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Are Winners Promoted Too Often? Evidence From The Nfl Draft 1999–2012

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  • Carl T. Kitchens

Abstract

type="main" xml:id="ecin12165-abs-0001"> Firms engaging in hiring face recruitment costs. To reduce these costs, firms concentrate their efforts in locations that are perceived as talent rich or have produced successful employees in the past. Such recruitment mechanisms may lead to statistical discrimination if they reduce uncertainty for a subset of candidates or if firms relate current employee attributes with the institution. In this article, I test for statistical discrimination associated with an individual's institutional affiliation that results from targeted hiring practices by using a unique individual-level data set of National Football League (NFL) draft prospects. I find that conditional on individual ability, individuals from highly ranked college teams are drafted earlier than individuals from lower ranked institutions. Over the length of a player's professional career, a player's college institution has no effect on career success, indicating that certain players are damaged by this recruitment mechanism. Even though players can suffer substantial financial damages as a result of being drafted later in the draft, NFL team performance is not sufficiently affected for teams to exploit this bias . ( JEL J71, J31)

Suggested Citation

  • Carl T. Kitchens, 2015. "Are Winners Promoted Too Often? Evidence From The Nfl Draft 1999–2012," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(2), pages 1317-1330, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ecinqu:v:53:y:2015:i:2:p:1317-1330
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/ecin.2015.53.issue-2
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    Cited by:

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    2. Kerianne Lawson, 2021. "The Lasting Impact of NCAA Sanctions: SMU and the Death Penalty," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 22(8), pages 946-981, December.
    3. Craig, J. Dean & Winchester, Niven, 2021. "Predicting the national football league potential of college quarterbacks," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 295(2), pages 733-743.
    4. J.D. Pitts & B. Evans, 2018. "Evidence on the importance of cognitive ability tests for NFL quarterbacks: what are the relationships among Wonderlic scores, draft positions and NFL performance outcomes?," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 50(27), pages 2957-2966, June.
    5. Joshua D. Pitts & Brent A. Evans, 2023. "New contracts and dismissal threats from highly drafted rookies: What motivates NFL quarterbacks?," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 44(1), pages 4-16, January.
    6. Brad R. Humphreys & Yulia Chikish & Peter von Allmen, 2024. "Should I Stay or Should I Go Pro? Early NFL Draft Entry by NCAA FBS Underclassmen," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 25(3), pages 346-368, April.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J71 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - Hiring and Firing
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials

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