La stabilisation des jeunes docteurs sur le marché de l'emploi académique

Modes of access to the academic career are generally regarded as crucial element of policy on science and higher education in a country. This can influence the future productivity of teaching and research in different countries. Our research is specifically concerned with the factors that may explain the conditions that lead to integration of researchers and lecturers in the academic career in France. More precisely, the paper analyses the factors affecting the access duration to a permanent job in the French academic sector. We use data from a French survey ?Generation 2001?, carried out by the Cereq. We focus on a sample of 1400 individuals who obtained their PhDs in 2001 and were interviewed in 2004. A discrete time model is used to analyse the main factors influencing the access duration. In addition, in order to assess the effect of a post-doctoral position on the academic job search, our empirical approach involves estimation of models that simultaneously explain the access duration to a permanent job and participation to a post-doc program. Our main results indicate that the scientific publications and post-doc have an influence on the access duration to a permanent job, which is coherent with the idea that potential employers use this information as a proxy of research and teaching abilities. However, our results provide evidence that other individual or university characteristics affect the access to the academic sector.