East Germany’s unemployment rate still doubles that of West Germany and for the last decade its economic growth has been below that of other transition countries. Policy makers often point to the lack of entrepreneurship as one of East Germany’s main problems. This paper addresses the question of how East Germany’s integration into an established economy, West Germany, may have hindered a fruit...

This paper examines the impact of marital status on maternal mortality in the period before and the period after German reunification in the area covered by the former East Germany. Maternal mortality ratio prior to the reunification was stable and declined after reunification. This can be attributed to the adoption of a lenient reporting system from West Germany. Unmarried status, on the othe...

Some 20 years after unification, the contrast between East and West Germany provides a unique natural experiment for studying the persistence of communist-era family patterns, the effects of economic change, and the complexities of the process of fertility postponement. After unification, fertility rates plummeted in the former East Germany to record low levels. The number of births per year fe...

Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we investigated the role of childbearing history in later-life health and mortality, paying particular attention to possible differences by sex and region. Higher parity is associated with better self-rated health in West German mothers and fathers aged 50+, but its relationship with East German women's physical health and survival is negative. E...

Rupert Kling was born in Bayrischzell, Germany, on December 12, 1944. He received the M.S. degree in electrical engineering from the Technical University of Munich, Munich, West Germany, in 1973. In 1973 he joined the Siemens Component Division, Munich, West Germany. He was working in the field of test program generation for various MOS-LSI circuits. At present, he is a member of a design team ...

The reunification of Germany has made it possible to compare the health care in two independently developed social structures. The prevalence of hypertension was considerably greater in East German men and women, compared with West German men and women, although salt intake was lower in East Germany than in West Germany. Cardiovascular mortality was correspondingly greater. A centralized public...