Press release No. N 052 of 31 August 2021

• Number of people receiving assistance down 27% in 2020 compared with 1991; lowest figure for pupils since German reunification
• Average amount of total assistance grew more than twofold in the same period, to 556 euros per month
• Expenditure of almost 90 billion euros since the Federal Training Assistance Act (BAföG) entered into force; increasing number of women among the recipients
• Recently, employment was the main source of livelihood for a third of the students

WIESBADEN – Almost 23 million pupils and students have received BAföG assistance since German reunification. 50 years after the Federal Training Assistance Act came into force on 1 September 1971, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reports that the number of people receiving assistance has declined in the last years, following a record high in 2012. In 2020, 639,000 people received BAföG assistance, which was a decrease of well over a quarter (-27%) compared with 873,000 in 1991, the year after German reunification. At 174,000, the number of pupil recipients stood at its lowest level for the last 30 years; this was a decline of 35% on 1991. The number of students receiving assistance fell by 23% in the same period.

For further information

on BAföG:

Statistics on the promotion of education and training,

tel: +49 611 75 3737

on the livelihood of students:

Demographic evaluations and analyses based on microcensus data

tel: +49 611 75 2262