Skip to main content
Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics
Download PDF

The Apple Falls Increasingly Far: Parent-Child Correlation in Schooling and the Growth of Post-Secondary Education in Switzerland

Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics volume 143, pages 133–152 (2007)Cite this article

Summary

We analyze the completed highest education degree of four ten-year birth cohorts between 1934 and 1973 in Switzerland, using data from the Swiss Household Panel 1999–2004. As expected, the fraction of tertiary graduates has increased over time, for women more so than for men. Educational attainment is highly correlated with educational attainment of parents. We then decompose the overall trend into a parental background effect and a general expansion effect. For women in particular, we find that a substantial fraction of the overall increase in participation in tertiary education can be explained by the fact that the participation rates of women with lowly educated parents have increased. We furthermore explore the role of financial constraints in explaining these trends. Although the number of individuals suffering financial hardship during youth has declined over time, logit models suggest that financial problems might have become more important as an impediment for higher education.

References

  • Angrist, Josh, Victor Lavy and Analia Schlosser (2006), “New Evidence on the Causal Link between the Quantity and Quality of Children”, IZA Discussion Paper No. 2075.

  • Antonovics, Kate L. and Arthur S. Goldberger (2005), “Does Increasing Women’s Schooling Raise the Schooling of the Next Generation? Comment”, American Economic Review, 95, pp. 1738–1744.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bauer, Philipp and Regina T. Riphahn (2006a), “Education and its Intergenerational Transmission: Country of Origin-specific Evidence for Natives and Immigrants from Switzerland”, Portuguese Economic Journal 5, pp. 89–110.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bauer, Philipp and Regina T. Riphahn (2006b), “Timing of School Tracking as a Determinant of Intergenerational Transmission of Education”, Economics Letters 91, pp. 90–97.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Behrman, Jere R. and Mark R. Rosenzweig (2002), “Does Increasing Women’s Schooling Raise the Schooling of the Next Generation?”, American Economic Review, 92, pp. 323–334.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Black, Sandra E., Paul J. Devereux and Kjell G. Salvanes (2005), “Why the Apple Doesn’t Fall Far: Understanding Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital”, American Economic Review, 95, pp. 437–449.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cameron, Stephen and James Heckman (2001), “The Dynamics of Educational Attainment for Black, Hispanic, and White Males”, Journal of Political Economy 109, pp. 455–499.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chevalier, Arnaud and Gauthier Lanot (2002), “The Relative Effect of Family Characteristics and Financial Situation on Educational Achievement”, Education Economics, 10, pp. 165–181.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dustmann, Christian (2004), “Parental Background, Secondary School Track Choice, and Wages”, Oxford Economic Papers, 56, pp. 209–230.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ermisch, John and Marco Francesconi (2001), “Family Matters: Impacts of Family Background on Educational Attainments”, Economica, 68, pp. 137–156.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Haveman, Robert and Barbara Wolfe (1995), “The Determinants of Children’s Attainments: A Review of Methods and Findings”, Journal of Economic Literature, 1995, 33, pp. 1829–1878.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jenkins, Stephen P. and Christian Schluter (2004), “The Effect of Familiy Income During Childhood on Later-Life Attainment: Evidence from Germany”, IZA Discussion Paper No. 604.

  • Schütz, Gabriela, Heinrich W. Ursprung, and Ludger Woessmann (2004), “Education Policy and Equality of Opportunity”, CESifo Working Paper No. 1518.

  • Vellacott, Maja C. and Stefan C. Wolter (2004), Equity in the Swiss Education System: Dimensions, Causes and Policy Responses. National Report from Switzerland contributing to the OECD’s review of “Equity in Education”, SKBF, Aarau.

    Google Scholar 

  • Woessmann, Ludger (2004), “How Equal are Educational Opportunities? Family Background and Student Achievement in Europe and the USA”, CESifo Working Paper No. 1162.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Swiss Co-ordination Centre for Research in Education, Zürich, Switzerland

    Alejandra Cattaneo

  2. Socioeconomic Institute, University of Zurich, Zürichbergstr. 14, CH-8032, Zürich, Switzerland

    Sandra Hanslin & Rainer Winkelmann

Authors
  1. Alejandra Cattaneo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Sandra Hanslin
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Rainer Winkelmann
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rainer Winkelmann.

Additional information

We thank two anonymous referees for valuable comments.

Rights and permissions

Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 International License ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Cattaneo, A., Hanslin, S. & Winkelmann, R. The Apple Falls Increasingly Far: Parent-Child Correlation in Schooling and the Growth of Post-Secondary Education in Switzerland. Swiss J Economics Statistics 143, 133–152 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03399236

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03399236

Keywords

JEL Classification