nep-sog New Economics Papers
on Sociology of Economics
Issue of 2009‒01‒10
two papers chosen by
Jonas Holmström
Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration

  1. Why Current Publication May Distort Science By Neal S Young
  2. Is Privatization Necessary to achieve Quality of Universities? By Brezis, Elise S.

  1. By: Neal S Young
    Abstract: The current system of publication in biomedical research provides a distorted view of the reality of scientific data that are generated in the laboratory and clinic. This system can be studied by applying principles from the field of economics.
    Keywords: scientific data, resources, medical, oligopoly, biological, sciences, publication, research, laboratory, clinic, biomedical, economics, winner's curse,
    Date: 2008
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ess:wpaper:id:1757&r=sog
  2. By: Brezis, Elise S.
    Abstract: The purpose of this study is to analyze the relationship between privatization in higher education and the quality of universities. An interesting fact is that of the top 10 universities in the US, nine are private. Previous studies have claimed that there is a relationship between the privatization of universities and their quality, since countries with a high proportion of private resources have superior universities. The purpose of this paper is to analyze if indeed this supposed relationship is due to empirical regularities between quality and ownership, or whether the two are unrelated. The analysis presented herein is based on data collected on 508 universities in 40 countries. I show that flexibility is the important element affecting quality, and not ownership per se.
    Keywords: Higher Education; quality; privatization; ranking
    JEL: I23 I28
    Date: 2008–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:12485&r=sog

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