Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/185192 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 11732
Publisher: 
Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Without a school degree, students can have difficulty in the labor market. To improve the lives of upper-secondary school dropouts, German states instituted a school reform that awarded an interim degree to high-track students upon completion of Grade 9. Using retrospective spell data on school and labor market careers from the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS), our difference-in-differences approach exploits the staggered implementation of this reform between 1965 and 1982. As intended, the reform reduced switching between school tracks. Surprisingly, it also increased successful high-track completion, university entrance rates, and later income, arguably by reducing the perceived risk of trying longer in the high-track school.
Subjects: 
school dropout
school degree
school tracking
JEL: 
I20
I24
I28
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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