Opportunity Monitor 2023: Educational Opportunities in Germany Strongly Dependent on Parents

Children and young people in Germany have enormously different educational opportunities: depending on their parents’ family background, their likelihood of attending a university-track secondary school ranges from one in five to four in five. This is the finding of the new ifo “A Heart for Children” Opportunity Monitor, which was presented today in Berlin together with the BILD charity “Ein Herz für Kinder” (A Heart for Children), with Germany’s Federal Minister of Education, Bettina Stark-Watzinger, in attendance. “The decisive factors for children’s educational opportunities in Germany are their parents’ education and income. Whether or not they have an immigration background is less important,” says Ludger Wößmann, Director of the ifo Center for the Economics of Education.

For the child of a single parent who did not graduate from high school, is in the lowest income quartile, and has an immigration background, the probability of attending a university-track high school is 21.5 percent. In contrast, it is 80.3 percent if the child grows up with two parents who both graduated from high school, are in the top income quartile, and do not have an immigration background.

Even considering the parents’ education alone, there are big differences: the likelihood of attending a university-track high school increases from 28.2 percent for children whose parents did not graduate from high school to 57.9 percent if one parent graduated from high school and to 75.3 percent if both parents did. Differences also become apparent when considering the parents’ employment. Overall, girls have a 44.9 percent probability of attending a university-track high school – 6.9 percentage points higher than boys (38 percent). Gender differences of this magnitude are present regardless of the children’s social background.

“This huge disparity in educational opportunity is not irrevocable. Policy measures ought to provide targeted support for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, for example through free tutoring and mentoring programs,” Wößmann says. He adds that it is important to attract especially qualified teachers to schools with many disadvantaged children. Higher salaries would be one possible way to make working at these schools more attractive. Attendance at early-childhood education institutions should also be made free of charge for disadvantaged families throughout the country. They should receive targeted support in their search for a daycare spot.

The data on which the Opportunity Monitor is based is the current Microcensus for 2019. This provides information on attendance at a university-track high school and family background for a sample of more than 50,000 children and adolescents ages 10 to 18. The family background is represented by four characteristics: number of parents who graduated from a university-track high school, net household income, parents’ immigration background, and whether it is a single-parent household.