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IZA Discussion Paper No. 1789
September 2005
Birth Order, Educational Attainment and Earnings: An Investigation Using the PSID

published in: Journal of Human Resources, 2006, 41(4), 755-777

Whether siblings of specific birth order perform differently has been a longstanding open empirical question. We use the family tree structure of the PSID to examine two claims found in the literature: whether being early in the birth order implies a distinct educational advantage, and whether there exists, within large families, a pattern of falling then rising attainment with respect to birth order, to the point where it becomes best to be last-born. Drawing from OLS and family fixed effects estimations, we find that being first-born confers a significant educational advantage that persists when considering earnings; being last-born confers none.

Communications
Mark Fallak
mark.fallak@liser.lu
+352 585-855-526
World of Labour
Olga Nottmeyer
olga.nottmeyer@liser.lu
+352 585-855-501
Network Coordination
Christina Gathmann
christina.gathmann@liser.lu

The IZA@LISER Network is a global community of scholars dedicated to excellence in labor economics and related fields, now coordinated at the Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) following its transition from Bonn.

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