that, even after controlling for cognitive abilities, personality predicts economic success in later life. The learning environment at school focuses on knowledge and cognitive skills. The transmission of character skills, however, is not at the center of attention. Leisure activities as informal learning activities outside of school may affect the formation of skills. By providing valuable opportunities, working part-time while attending full-time secondary schooling can be seen as a stepping stone toward independence and adulthood. The channel of the positive influence, however has not been identified empirically. I suggest that employment during adolescence promotes the formation of character skills that are known to have a positive effect on labor market outcomes and educational achievement. Employing a exible strategy combining propensity score matching and regression techniques to account for self-selection, I find beneficial e ects on character skills. Further, it improves future expectations, the knowledge on which skills and talents school students have and reduces the importance of parents advice with respect to their childs future career. The results are robust to several model specifications and varying samples and robust to including family-fixed effects.
Subjects: 
human capital
teenage employment
non-cognitive skills
time use
treatment effect
JEL: 
I21
J13
J24
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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