Data
ifo Education Survey (ifo Bildungsbarometer)
The ifo Education Survey (ifo Bildungsbarometer) is a representative opinion survey of the German voting-age population on education topics that has been conducted annually since 2014. It covers public preferences on a wide range of education policy issues ranging from early childhood education, schools, and apprenticeships to university education and life-long learning. The dataset comprises several survey experiments that facilitate investigating the causal effects of information provision, framing, and question design on answering behavior.
The datasets of the first eight waves (2014-2021) of the ifo Education Survey are available for scientific use in the LMU-ifo Economics & Business Data Center (EBDC). The following article gives an overview of the survey content and methodology, describes the data, and explains how researchers can access the datasets of over 4,000 participants per wave:
The ifo Education Survey 2014-2021: A New Dataset on Public Preferences for Education Policy in Germany (with V. Freundl, E. Grewenig, F. Kugler, P. Lergetporer, R. Schüler, K. Wedel, K. Werner, and O. Wirth). Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik / Journal of Economics and Statistics 243 (6): 699-710, 2023
ifo Prussian Economic History Database (iPEHD)
The ifo Prussian Economic History Database (iPEHD) is a county-level database covering a rich collection of variables for all counties of Prussia during the 19th century. The Royal Prussian Statistical Office collected these data in a number of censuses over the period 1816-1901, with much county-level information surviving in the archives. These data provide a unique treasure for unprecedented micro-regional empirical research in economic history, analyzing the importance of such factors as education, religion, fertility, and many others for the economic development of Prussia in the 19th century. The service of iPEHD is to provide the data in a digitized and structured way.
iPEHD starts with the population census in 1816, which is the first full-scale census released by the Royal Prussian Statistical Office, which had been founded in 1805. The 1816 census covers the 308 Prussian counties at the time. Further extensive census data are available in 1849, 1864, 1871, and 1882, but many more detailed data were collected in additional years. As the number of counties grew over time, by 1901 the data cover 574 Prussian counties. In total, iPEHD contains more than 1,500 variables and more than half a million data points, all at the county level. These data are drawn from a total of 15 original sources, many of which consist of several volumes. The following article describes iPEHD in greater detail:
iPEHD – The ifo Prussian Economic History Database (with S.O. Becker, F. Cinnirella, and E. Hornung). Historical Methods 47 (2): 57-66, 2014
Datasets and Codes of Papers
The Separation and Reunification of Germany: Rethinking a Natural Experiment Interpretation of the Enduring Effects of Communism (with S.O. Becker and L. Mergele). Journal of Economic Perspectives 34 (2): 143-171, 2020
Skills, Signals, and Employability: An Experimental Investigation (with M. Piopiunik, G. Schwerdt, and L. Simon). European Economic Review 123: 103374, 2020
Social Cohesion, Religious Beliefs, and the Effect of Protestantism on Suicide (with S.O. Becker). Review of Economics and Statistics 100 (3): 377-391, 2018
Knowledge Capital and Aggregate Income Differences: Development Accounting for US States (with E.A. Hanushek and J. Ruhose). American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 9 (4): 184-224, 2017
Education and Religious Participation: City-Level Evidence from Germany’s Secularization Period 1890-1930 (with S.O. Becker and M. Nagler). Journal of Economic Growth 22 (3): 273-311, 2017
The Importance of School Systems: Evidence from International Differences in Student Achievement. Journal of Economic Perspectives 30 (3): 3-31, 2016
The Empire Is Dead, Long Live the Empire! Long-Run Persistence of Trust and Corruption in the Bureaucracy (with S.O. Becker, K. Boeckh and C. Hainz). Economic Journal 126 (590): 40-74, 2016
Knowledge Capital, Growth, and the East Asian Miracle (with E.A. Hanushek). Science 351 (6271): 344-345, 2016
Returns to Skills around the World: Evidence from PIAAC (with E.A. Hanushek, G. Schwerdt, and S. Wiederhold). European Economic Review 73: 103-130, 2015
Not the Opium of the People: Income and Secularization in a Panel of Prussian Counties (with S.O. Becker). American Economic Review: Papers & Proceedings 103 (3): 539-544, 2013
Does Women’s Education Affect Fertility? Evidence from Pre-Demographic Transition Prussia (with S.O. Becker and F. Cinnirella). European Review of Economic History 17 (1): 24-44, 2013
The Effect of Investment in Children’s Education on Fertility in 1816 Prussia (with S.O. Becker and F. Cinnirella). Cliometrica 6 (1): 29-44, 2012
Do Better Schools Lead to More Growth? Cognitive Skills, Economic Outcomes, and Causation (with E.A. Hanushek). Journal of Economic Growth 17 (4): 267-321, 2012
Education and Catch-up in the Industrial Revolution (with S.O. Becker and E. Hornung). American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 3 (3): 92-126, 2011
The Trade-off between Fertility and Education: Evidence from before the Demographic Transition (with S.O. Becker and F. Cinnirella). Journal of Economic Growth 15 (3): 177-204, 2010
‘Every Catholic Child in a Catholic School’: Historical Resistance to State Schooling, Contemporary School Competition and Student Achievement across Countries (with M.R. West). Economic Journal 120 (546): F229-F255, 2010
The Effect of Protestantism on Education before the Industrialization: Evidence from 1816 Prussia (with S.O. Becker). Economics Letters 107 (2): 224-228, 2010
Was Weber Wrong? A Human Capital Theory of Protestant Economic History (with S.O. Becker). Quarterly Journal of Economics 124 (2): 531-596, 2009
Luther and the Girls: Religious Denomination and the Female Education Gap in 19th Century Prussia (with S.O. Becker). Scandinavian Journal of Economics 110 (4): 777-805, 2008
Educational Production in Europe. Economic Policy 20 (43): 445-504, 2005