The Macro-Foundations of Microeconomics: Initial Labor Market Conditions and Long-Term Outcomes for Economists

Paul Oyer ()

No 12157, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: Each year, graduate students entering the academic job market worry that they will suffer due to uncontrollable macroeconomic risk. Given the importance of general human capital and the relative ease of publicly observing productivity in academia, one might expect unlucky graduating cohorts' long-term labor market outcomes to resemble those who graduate in favorable climates. In this paper, I analyze the relationship between macroeconomic conditions at graduation, initial job placement, and long-term outcomes for PhD economists from seven programs. Using macro conditions as an instrument for initial placement, I show a causal effect of quality and type of initial job on long-term job characteristics. I also show that better initial placement increases research productivity, which helps to limit the set of economic models that can explain the effect of initial placement on long-term jobs.

JEL-codes: A11 J24 J44 M50 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-sog
Note: LE LS
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (34)

Published as Oyer, Paul. "Initial Labor Market Conditions and Long-Term Outcomes For Economics," Journal of Economic Perspectives, 2006, v20(3,Summer), 143-160.

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w12157.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:12157

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w12157

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().