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on Sociology of Economics |
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Issue of 2007‒03‒10
nine papers chosen by Jonas Holmstrom Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration |
| By: | Jonung, Christina; Ståhlberg, Ann-Charlotte (Swedish Institute for Social Research, Stockholm University) |
| Abstract: | Economics in Sweden is still a male-dominated profession, despite an increasing number of women entering the profession during recent decades. About one third of the students in the higher undergraduate programs in economics are women. Women’s proportion of the licentiate degrees obtained has increased from zero to 27 percent and their share of doctoral degrees from zero to 26 percent between 1970 and 2005. The proportion of women in the research and teaching staff at academic institutions in economics, 16 percent, is slightly below their proportion of the total number with a doctoral degree in economics in the country, 18 percent. Further, women’s careers in academia have not kept up with those of men. Only 13 percent of those with the academic grade of associate professor or higher are women. No more than six percent of the full professors in economics at Swedish universities, i.e. five, are women. <p> Women in economics are underrepresented relative to women employed in the university as a whole. When comparing the career ladder for women in economics to that of other academic fields, we find economics to be more akin to mathematics than to the other social sciences. The situation for women in academic economics in Sweden is surprisingly similar to that in other countries for which we have comparable data. The paper also considers the interest and success of female economists in professional and public economic policy debate through their representation in The Swedish Association of Economics and their participation as authors in Ekonomisk Debatt, the journal of the association, inaugurated in 1973. |
| Keywords: | - |
| Date: | 2006–11–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:sofiwp:2007_005&r=sog |
| By: | Pietro Garibaldi; Francesco Giavazzi; Andrea Ichino; Enrico Rettore |
| Abstract: | For many students throughout the world the time to obtain an academic degree extends beyond the normal completion time while college tuition is typically constant during the years of enrollment. In particular, it does not increase when a student remains in a program beyond the normal completion time. Using a Regression Discontinuity Design on data from Bocconi University in Italy, this paper shows that a tuition increase of 1,000 euro in the last year of studies would reduce the probability of late graduation by 6.1 percentage points with respect to a benchmark average probability of 80%. We conclude suggesting that an upward sloping tuition profile is efficient in situations in which effort is suboptimally supplied, for instance in the presence of public subsidies to education, congestion externalities and/or peer effects. |
| Keywords: | tuition, student performance, regression discontinuity. |
| JEL: | I2 C31 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cca:wpaper:38&r=sog |
| By: | Daniel Chudnovsky (Centro de Investigaciones para la Transformación (CENIT).); Andrés López (Centro de Investigaciones para la Transformación (CENIT).); Martín Rossi (Universidad de San Andrés); Diego Ubfal (Inter-American Development Bank) |
| Abstract: | The paper contains an impact evaluation of research subsidies on the academic performance of researchers in Argentina. |
| Keywords: | scientific research, program evaluation, propensity score matching, Latin America, Argentina. |
| JEL: | H50 O38 |
| Date: | 2006–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:idb:ovewps:1206&r=sog |
| By: | John Geweke; Joel Horowitz; M. Hashem Pesaran |
| Abstract: | As a unified discipline, econometrics is still relatively young and has been transforming and expanding very rapidly over the past few decades. Major advances have taken place in the analysis of cross sectional data by means of semi-parametric and non-parametric techniques. Heterogeneity of economic relations across individuals, firms and industries is increasingly acknowledged and attempts have been made to take them into account either by integrating out their effects or by modeling the sources of heterogeneity when suitable panel data exists. The counterfactual considerations that underlie policy analysis and treatment evaluation have been given a more satisfactory foundation. New time series econometric techniques have been developed and employed extensively in the areas of macroeconometrics and finance. Non-linear econometric techniques are used increasingly in the analysis of cross section and time series observations. Applications of Bayesian techniques to econometric problems have been given new impetus largely thanks to advances in computer power and computational techniques. The use of Bayesian techniques have in turn provided the investigators with a unifying framework where the tasks of forecasting, decision making, model evaluation and learning can be considered as parts of the same interactive and iterative process; thus paving the way for establishing the foundation of “real time econometrics”. This paper attempts to provide an overview of some of these developments. |
| Keywords: | History of econometrics, Microeconometrics, Macroeconometrics, Bayesian Econometrics, Nonparametric and Semi-parametric Analysis |
| JEL: | C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 |
| Date: | 2006–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cam:camdae:0655&r=sog |
| By: | Josep M. Colomer |
| Abstract: | In order to have references for discussing mathematical menus in political science, I review the most common types of mathematical formulae used in physics and chemistry, as well as some mathematical advances in economics. Several issues appear relevant: variables should be well defined and measurable; the relationships between variables may be non-linear; the direction of causality should be clearly identified and not assumed on a priori grounds. On these bases, theoretically-driven equations on political matters can be validated by empirical tests and can predict observable phenomena. |
| Keywords: | natural and social sciences, econometrics, political science methods, mathematical models, regression analysis |
| Date: | 2007–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upf:upfgen:1017&r=sog |
| By: | Josep Lluís Boned; Llorenç Bagur |
| Abstract: | Organisations are becoming increasingly aware of the need for management information systems, due largely to the changing environment and a continuous process of globalisation. All of this means that managers need to adapt the structures of their organisations to the changes and, therefore, to plan, control and manage better. The Spanish public university cannot avoid this changing (demographic, economic and social changes) and globalising (among them the convergence of European qualifications) environment, to which we must add the complex organisation structure, characterised by a high dispersion of authority for decision making in different collegiate and unipersonal organs. It seems obvious that these changes must have repercussions on the direction, organisation and management structures of those public higher education institutions, and it seems natural that, given this environment, the universities must adapt their present management systems to the demand by society for the quality and suitability of the services they provide. |
| Keywords: | Management accounting, balanced scorecard, public universities |
| JEL: | M41 M49 |
| Date: | 2006–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upf:upfgen:976&r=sog |
| By: | Heijke Hans; Meng Christoph (ROA wp) |
| Abstract: | This paper summarizes the outlines of three empirical studies that we have carried out on actual labour market value of the various types of competencies acquired in higher education and how these competencies may be taught most effectively. The focus is on the discipline-specific competencies and academic competencies. In all three studies, use was made of the European CHEERS dataset. The main results with regard to the labour market value of the various competencies are that a high level of discipline-specific competencies provides graduates with a comparative advantage in jobs within their own professional domain, where they also earn more than outside this domain. Graduates who possess a high level of academic competencies, have a comparative advantage outside their own professional domain, where they may initially earn less than in their own domain. As they are more inclined to take part in training activities and are able to obtain the required competencies for a supervisory position more quickly, their salaries rise more quickly with time. With regard to the organization of the education process, we found that activating learning methods contribute effectively to both the acquisition of academic competencies and the acquisition of discipline-specific competencies. By combining these methods with a more prominent position for knowledge transfer by teachers, the acquired level of discipline-specific competencies can be increased without affecting the acquisition of academic competencies. |
| Keywords: | education, training and the labour market; |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:umarow:2007001&r=sog |
| By: | McKnight, Abigail (London School of Economics); Naylor, Robin (University of Warwick); Smith, Jeremy (University of Warwick) |
| Abstract: | We exploit individual-level administrative data for whole populations of UK university students for the leaving cohorts of 1985-1993 (together with that of 1998) to investigate the influence of degree performance on graduate occupational earnings. We find that there is a significant premium associated with a good performance at university. We also find that this premium increased between 1985/6 and 1993/4, a period of substantial expansion in the graduate population. Among other results, we find that there are significant differences in the occupational earnings of leavers according to university attended, subject studied, and pre-university educational and social background, ceteris paribus. |
| Keywords: | Graduate earnings ; degree class ; educational performance |
| JEL: | J3 J4 I2 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:786&r=sog |
| By: | Yee-Yee, Hla; Gnanajothy, Ponnudurai; Chan, Tze-Haw |
| Abstract: | Many schools in the developed world have adopted portfolios in an attempt to address the scholarship of teaching. This is because of the atmosphere of “publish or perish” which pervades academia. Buying off teaching obligations with research dollars is an increasingly pervasive practice in many institutions and Faculty caught up in this system have generally gone along with it, focusing on the scholarship of discovery at the expense of the scholarship of integration, application, and teaching - little of which carries the financial consequence or peer recognition of sponsored research.1 Add to this the fact that many medical schools world wide have adopted teacher- intensive, integrated hybrid PBL curricula and the result is frustrated teachers who undergo occupational burnout. An ideal faculty reward system should support the priorities and mission of the institution e.g. if improving the quality of teaching and learning is a high priority, then the tenure, promotion, and merit pay system must support quality efforts to redesign the curriculum, improve courses, and increase the effectiveness of teaching.2 Education Portfolios are not widely used in this part of the world, and few Faculty have even heard of the term “Education Scholarship”. This study is a preliminary report on perception of the faculty rewards in place in their institution and their familiarity with the concept of education scholarship. A questionnaire was posted to Faculty of medical schools in Malaysia and also distributed to staff of the National University of Singapore, during an international conference. A total of 54 responses were collected from six institutions (14 were unidentified); representing a response rate of about twenty per cent. Thirty two were teaching in a hybrid curriculum; and 26 were clinical teachers. Thirty three had been in their respective institutions for more than three years. |
| Keywords: | Faculty Rewards; Education Portfolios; medical schools |
| JEL: | I00 I23 |
| Date: | 2006 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:2022&r=sog |