IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecoedu/v28y2009i2p258-267.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Congratulations or condolences? The role of human capital in the cultivation of a university administrator

Author

Listed:
  • McDowell, John
  • Singell Jr., Larry D.
  • Stater, Mark

Abstract

Administrative skill is essential to organizational effectiveness. Yet, few studies examine how human capital investments over a career affect selection into administration. We use panel data for economists to estimate the probability of choosing administration over a pure academic track. The results show that, while research-specific human capital reduces the probability of becoming an administrator, general human capital increases it. There are also inferior administrative opportunities for women that have not improved over time and variation in the role of human capital according to institutional research mission. Thus, our results suggest academic leaders are not merely born, but cultivated through their human capital investments.

Suggested Citation

  • McDowell, John & Singell Jr., Larry D. & Stater, Mark, 2009. "Congratulations or condolences? The role of human capital in the cultivation of a university administrator," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 258-267, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecoedu:v:28:y:2009:i:2:p:258-267
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272-7757(08)00056-3
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Charles T. Clotfelter & Michael Rothschild, 1993. "Studies of Supply and Demand in Higher Education," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number clot93-1.
    2. Sharon M. Oster & Daniel S. Hamermesh, 1998. "Aging And Productivity Among Economists," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 80(1), pages 154-156, February.
    3. Clotfelter, Charles T. & Rothschild, Michael (ed.), 1993. "Studies of Supply and Demand in Higher Education," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, edition 1, number 9780226110547.
    4. Graves, Philip E & Marchand, James R & Thompson, Randal, 1982. "Economics Departmental Rankings: Research Incentives, Constraints, and Efficiency," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(5), pages 1131-1141, December.
    5. Hansen, W Lee & Weisbrod, Burton A & Strauss, Robert P, 1978. "Modeling the Earnings and Research Productivity of Academic Economists," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(4), pages 729-741, August.
    6. John M. McDowell & Larry D. Singell Jr. & James P. Ziliak, 2001. "Gender and Promotion in the Economics Profession," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 54(2), pages 224-244, January.
    7. Ronald G. Ehrenberg, 1999. "Adam Smith Goes to College: An Economist Becomes an Academic Administrator," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 13(1), pages 99-116, Winter.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Singell, Larry D. & Tang, Hui-Hsuan, 2013. "Pomp and circumstance: University presidents and the role of human capital in determining who leads U.S. research institutions," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 219-233.
    2. James Monks, 2022. "University Presidential Searches: An Empirical Examination of Internal Versus External Hiring," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 48(4), pages 580-601, October.
    3. John M. McDowell & Larry D. Singell Jr. & Mark Stater, 2011. "On (And Off) the Hot Seat: An Analysis of Entry into and Out of University Administration," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 64(5), pages 889-909, October.
    4. Amanda H. Goodall & John M. McDowell & Larry D. Singell, 2017. "Do Economics Departments Improve after They Appoint a Top Scholar as Chairperson?," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(4), pages 546-564, November.
    5. Goodall, Amanda H. & McDowell, John M. & Singell, Larry D., 2014. "Leadership and the Research Productivity of University Departments," IZA Discussion Papers 7903, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fakhraddin Maroofi & Seyed Hamid Mahdiun & Jamshid Taghsimi, 2017. "The Role of Human Capital Within the University Administration," International Journal of Asian Social Science, Asian Economic and Social Society, vol. 7(2), pages 169-181, February.
    2. Amanda H. Goodall & John M. McDowell & Larry D. Singell, 2017. "Do Economics Departments Improve after They Appoint a Top Scholar as Chairperson?," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(4), pages 546-564, November.
    3. Wendy A. Stock & John J. Siegfried, 2006. "Where Are They Now? Tracking the Ph.D. Class of 1997," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 73(2), pages 472-488, October.
    4. Bruno S. Frey, "undated". "Publishing as Prostitution? Choosing Between One�s Own Ideas and Academic Failure," IEW - Working Papers 117, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    5. Siow, Aloysius, 1997. "Some evidence on the signalling role of research in academia," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 271-276, July.
    6. Singell, Larry D. & Tang, Hui-Hsuan, 2013. "Pomp and circumstance: University presidents and the role of human capital in determining who leads U.S. research institutions," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 219-233.
    7. Gordon C. Winston, 1997. "Why Can't a College be More Like a Firm?," Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education DP-42, Department of Economics, Williams College.
    8. Bruno Frey, 2005. "Problems with Publishing: Existing State and Solutions," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 173-190, April.
    9. Jinyoung Kim & Kanghyock Koh, 2014. "Incentives for Journal Editors," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 47(1), pages 348-371, February.
    10. Joan Rosselló Villalonga, 2013. "Stratification of Public Universities and Students’ Segregation," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 205(2), pages 99-124, June.
    11. Laurie Bates & Rexford Santerre, 2000. "A Time Series Analysis of Private College Closures and Mergers," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 17(3), pages 267-276, November.
    12. Frank A. Scott & Jeffrey D. Anstine, 1997. "Market Structure in the Production of Economics Ph.D.'s," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 64(1), pages 307-320, July.
    13. Brian Jacob & Brian McCall & Kevin Stange, 2018. "College as Country Club: Do Colleges Cater to Students’ Preferences for Consumption?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(2), pages 309-348.
    14. Gordon C. Winston, 1996. "The Economic Structure of Higher Education : Subsidies, Customer-Inputs, and Hierarchy," Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education DP-40, Department of Economics, Williams College.
    15. Walter Novaes, 2007. "A Pesquisa em Economia no Brasil: Uma avaliação empírica dos conflitos entre quantidade e qualidade," Textos para discussão 553, Department of Economics PUC-Rio (Brazil).
    16. Karen Mumford & Cristina Sechel, 2020. "Pay and Job Rank among Academic Economists in the UK: Is Gender Relevant?," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 58(1), pages 82-113, March.
    17. Ragan Jr, James F. & Warren, John T. & Bratsberg, Bernt, 1999. "How similar are pay structures in 'similar' departments of economics?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 347-360, June.
    18. Cook, Emily E. & Turner, Sarah, 2022. "Progressivity of pricing at US public universities," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    19. Joseph Macri & Dipendra Sinha, 2006. "Rankings Methodology for International Comparisons of Institutions and Individuals: an Application to Economics in Australia and New Zealand," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(1), pages 111-156, February.
    20. Stephen L. DesJardins & Dennis A. Ahlburg & Brian P. McCall, 2006. "An Integrated Model of Application, Admission, Enrollment, and Financial Aid," The Journal of Higher Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 77(3), pages 381-429, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecoedu:v:28:y:2009:i:2:p:258-267. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/econedurev .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.