Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

An Assessment Of Data Sources To Study The Employment Effects Of Technological Change, Timothy Hunt, H. Hunt

H. Allan Hunt

No abstract provided.

Reaching For The Brass Ring: The U.S. News & World Report Rankings And Competition, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] The behavior of academic institutions, including the extent to which they collaborate on academic and nonacademic matters, is shaped by many factors. This paper focuses on one of these factors, the U.S. News & World Report (USNWR) annual ranking of the nation’s colleges and universities as undergraduate institutions, exploring how this ranking exacerbates the competitiveness among American higher education institutions. After presenting some evidence on the importance of the USNWR rankings to both public and private institutions at all levels along the selectivity spectrum, I describe how the rankings actually are calculated, then discuss how academic institutions alter their …

The 1995 Nrc Ratings Of Doctoral Programs: A Hedonic Model, Ronald Ehrenberg, Peter Hurst

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

We describe how one can use multivariate regression models and data collected by the National Research Council as part of its recent ranking of doctoral programs (Research-Doctorate Programs in the United States: Continuity and Change) to analyze how measures of program size, faculty seniority, faculty research productivity, and faculty productivity in producing doctoral degrees influence subjective ratings of doctoral programs in 35 academic fields. Using data for one of the fields, economics, we illustrate how university administrators can use the models to compute the impact of changing the number of faculty positions they allocate to the field on …

Advance Notice Provisions In Plant Closing Legislation: Do They Matter?, Ronald Ehrenberg, George Jakubson

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

This paper evaluates the cases for and against plant closing legislation. In spite of the growth of legislative efforts in the area, there has been surprisingly little effort devoted to analyzing what the effects are of existing plant closing legislation, of provisions in privately negotiated collective bargaining agreements that provide for advance notice in case of plant shutdowns and/or layoffs, and of voluntary employer provision of advance notice. The paper summarizes the results of previous research, and our own empirical analyses that used the January 1984 Bureau of Labor Statistics Survey of Displaced Workers, on the effects of advance notice …

Did Teachers’ Race And Verbal Ability Matter In The 1960’S? Coleman Revisited, Ronald Ehrenberg, Dominic Brewer

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

Our paper reanalyzes data from the classic 1966 study Equality of Educational Opportunity, or Coleman Report. It addresses whether teacher characteristics, including race and verbal ability, influenced "synthetic gain scores" of students (mean test scores of upper grade students in a school minus mean test scores of lower grade students in a school), in the context of an econometric model that allows for the possibility that teacher characteristics in a school are endogenously determined. We find that verbal aptitude scores of teachers influenced synthetic gain scores for both black and white students. Verbal aptitude mattered as much for black teachers …

Generation X: Redefining The Norms Of The Academy, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] The members of Generation X are the young faculty members of today and the immediate future. The panelists at this session of the conference were asked to discuss the effects of this generation on academic norms and institutional governance and the types of new models that may be emerging for academia as a result of them. More specifically, they were asked if the attitudes and loyalties of these young faculty members really do differ from that of the Baby Boom Generation, how their attitudes and behavior affect graduate programs, what academic institutions will need to do to attract the …

Decomposing The Sources Of Earnings Inequality: Assessing The Role Of Reallocation, Fredrik Andersson, Elizabeth Davis, Matthew Freedman, Julia Lane, Brian Mccall, L. Kristin Sandusky

Matthew Freedman

Unequal Progress: The Annual Report On The Economic Status Of The Profession 2002-03, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Most colleges and universities adopted budgets for the 2002-03 academic year in the spring and early summer of 2002. At that time, a pessimist might have cited several factors – negative rates of return from institutional endowments, a rising unemployment rate, an economic recession, and large increases in college and university enrollments, for example - to predict that faculty members would not see their earnings increase substantially in real terms in the coming year. The good news is that, overall and on average, the pessimists' worst fears proved incorrect. The bad news is that the overall aver-ages don't tell …

The Changing Distributions Of New Ph.D. Economists And Their Employment: Implications For The Future, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Academic careers are no longer the be-all and end-all for economics Ph.D. students, and the findings and background provided by Siegfried and Stock help to explain why this is so. The median age at which individuals receive economics Ph.D.'s in the Siegfried and Stock sample is 32. While they are somewhat surprised at this finding, it parallels the experiences of many other fields. Increasingly, students are working before proceeding to doctoral studies. Often Ph.D. students in economics enter their programs after having spent several years working for government agencies or research consulting companies—work that has whetted their appetites for …

Do Economics Departments With Lower Tenure Probabilities Pay Higher Faculty Salaries?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Paul Pieper, Rachel Willis

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

The simplest competitive labor market model asserts that if tenure is a desirable job characteristic for professors, they should be willing to pay for it by accepting lower salaries. Conversely, if an institution unilaterally reduces the probability that its assistant professors receive tenure, it will have to pay higher salaries to attract new faculty. Our paper tests this theory using data on salary offers accepted by new assistant professors at economics departments in the United States during the 1974-75 to 1980-81 period, along with data on the proportion of new Ph.D.s hired by each department between 1970 and 1980 that …

The Impact Of Retirement Policies On Employment And Unemployment, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] This paper has focused on the impact of retirement policies on the level and distribution of employment and unemployment. All of the policies discussed, except for early retirement provisions in privately negotiated collective bargaining contracts were seen to have adverse effects on the level and distribution of employment. Hence, the paper illustrates the more general point that policies designed to promote one social goal may well detract from achieving other goals and suggests that more explicit attention should be given to the employment effects of social programs and legislation prior to their adoption.

How Would Universities Respond To Increased Federal Support For Graduate Students?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Daniel Rees, Dominic Brewer

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] This paper has demonstrated that doctorate-producing universities respond to changes in the number of FTSEG students supported on external funds by altering the number of FTSEG students that they support on institutional funds. While institutional adjustment to changes in external support levels appears to be quite rapid, in the aggregate the magnitude of these responses is quite small. A increase of 100 in the number of FTSEG students supported by external funds is estimated to reduce the number supported on institutional funds by 22 to 23. Since some of the institutional funds that are "saved" may be redirected to …

Institutional Responses To Increased External Support For Graduate Students, Ronald Ehrenberg, Daniel Rees, Dominic Brewer

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

This paper uses institutionally based data to estimate how universities would respond to increased federal support for graduate students. It demonstrates that doctorate-producing universities do respond to changes in the number of full-time science and engineering students supported on external funds by altering the number of students that they support on institutional funds. Institutional adjustment to changes in external support levels appears to be quite rapid. However, in the aggregate, the magnitude of these responses is quite small.

Black Youth Nonemployment: Duration And Job Search: Comment, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Holzer's paper has a number of attributes that I find very appealing. It focuses on an important topic and uses two different data bases to test the robustness of its findings. It uses alternative specifications of the variable of interest (reservation wages), examines the sensitivity of the results to alternative sets of control variables, uses a variety of statistical methods to confront a number of statistical issues, and honestly reports cases in which any of the above leads to differences in results. Finally, the paper does not claim more than the evidence warrants—a feature not present in enough academic …

Do Tournaments Have Incentive Effects?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Michael Bognanno

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

Much attention has been devoted to studying models of tournaments or situations in which an individual's payment depends only on his or her output or rank relative to that of other competitors. Academic interest derives from the fact that under certain sets of assumptions, tournaments have desirable normative properties because of the incentive structures they provide. Our paper uses nonexperimental data to test whether tournaments actually elicit effort responses. We focus on professional golf tournaments because information on the incentive structure (prize distribution) and measures of individual output (players' scores) are both available. We find strong support for the proposition …

Introduction [To Advance Notice Provisions In Plant Closing Legislation], Ronald Ehrenberg, George Jakubson

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

No abstract provided.

Introduction: Do Compensation Policies Matter?, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] The papers in this volume should give the reader a sense of the exciting empirical research that has recently taken place on compensation-related issues. As a set, these papers considerably expand our empirical evidence on the effects of compensation policies. Several papers show that executive compensation is structured in a way that at least implicitly ties executive compensation changes to measures of corporate performance, and —crucially—that doing so leads to improved corporate performance (Leonard, Murphy/Gibbons, Abowd). Others show that compensation systems that pay workers for performance, in the sense of providing explicit or implicit incentives for high levels of …

Unemployment Insurance, Duration Of Unemployment, And Subsequent Wage Gain, Ronald Ehrenberg, Ronald Oaxaca

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] In order to evaluate what the "optimal" level of UI benefits is, one must therefore first estimate the magnitude of the relationships between UI benefits levels and unemployed workers' durations of unemployment and post-unemployment wages. There have been several previous studies of the impact of UI benefits on duration of spells of unemployment, however none have been completely satisfactory methodologically. To our knowledge, there have been no previous studies of the system's impact on subsequent wage rates. We attempt to fill these gaps, utilizing data from the National Longitudinal Survey (NLS) to estimate both relationships. The plan of our …

A Profile Of The Demographic, Socioeconomic, And Job Characteristics Of The Employed In Biopharmaceutical And All Industries Of Massachusetts And The U.S., Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada, Joseph Mclaughlin, Paulo Tobar, Sheila Palma

Sheila Palma

No abstract provided.

Trends In Employment, The Number Of Establishments, And Workers Per Establishment In Biopharmaceutical Industries In Massachusetts And The U.S., Ishwar Khatiwada, Andrew Sum, Sheila Palma

Sheila Palma

No abstract provided.

Massachusetts' Competitive Ranking Among The 50 States With Respect To Employment, Payrolls, And Revenues For Biopharmaceutical Industries And Overall Competitiveness Factors, Ishwar Khatiwada, Andrew Sum

Ishwar Khatiwada

No abstract provided.

The Continued Collapse Of The Nation's Teen Job Market And The Dismal Outlook For The 2008 Summer Labor Market For Teens : Does Anybody Care?, Andrew Sum, Joseph Mclaughlin, Ishwar Khatiwada

Ishwar Khatiwada

The deterioration of national labor market conditions has accelerated the collapse of the teen job market across the country. Teen employment rates have been declining sharply since the fall of 2006, well before the national job market began to deteriorate, and the drop has accelerated in recent months.

The Adult Disabled Population (16-74) In Massachusetts: Its Size And Demographic/Socioeconomic Composition In 2003-2004, Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada, Paulo Tobar, Sheila Palma

Ishwar Khatiwada

During the fall of 2005, leaders of the Massachusetts Rehabilitation Commission, including the Commissioner Elmer Bartels, met with staff from the Center for Labor Market Studies and the Commonwealth Corporation to discuss the feasibility of conducting research on the disabled population in the state of Massachusetts and the New England region to improve our knowledge base on the size and characteristics of the disabled population of the state, their geographic locations across the state, their labor market experiences and problems, and their personal and familial economic well-being. During the past few months, research staff within the Center for Labor Market …

The Economic, Labor Market, And Fiscal Performance And Impacts Of The Biopharmaceutical Industries Of Massachusetts (Research Summary), Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada, Joseph Mclaughlin, Paulo Tobar, Sheila Palma

Ishwar Khatiwada

This executive summary provides a brief overview of findings from a comprehensive series of research papers on a wide array of analyses of the employment, output, research and development expenditures, profitability, and multiplier effects of biopharmaceutical industries as well as the demographic characteristics of their workforce, their occupations, earnings, and net fiscal contributions to national, state, and local governments.

Income Inadequacy Problems Among The Disabled Adult Population In Massachusetts, 2003-2004: Implications For Future State Antipoverty And Workforce Development Policy, Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada

Ishwar Khatiwada

In our first research report in this series, the findings of the American Community Surveys for calendar years 2003 and 2004 were used to produce a comprehensive profile of the size and demographic/socioeconomic characteristics of the 16-74 year old disabled population of the state. Our second paper provided a detailed description, analysis, and assessment of the labor market behaviors, experiences, and problems of the disabled 16-74 year old population of the state. The paper reviewed the labor force participation behavior, unemployment problems, and employment rates of the 16-74 year old disabled population and compared these findings to those of their …

The Annual Earnings Of Workers In Biopharmaceutical Industries Of Massachusetts And The U.S.: A Comparative Assessment, Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada, Meredith Franks, Sheila Palma

Ishwar Khatiwada

No abstract provided.

An Assessment Of The Labor Market, Income, Health, Social, Civic And Fiscal Consequences Of Dropping Out Of High School: Findings For Massachusetts And Bristol County Adults In The 21st Century, Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada, Joseph Mclaughlin, Sheila Palma

Ishwar Khatiwada

No abstract provided.

The Consequences Of Dropping Out Of High School : Joblessness And Jailing For High School Dropouts And The High Cost For Taxpayers, Andrew Sum, Ishwar Khatiwada, Joseph Mclaughlin

Ishwar Khatiwada

No abstract provided.

Massachusetts' Competitive Ranking Among The 50 States With Respect To Employment, Payrolls, And Revenues For Biopharmaceutical Industries And Overall Competitiveness Factors, Ishwar Khatiwada, Andrew Sum

Andrew Sum

No abstract provided.

The Labor Force Behaviors, Employment And Earnings Experiences, And Labor Market Problems Of The Disabled Working-Age Population In Massachusetts, New England, And The U.S. In 2003 And 2004, Ishwar Khatiwada, Andrew Sum, Joseph Mclaughlin

Andrew Sum

In a previous research report in this series, the findings of the American Community Surveys for calendar years 2003 and 2004 were used to produce a detailed profile of the size and demographic/ socioeconomic characteristics of the 16-74 year old disabled population of the state. Comparisons of the findings for Massachusetts were made with those for the New England region and the U.S. Projections were made of the future size of the 55-74 year old disabled population in the state, and the implications of these projections for the vocational rehabilitation and workforce development systems of the state were briefly assessed. …