Code for "Early Career Paths of Economists Inside and Outside of Academia"

Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s) Lucia Foster, U.S. Census Bureau; Erika McEntarfer, U.S. Census Bureau; Danielle H. Sandler, U.S. Census Bureau

Version: View help for Version V1

Name	File Type	Size	Last Modified
data			08/10/2023 12:11:PM
programs			09/26/2023 05:04:PM
README.pdf	application/pdf	732 KB	10/24/2023 08:19:AM

Project Citation:

Foster, Lucia, McEntarfer, Erika, and Sandler, Danielle H. Code for “Early Career Paths of Economists Inside and Outside of Academia.” Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2023. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2023-10-31. https://doi.org/10.3886/E193216V1

Project Description

Summary: Economics job candidates face considerable professional and financial uncertainties when deciding between academic and nonacademic career paths. Using novel panel data, we provide a broad picture of PhD economists’ early career mobility and earnings growth – both in and outside of academia. We find that academic jobs have fallen to just over half of US placements, with growing shares in tech, consulting, and government. We document considerable early career job mobility and higher earnings growth among job changers, private-sector economists, and men. We also find an earnings premium for graduates of top-ranked PhD programs that grows over early career years in academia while shrinking in the private sector. These different earnings dynamics mean the opportunity cost (in terms of potential earnings) of remaining in academia is generally less for graduates of top-ranked programs, although there is significant dispersion in mid-career earnings among these academics.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms: economics

JEL Classification:
A11 Role of Economics; Role of Economists; Market for Economists
J44 Professional Labor Markets; Occupational Licensing

Geographic Coverage: USA

Time Period(s): 2001 – 2021

Universe: Frame of analysis is economics PhDs granted by US institutions between 2001-2017, linked to earnings histories spanning 2000-2021.

Data Type(s): program source code

Methodology

Data Source: Program code uses three main sources of confidential microdata:

NCSES Survey of Earned Doctorates
US Census Bureau Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics
Internal Revenue Service W2 record data

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Published Versions

V1 [2023-10-31]

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