Are some birthdays better than others?

A cut-off date for school eligibility creates a continuum of ages when students start attending primary school. This means that in one class, some students are younger and some students are older. This is called “relative age” in literature. Relatively older students are more mature, and some studies show that this creates an advantage for the relatively older students. The results in this study show an insignificant effect of relative age on test scores of about 0.10-0.15 standard deviations in the eighth grade. Furthermore, the results show that relative age has an insignificant effect on education years of approximately 0.25 years, a significant higher income of approximately 15% for males, and also an insignificant higher skill level. Lastly, the effect of relative age on health is analysed. Since education attainment affects health, it may be the case that relative age has an indirect effect on health. The effect of relative age on self-reported health is statistically and economically insignificant, but the effect of relative age on dead shows that relative older students are less likely to die before the age of approximately 70 years. This result, however, is not significant.