Knowledge about Child Care in Germany and Policy Preferences

We use a Germany-wide representative survey to conduct our experiment. In the survey, we randomly provide information about the early child care system in Germany to participants. We organize this information in four different treatment groups and one control group, which does not receive additional information. We then investigate whether the information provided had an effect on preferences for four different policies that aim at closing the existing enrollment gap between migrants and natives in the German early child care system.

We provide the following treatments:
• Control Group:
Below we ask questions about issues in early child care in Germany.

• Treatment 1 – Take-Up Information:
Below we ask questions about issues in early child care in Germany.
Please look at the following information first before answering the questions.

33 out of 100 children of German parents and 12 out of 100 children of Turkish parents attend early child care.
[Picture with early child care take-up information for German and Turkish parents.]

• Treatment 2 – Discrimination Information:
Below we ask questions about issues in early child care in Germany.
Please look at the following information first before answering the questions.

71 out of 100 German parents and 63 out of 100 Turkish parents get a response to an e-mail inquiry to a child care center.
[Picture with discrimination information in early child care against Turkish parents.]

• Treatment 3 – Take-Up + Discrimination Information:
Below we ask questions about issues in early child care in Germany.
Please look at the following information first before answering the questions.

33 out of 100 children of German parents and 12 out of 100 children of Turkish parents attend early child care.
[Picture with early child care take-up information for German and Turkish parents.]

71 out of 100 German parents and 63 out of 100 Turkish parents get a response to an e-mail inquiry to a child care center.
[Picture with discrimination information in early child care against Turkish parents.]

• Treatment 4 – Take-Up + Enrollment Wish Information:
Below we ask questions about issues in early child care in Germany.
Please look at the following information first before answering the questions.

33 out of 100 children of German parents and 12 out of 100 children of Turkish parents attend early child care.
[Picture with early child care take-up information for German and Turkish parents.]

44 out of 100 German parents and 40 out of 100 Turkish parents want their child to attend early child care.
[Picture with information on the enrollment wish for German and Turkish parents.]


Primary Outcomes:

1. Policy Preferences
First, we assess preferences for four different policies that have the potential to close the enrollment gap between native and migrant children in early child care in Germany. We measure the policy preferences on a five point Likert scale from "1 – I completely disagree" to "5 – I completely agree". We consider the following policies:
- A centralized admission process at the municipality level instead of decentralized decisions by individual child care center managers.
- A further increase in the number of available slots financed by tax money.
- A preferential treatment of families with migration background in the admission process.
- Additional financial resources for child care centers when enrolling children with migration background.

2. Discrimination Source
Second, we ask participants how they would explain existing discrimination against migrants in the child care admission process, using a multiple choice list design. Participants can choose among the following potential explanations for discrimination:
- Disadvantageous treatment of migrants because of their migration background.
- Disadvantageous treatment of migrants due to a presumed larger workload caused by migrant children (e.g., due to language barriers).
- Disadvantageous treatment of migrants as child care centers ensure that the share of migrant children in the center is not too large, because this is what other parents want.
- Further: [Open Text]
- No answer

2022-11-14

2022-12-09

• Policy Preferences:
First, we assess preferences for four policies that have the potential to close the enrollment gap between native and migrant children in early child care in Germany. We measure preferences on a five point Likert scale from "1 – I completely disagree" to "5 – I completely agree".

• Discrimination Source:
Second, we ask participants how they would explain existing discrimination in the admission process against migrants, using a multiple choice list design.

We will conduct heterogeneity analyses by respondents’ migration background, political affiliation, parent status, stated priors, and education background.

We conduct a survey experiment to investigate respondents’ support of policy measures to mitigate enrollment gaps in German early child care. To do so, we randomly inform respondents about various existing inequalities in the German early child care system. We then measure the causal effect of this information provision on policy preferences

Randomization by survey software

Participant level

No

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6'000 survey participants.

We have five treatment arms (including the control group) at planned 6'000 survey participants, which results in ~1'250 observations per treatment arm dependent on the randomization.

With a sample of 6’000 respondents, five treatment arms and 80% power at the 5% significance level, the minimum detectable effect size is at around 0.04 of a difference in the mean scale points between two treatment conditions. Similarly, assuming a mean of 50% and a sample of 6’000 respondents, the minimum detectable effect size is at around a 4% difference in the mean of selected reasons for discrimination.