تاثیر تغییرات جمعیت شناختی بر انباشت سرمایه انسانی

This paper investigates whether and to what extent demographic change has an impact on human capital accumulation. The effect of the relative cohort size on educational attainment of young adults in Germany is analyzed utilizing data from the German Socio-Economic Panel for West-German individuals of the birth cohorts 1966 to 1986. These are the cohorts which entered the labor market since the 1980s. Particular attention is paid to the effect of changes in labor market conditions, which constitute an important channel through which demographic change may affect human capital accumulation. Our findings suggest that the variables measuring demographic change exert a considerable though heterogeneous impact on the human capital accumulation of young Germans. Changing labor market conditions during the 1980s and 1990s exhibit a sizeable impact on both the highest schooling and the highest professional degree obtained by younger cohorts.

During the last fifty years all European societies have transformed their demographic composition to a considerable extent. European economic and political integration together with an intense immigration experience have been additional relevant factors in this development. The most remarkable influence on European demographics, however, has been exerted by post-war baby booms and baby busts. The demographic burden induced by population ageing constitutes long-term societal challenges for all European countries, though with some heterogeneity regarding the precise timing (see e.g. Fertig and Schmidt (2003) for a more detailed discussion). In this context, Germany provides an interesting case study. According to the Federal Statistical Office (2006), Germany will soon have one of the highest shares of older people in all industrialized countries. The proportion of elderly relative to the labor force is projected to rise from 34% in 2010 to 64% in 2050, due to a pronounced decline in fertility rates and a simultaneous rise in life expectancy. It is uncontroversial that this demographic change will have a direct impact on the pay-as-you-go pension system (Börsch-Supan, 1999). Furthermore, it seems safe to argue that social security systems on the whole, most notably the public health care system will be affected directly by ageing societies as well. However, the discussion on the consequences of demographic change often neglects other, similarly important potential consequences of population ageing. In general, an ageing society implies not only a reduction of overall labor supply and an increasing old-age dependency ratio, but also a decline in the relative labor supply of younger workers. Thus, population ageing might affect the level and composition of the labor force in a much more complex way than is often recognized. This relative shift in labor supply might impinge upon a variety of different aspects of individual and societal welfare, among which educational attainment is of special interest. Börsch-Supan (2002), for instance, argues that it is unlikely that the decline in the relative labor supply of the young will be offset by higher capital intensity so that labor productivity has to increase considerably to keep production on its current level. An increase in productivity, however, typically requires higher human capital accumulation. Thus, the educational attainment of young cohorts is of vital interest for any economy coping with demographic change. This paper, therefore, investigates whether and to what extent demographic change has an impact on the human capital accumulation of younger cohorts. In this endeavor, we utilize data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) for West-German individuals of the birth cohorts 1966 to 1986 who entered the labor market since the 1980s. In addition to the direct measure of demographic change (i.e. the relative cohort size of 18–21 year old individuals relative to the total population), we consider labor market variables which capture important indirect effects of demographic change on human capital accumulation. It will become transparent that the variables measuring demographic change have a substantial impact on the human capital accumulation of young Germans. However, there is also remarkable heterogeneity in these effects for different cohorts. Our findings further suggest that both the highest schooling and the highest professional degree obtained by younger cohorts were determined by changing labor market conditions during the 1980s and 1990s. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 discusses the relationship between relative cohort size and educational attainment with a special focus on the German case. In Section 3 the empirical strategy and the utilized data are described in detail. Section 4 reports and discusses the empirical results and Section 5 offers some conclusions.

This paper investigates the impact of demographic change — measured by relative cohort size as well as cohort composition — on the human capital accumulation of individuals born between 1966 and 1986 in Germany. These cohorts entered the labor market since the 1980s. In addition to the direct measure of demographic change, we consider labor market variables which capture important indirect effects of demographic change on human capital accumulation. Specifically, we analyze the impact of relative cohort size, cohort structure, relative income and unemployment in an ordered Probit framework for the highest schooling and professional degree of men and women. All models also control for individual socio-demographic characteristics and parental background variables. Our empirical results provide evidence for a negative impact of the relative cohort size on educational attainment of both males and females. However, relative cohort size effects of cohorts born before 1978 differ substantially from those of cohorts born in 1978 or later. Furthermore, our results suggest that the labor market situation of young people plays a considerable role for investments in human capital. Although the quantitative dimensions of demographic measures suggest that increases in human capital investment may partly offset the decline in the number of highly educated young persons, policy should not expect large increases in human capital investment of younger cohorts due to demographic change alone. Against the background of a rather strong intergenerational dependence in educational success in Germany and considering the fact that human capital investments depreciate over time if not regularly renewed, there seems to be room for additional incentives for higher investments in human capital for younger as well as older workers. However, instead of selective initiatives policy should embed these incentives in a coherent strategy of life-long learning which is able to reduce the strong intergenerational dependence in human capital accumulation.