Teodora Tsankova, from Tilburg University, will present "Tracking and Geographic Mobility: Evidence from Finland"

There is wide cross-country variation in the relative importance of general versus vocational training at the secondary level of education. De-tracking reforms, which were widely implemented across Europe in the twentieth century, have substantially changed the type of skills taught in schools within country. In practice, such reforms harmonize the curriculum and offer more general training to students who would have otherwise ended up in a vocational track. We focus on the Finnish 1970s comprehensive school reform, which postponed the age of tracking from 10/11 to 15/16. Using the staggered implementation of the reform across Finnish regions, we investigate its effect on internal and international mobility in a difference-in-differences framework. Administrative panel data allow us to estimate short- to long-term effects. We find that the reform increased internal mobility in the long-run, particularly for those coming from a high SES background and urban centers.  Short-run effects tend to be the opposite. Labor market analysis shows that this mimics effects on employment outcomes.