IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/amu/wpaper/2019-05.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Is an Academic Career a Luxury Good? Student Debt and the Under-Representation of Minorities

Author

Listed:
  • Robert M. Feinberg

Abstract

Minority groups are under-represented in university teaching and research positions; they are employed in these positions at lower rates than would be indicated by college enrollments and (to a lesser extent) shares of doctoral degrees. Using data from the National Science Foundation’s Survey of Earned Doctorates, from 2001 to 2016, this article examines whether some of this is due an under-representation of scholars with high student debt and fewer parental resources, choosing business or government careers rather than academia. Analyzing a large sample of new PhDs from 2001 to 2016, we find that student debt has limited the decision to enter academia, perhaps with long-term impacts for diversity of the profession. Examining the subsample of STEM PhDs, the same patterns emerge -- with perhaps stronger adverse impacts of debt on Black and Hispanic academic career choice.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert M. Feinberg, 2019. "Is an Academic Career a Luxury Good? Student Debt and the Under-Representation of Minorities," Working Papers 2019-05, American University, Department of Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:amu:wpaper:2019-05
    DOI: 10.17606/6xkx-ba92usp=sharing
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.17606/6xkx-ba92usp=sharing
    File Function: First version, 2019
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.17606/6xkx-ba92usp=sharing?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rothstein, Jesse & Rouse, Cecilia Elena, 2011. "Constrained after college: Student loans and early-career occupational choices," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1-2), pages 149-163, February.
    2. Scott Stern, 2004. "Do Scientists Pay to Be Scientists?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(6), pages 835-853, June.
    3. Donna K. Ginther & Kathy J. Hayes, 2003. "Gender Differences in Salary and Promotion for Faculty in the Humanities 1977–95," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 38(1).
    4. Roach, Michael & Sauermann, Henry, 2010. "A taste for science? PhD scientists' academic orientation and self-selection into research careers in industry," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 422-434, April.
    5. Henry Sauermann & Michael Roach, 2012. "Science PhD Career Preferences: Levels, Changes, and Advisor Encouragement," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(5), pages 1-9, May.
    6. Donna K. Ginther & Shulamit Kahn, 2004. "Women in Economics: Moving Up or Falling Off the Academic Career Ladder?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(3), pages 193-214, Summer.
    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. Richard J. Paulsen, 2024. "Student loan debt and the career choices of college graduates with majors in the arts," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 48(1), pages 95-115, March.

    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. Sieg, Holger & Wang, Yu, 2018. "The impact of student debt on education, career, and marriage choices of female lawyers," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 124-147.
    2. Stefano Bianchini & Francesco Lissoni & Michele Pezzoni & Lorenzo Zirulia, 2016. "The economics of research, consulting, and teaching quality: theory and evidence from a technical university," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 25(7), pages 668-691, October.
    3. Hayter, Christopher S. & Parker, Marla A., 2019. "Factors that influence the transition of university postdocs to non-academic scientific careers: An exploratory study," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 556-570.
    4. Holger Sieg & Yu Wang, 2017. "The Impact of Student Debt on Education, Career, and Marriage Choices of Female Lawyers," NBER Working Papers 23453, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Sauermann, Henry & Roach, Michael, 2014. "Not all scientists pay to be scientists: PhDs’ preferences for publishing in industrial employment," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 32-47.
    6. Herrera, Liliana & Nieto, Mariano, 2016. "PhD careers in Spanish industry: Job determinants in manufacturing versus non-manufacturing firms," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 113(PB), pages 341-351.
    7. Henry Sauermann & Paula Stephan, 2013. "Conflicting Logics? A Multidimensional View of Industrial and Academic Science," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 24(3), pages 889-909, June.
    8. Balsmeier, Benjamin & Pellens, Maikel, 2014. "Who makes, who breaks: Which scientists stay in academe?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(2), pages 229-232.
    9. Lars P. Feld & Sarah Necker & Bruno S. Frey, 2015. "Happiness of economists," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(10), pages 990-1007, February.
    10. Bruno Brandão Fischer & Maxim Kotsemir & Dirk Meissner & Ekaterina Streltsova, 2020. "Patents for evidence-based decision-making and smart specialisation," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 45(6), pages 1748-1774, December.
    11. Epifanio, Mariaelisa & Troeger, Vera E, 2013. "How much do children really cost? Maternity benefits and career opportunities of women in academia," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 171, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    12. Hottenrott, Hanna & Lawson, Cornelia, 2014. "Flying the nest: How the home department shapes researchers’ career paths," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis LEI & BRICK - Laboratory of Economics of Innovation "Franco Momigliano", Bureau of Research in Innovation, Complexity and Knowledge, Collegio 201409, University of Turin.
    13. Giulio Marini, 2021. "The employment destination of PhD-holders in Italy: non-academic funded projects as drivers of successful segmentation," DoQSS Working Papers 21-16, Quantitative Social Science - UCL Social Research Institute, University College London.
    14. Ioana Boiciuc, 2015. "The Effects of Fiscal Policy on Emerging Economies. A TVP- VAR Approach," South-Eastern Europe Journal of Economics, Association of Economic Universities of South and Eastern Europe and the Black Sea Region, vol. 13(1), pages 75-84.
    15. Maria De Paola & Michela Ponzo & Vincenzo Scoppa, 2018. "Are Men Given Priority for Top Jobs? Investigating the Glass Ceiling in Italian Academia," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 12(3), pages 475-503.
    16. Wesley M. Cohen & Henry Sauermann & Paula Stephan, 2020. "Not in the Job Description: The Commercial Activities of Academic Scientists and Engineers," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(9), pages 4108-4117, September.
    17. Bram Wouterse & Karen Wiel & Marc Steeg, 2017. "Income Differences Between PhDs and Masters: Evidence from The Netherlands," De Economist, Springer, vol. 165(4), pages 439-461, December.
    18. Joan Daouli & Eirini Konstantina Nikolatou, 2015. "The Market for Ph.D. Holders in Greece: Probit and Multinomial Logit Analysis of their Employment Status," South-Eastern Europe Journal of Economics, Association of Economic Universities of South and Eastern Europe and the Black Sea Region, vol. 13(1), pages 47-74.
    19. George-Levi Gayle & Limor Golan & Robert Miller, "undated". "Are There Glass Ceilings for Female Executives?," GSIA Working Papers -1969975920, Carnegie Mellon University, Tepper School of Business.
    20. Liu, Christopher C. & Stuart, Toby, 2014. "Positions and rewards: The allocation of resources within a science-based entrepreneurial firm," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(7), pages 1134-1143.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Student debt; academic career; diversity; doctorates;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A2 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics
    • I23 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Higher Education; Research Institutions
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:amu:wpaper:2019-05. 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: Thomas Meal (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.american.edu/cas/economics/ .

    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.