Students with a 5-year Master's accepted for a PhD position at the IMPRS on Astrophysics receieve automatically a PhD contract that covers the cost of living. The funding comes from various sources: e.g. funding is provided from the Max-Planck Society (MPG), from the institute's budgets, from ESO studentships and the German Science Foundation (DFG). The local institute decides which type of funding will be offered to each student. This can lead to small variations in the monthly rates among various students. On average, however, the monthly payments are all at a comparable level. The following table gives a brief summary on the approximate payment rates: 

MPE + MPA

Finance via a work contract (E13 65%):

• 1^st year about EUR 1.830 net per month (depends on German tax class)
• 2^nd and 3^rd year about EUR 1.980 net per month
• Statutory child allowance for each dependent child: EUR 250 per month
• Tax relief for married students
• Basic German health insurance already included

Yearly income:

1^st year: about EUR 23.134 net

(corresponding to EUR 34.295 gross)
2^nd and 3^rd year: EUR 25.031 net

(corresponding to EUR 37.068 gross)

ESO

Finance via a studentship:

• Basic studentship 1^st year: about EUR 1.989 net per month
• Basic fellowship 2^nd and 3^rd year: about EUR 2.218 per month
• Child allowance for each dependent child: EUR 324,20 per month
• Household allowance for members of the personnel who are married or who are entitled to children's allowance: EUR 216,13 per month
• The contribution of the student to the health insurance, presently 4.34% of the basic remuneration is subject to annual adjustments

Yearly income:

1^st year: EUR 22.800

Due to ESO’s status as an intergovernmental organisation, under most circumstances no income tax is payable on ESO salaries. Instead, an internal tax is withheld at source.

Please find more details here:ESO Studentships

University Observatory at LMU

Finance via a work contract (E13 65%):

• 1^st year about EUR 1.860 net per month (depends on German tax class)
• 2^nd and 3^rd year about EUR 1.989 net per month
• Statutory child allowance for each dependent child: EUR 250 per month
• Tax relief for married students
• Basic German health insurance already included

Yearly income:

1^st year: about EUR 23.313 net

(corresponding to EUR 34.295 gross)
2^nd and 3^rd year: EUR 24.855 net

(corresponding to EUR 37.068 gross)

Bachelor Stipend

If you have successfully applied to our IMPRS program with a degree that is not equivalent to the 5-year MSc (e.g. BSc, Bachelor with Honours, MSci), you will need to gain additional ECTS credits before being fully admitted to the PhD programme at LMU.

Unfortunately, this means that we cannot grant you a doctoral contract during this period of provisional admission. But we can support successful applicants at MPE and MPA with a so-called "Bachelor Stipend". However, we only pay the stipend if research work for the PhD studies have already started in parallel with the university's course program to obtain the additional ECTS credits.

The stipend can be paid for a maximum duration of 18 months.

Financial support via a Bachelor Stipend:

• EUR 861 net per month / EUR 10.332 net per year
• Child allowance for one dependent child: EUR 400 per month
• Child allowance for every other child: EUR 100 per month
• Basic German health insurance is not included, but an allowance of EUR 100 per month is provided to pay for health insurance