You are invited to join the weekly Nuremberg Research Seminar in Economics on 3 December 2025, from 13.15 to 14.45 pm. The seminar will be held in room LG 4.154 (!!). Mirjam Stockburger (University of Giessen) will be talking about “Fast-Track fo Family? Evidence from the G8 High School Reform in Germany”.
More information can be found here:
Many OECD countries experience rising educational attainment alongside delayed childbirth. This paper examines whether reducing the duration of secondary school affects family formation. Germany’s G8 reform compressed the academic school track (Gymnasium) from nine to eight years while keeping the total instruction hours unchanged. We exploit the reform’s staggered adoption in the federal states in 2001-2009 with a difference-in-differences design and use German Microcensus data. We confirm that G8 lowers the age at which students graduate from school and complete their education. Next, we find that 22-year-old individuals, who are typically just completing their studies, are almost 18% more likely to be in full-time employment, indicating earlier entry into the labor market of G8 cohorts. We further observe a shift in fertility timing, with G8-exposed individuals being 40% more likely to have had their first child by age 30. The results reveal that freeing a year in early adulthood, while holding qualification constant, can ease the education-fertility conflict for women and support gender-equitable policy goals.