School Social Workers in Germany
Introduction
Drescher (2026) examines the impact of a policy reform in Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany that increased the number of social workers in public schools. The paper uses crime register data and administrative education data from 2006 to 2018 to measure impacts on youth delinquency and educational outcomes. The paper utilizes a difference-in-differences design, exploiting regional variation in the increase of school social workers generated by the policy reform.
MVPF = 3.3
Net Cost
The paper reports an expenditure of approximately €50,000 for the introduction of an additional school worker in a school with 1,000 students, including 200 in grades 10-13. The policy reform provided a state subsidy of €16,700 per full-time school social worker, which was intended to cover a third of the costs of the position.
The paper also considers public expenses on the criminal justice system and cost savings from reduced grade retention in grades 10-13. It estimates a public cost of €9,000 per offender resulting from criminal activity, according to the National Audit Office (2011). The paper finds that one additional school social worker prevents 4 offenders per 1,000 adolescents per year, generating €36,000 (€9,000 * 4) in savings per 1,000 adolescents. For reduced grade retention, the paper uses a government cost per repeater of €5,000 based on Klemm (2009). The paper finds that an additional school social worker reduces grade retention by 0.2 percentage points in grades 10-13, resulting in a cost reduction of 2,000€ per school (€5,000 * 0.002 * 200). In addition, the paper assumes that a student who repeats a grade foregoes earnings equal to the German minimum wage, generating additional public savings of €2,800 per school due to increased tax revenue (€7,000 * 0.002 * 200).
Combining expenditures with public savings, the paper reports a net cost of €9,200 (€50,000 – €36,000 – €2,000 – €2,800) for a school with 1,000 students.
Willingness to Pay
The paper calculates benefits according to the savings resulting from the reduction in juvenile crime and reduced grade retention due to the policy reform.
For the reduction in juvenile crime, the paper focuses on offense types where there were significant reductions among adolescents (theft, property damage, and serious bodily injury). The paper refers to Heeks et al. (2018) to estimate the average cost of a theft at €1,100, the cost of an incident of property damage at €1,000, and the cost of a case of serious bodily injury at €13,000. The paper finds that one additional school social worker reduced approximately 4.2 thefts, 1.1 property damage offenses, and 1.3 cases of serious bodily injury per 1,000 adolescents. This results in an estimated €22,600 in private savings (€1,100 * 4.2 + €1,000 * 1.1 + €13,000 * 1.3).
For reduced grade retention, the paper assumes that a student who repeats a grade foregoes earnings equal to the German minimum wage, resulting in increased net income per school of €7,600 (€19,000 * 0.002 * 200).
Combining these benefits, the paper estimates a WTP of €30,200 for a school with 1,000 students. Additionally, the paper calculates an alternative WTP accounting for the number of unreported crimes, which increases it to €70,000.
MVPF Summary
Considering only the savings from the reduction in reported crimes, the paper reports an MVPF of 3.3. The paper also calculates an alternative WTP accounting for the number of unreported crimes, which increases the MVPF to 7.6.
References
Drescher, Katharina (2026). “Does School Social Work Work? The Impact of School Social Workers on Youth Crime and Education.” Working Paper. https://www.bgpe.de/files/2026/01/DP246_final-1.pdf
Heeks, Matthew, Sasha Reed, Mariam Tafsiri, & Stuart Prince (2018). “The Economic and Social Costs of Crime, Second Edition.” Home Office Research Report 99. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-economic-and-social-costs-of-crime
Klemm, Klaus (2009). “Klassenwiederholungen–teuer und unwirksam. Eine Studie zu den Ausgaben für Klassenwiederholungen in Deutschland.” Gütersloh: Bertelsmann Stiftung.
National Audit Office (2011). “The Cost of a Cohort of Young Offenders to the Criminal Justice System.” Ministry of Justice London.
Policy Features
- Category
- Education
- Sub-Category
- Child Education
- Beneficiary Type(s)
- Children and Youth, Secondary school enrollees, Students
- Country of Implementation
- Germany
- Year of Implementation
- 2012
- Empirical Method
- Difference in Differences
- Research Type
- Primary
- Peer Reviewed
- No
- MVPF Publication Link
- www.bgpe.de/files/2026/01/DP246_final-1.pdf