C. Katharina Spiess studied economics and political science at the University of Mannheim, where she received her degree as a Diplom-Volkswirtin in 1992. From 1993-1997 she worked as a research associate at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, where she obtained her doctoral degree in 1996. During 1997 to 2000 she worked at the Prognos AG, Basle and Berlin. From 2000-2021 she was a senior researcher and later head of the “education and family department” at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) in Berlin. From 2006-2021 she was a professor at the Freie Universität Berlin. Since 2021 she is the director of the Federal Institute for Population Research (BiB) and a professor for population economics at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz.