Doing Business In Germany
Germany Global Reports | Rankings
Facts About Germany
Government - Law In Germany
Governance In Germany
Taxation Triggers
Population - Ethnicity - Language In Germany
Holidays In Germany - Festivals
Demographics For Women In Germany
Demographics On Aging In Germany
Mobile - Internet Usage In Germany
Ways To Do Business In Germany
Business Culture In Germany
Data Privacy in Germany
Data Protection Authority
How-To Marketing
Market Research In Germany
Influencer Marketing In Germany
Email Marketing In Germany
Direct Response Marketing In Germany
Social Media Marketing In Germany
Ecommerce - Online Shopping In Germany
Advertising In Germany
International PR For Germany
Prize Promotions - Competitions In Germany
Mobile Marketing In Germany
Product Localization
International SEO For Germany
Data Protection Regulations In Germany
Value Added Tax In Germany
International Trademark In Germany
Language Localization For Germany
Cultural Localization For Germany
Employment in Germany
Hiring And Visa Options
CE Marking - Licensing
Import - Export Business
KNOWLEDGE BASE Education In Germany
The information on this page was current at the time it was published. Regulations, trends, statistics, and other information are constantly changing. While we strive to update our Knowledge Base, we strongly suggest you use these pages as a general guide and be sure to verify any regulations, statistics, guidelines, or other information that are important to your efforts.
Germany has an effective educational system, with some of the most favorable statistics in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, or OECD, in the areas of education and employment .
The OECD is made up of 35 countries from around the world, including Germany, the United States, Japan, Australia, Poland, Israel, and Mexico - just to give you a sense for the diversity. Many of the German educational statistics you will see in this section and others are from the OECD, and many measures are shown as compared to the OECD average.
Before we look at some of the numbers, let's take a minute to review Germany's education system. In simplified terms, Germany has two different educational 'tracks' - an academic track leading to an academic college or university (called Tertiary - Type A in this section), and a vocational track leading to vocational training, an apprenticeship and a vocation (called Tertiary - Type B in this section). This approach has been very successful for Germany and affords its students options that are aligned with their interests and talents. You can learn more about this system on Wikipedia.
Over 9 out of 10 German 3 and 4 year olds are in early childhood education programs. The majority of those children attend programs that, while government-dependent, are not public institutions.
Upper-secondary education
At 86%, Germany has one of the highest percentages of people with at least an upper-secondary education. Think of upper-secondary as the equivalent of having finished high school in the US, keeping in mind that some of these students will have gone the academic route, while others the vocational route. With a projected 95% of today's young Germans expected to complete some form of upper secondary education, nearly half are choosing the vocational path.
One of the interesting numbers you'll see in the chart below is that only 3% of Germans with a general upper secondary degree don't continue on for further education, a very low number compared to the OECD average of 12%. This number is a good indication for how the German vocational/academic split works. The general upper secondary degree is intended to lead to further education, not directly into the labor market. If a person wants to go into the labor market without continuing academic studies, they will likely have chosen a vocational track. Therefore, if a person has taken the more general route, it's less likely they will just stop there.
Though the upper secondary (which includes both upper secondary and tertiary) achievement rates are very high for Germany, the tertiary portion of that is actually below the OECD average. One reason for the lower tertiary participation could be that the upper secondary vocational programs are so successful that fewer people feel the need to continue their education.
Education and pay
While a significant portion of Germans do not continue on for a tertiary education, there is a wage advantage to doing so. A German with a tertiary education can earn 74% more - which is higher than the OECD average difference. And not surprisingly, having only a lower secondary education leads to a further disadvantage. Women are also at a disadvantage to men.
Germany's unemployment has actually declined since 2005, although the less education one has, the more likely they are to be unemployed. Even with the disadvantages of a lower education, Germans still have a lower unemployment rate at all levels of education than the OECD average.
German women enter the sciences in tertiary education more than in other OECD countries and earned 44% of the degrees in 2012. In fact, they actually earned a higher percentage than men in math and statistics degrees. Between 2000 and 2012, the proportion of degrees earned by women in the sciences (including life sciences, physical sciences, mathematics and statistics, and computing) grew by at least 10%. This growth rate puts Germany in the company of just 4 other countries, including the Czech Republic, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, and Switzerland.
Though they have parity in education, German women with similar levels of education are earning less than men. And while they may have a greater share who are working part-time, other indicators suggest that they are not being paid equally for equal work. The World Economic Forum's Global Gender Index 2014 reports that there is still a gap in wage equality for similar work in Germany.
OECD interactive education attainment data page
OECD Education at a Glance 2014 - Germany
Statistisches Bundesamt - demographics on education, research, culture
Success! Your Request For Information was sent via email. You should hear back from the vendor soon. Ciao!