Wednesday, November 01, 2006

The Economics of Economists

I got an e-mail from Professor Pete Boettke yesterday referring to a recent article tracking the job placement of PhDs from the class of 1997.  The article appeared in the latest issue of the Southern Economic Journal and was written by Wendy Stock and John Siegfried.  Here are a few of their findings:

  • All people with PhDs in economics get jobs and have permanent jobs within 6 years of graduation.  Approximately 45% of them change jobs sometime in the first six years.
  • Journal publications are worth ~ $1200 per paper in terms of salary for academic jobs, but have little impact for non-academic jobs.
  • The top 30 programs have a salary premium that declines as time goes on as compensation shifts towards being based on productivity.
  • Median incomes for economists employed in (in 2003 dollars) were as follows:
    • Academia: $69,000 for 9 months ($80,000 for 12 months).
    • Business: $125,000
    • Government or think tanks: $98,000.

Looks like this economics gig might not be such a bad deal after all!

In his e-mail, Pete writes:

This [salary differential] reflects that as an academic you consume a part of your salary in terms of life-style chooses (such as working on projects that you deem to be of value rather than what others tell you about).

Hmm... flexibility of lifestyle, control over what you research, and summers off in exchange for a lower, but still decent salary?  Doesn't sound like too bad a trade-off to me!

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