Parents’ social background predicts their children’s educational achievement, thus reproducing social inequality between generations. This finding is internationally well-known and a constant cause for public and academic discussion. But which aspects of parental social background are relevant in this context? So far, research has identified parents’ education, occupation and income as important determinants of their children’s educational achievement. In our study, we focus on wealth as an additional predictor. Wealth has received broader attention, not at least since Pikettys (2014) book on “Capital in the Twenty-first Century”, in which the author showed that wealth inequality is rising in most Western countries. We analyse the relationship between parental wealth and childrens cognitive abilities in primary school as well as their transition to secondary school in Germany. Germany is an interesting study case for at least two reasons. First, despite that education is largely free of charge, educational success is strongly linked to parental origin. Second, in Germany, the consequential track choice after primary school happens earlier than in most other countries. This should make an early parental investment in education particularly important and may thus increase advantages for children from wealthy families.
New Blog Post: Müller & Dräger write about wealth stratification in the early school career in Germany
Categories:
GESIS-News
