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The present paper studies the determinants of higher education spending by the German federal states with a focus on the interplay between higher education spending of neighboring states. More specifically, the paper asks whether the German federal states free-ride on one another's higher educational spending or whether they employ higher education spending to attract university graduates. We identify a positive relationship between the states' higher education spending and conclude that the states compete for graduates rather than free-ride. We also consider the effect of the recent introduction of tuition fees in some, but not all German states. We do not find evidence that tuition fees led to crowding out of public higher education funds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Soziologie is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Soziologie is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This work is a contribution to the usefulness of climate-related authentic material for pedagogical purposes in Higher Education. The two case studies had the aim of raising environmental awareness of a sustainable future among university students, while encouraging them to explore language use and draw their own conclusions and considerations through different methodologies. Specifically, we highlight how posts from the social networking platform Instagram can help learners with different levels of language proficiency in Higher Education, approach specific topics using authentic language samples and visual data, and simultaneously develop new skills that may be integrated within their field of study. The case studies occurred in a distance learning context at the University of Calabria and Humboldt University of Berlin. They present two possible ways of increasing climate change awareness among university students while applying data-driven and research-based learning interdisciplinary approaches to climate change communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2001, the voluntary Riester pension scheme was implemented in Germany. Financial subsidies should provide incentives to increase private pension savings. In this paper, we hypothesize that these publicly subsidized savings are mainly driven by the incentives of child benefits and that supplier induced demand is an important factor. Using data from the Socio-economic Panel we analyze the key determinants in the choice of a Riester-pension. We find a higher probability to sign a Riester contract for those with higher income, higher education and children. Furthermore, we show that a contact with an insurance agent in the previous year is a major factor for the possession of a Riester-pension. Separate estimations regarding gender and socialization confirm our hypothesis of heterogeneous determinants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of ABI Technik is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Soziologie is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Soziologie is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article focuses on a survey by the ZKI (centers for communication and information processing in research and higher education) on the role of chief information officers (CIOs) in German universities. Topics discussed include examination of universities' websites, questionnaire for the survey, classification of CIOs by German Research Foundation (DFG) into four different section, and no implementation of recommendations of DFG and ZKI by most of the German higher education institutions.

The question of costs and benefits related to the introduction of tuition fees still dominates the current discussion of higher education policy in Germany. In this contribution, we quantify the effect of tuition fees on state-to-state migration patterns among university freshmen in Germany using an empirical migration model for all 16 German states (Bundesländer) in the period 1999 to 2010. Overall, our results reveal a negative effect of tuition fees on gross in-migration to fee-charging states since their introduction in 2006. Although the absolute size of this spatial redistribution effect is moderate, by means of simulation exercises we nevertheless show that the potential use of tuition fees as a planning instrument for higher education policy may not be seen as negligibly. With regard to the questions, which of the other determinants in the migration model can affect gross in-migration flows in a similar way as the introduction of tuition fees was able to do, we find that only a very drastic improvement in the quality of teaching and research facilities at universities in non-charging states relative to fee-charging universities would be able to evoke a similar effect on the spatial redistribution of university freshmen among German states. This raises a closely related question, namely, which of the available instruments may serve best to accomplish the goal of high utilization rates for existing capacities at universities in East Germany as formulated in the University Pact 2020 (Hochschulpakt 2020). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a panel of west German states ( ) for the period 1985 to 2002 we analyse potential effects of demographic change and political constellations on higher education spending, as suggested by recent literature on the political economy of the determination of public expenditures. We find empirical evidence for the hypothesis of a negative relationship between demographic aging and higher spending on public education. In contrast to the hypothesis of the classical partisan theory that implies higher public expenditures under leftist parties, we find that governments under conservative parties or a coalition between social democrats and conservatives spend more on public higher education than governments run by the social-democratic party alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]