IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/jau/wpaper/2024-05.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Unlocking University Efficiency: A Bayesian Stochastic Frontier Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Zaira García-Tórtola

    (Department of Economics, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón, Spain)

  • David Conesa

    (Department of Statistics and Operational Research, Universidad de Valencia, Spain)

  • Joan Crespo

    (Department of Economic Structure, Universidad de Valencia, Spain)

  • Emili Tortosa-Ausina

    (IVIE, Valencia and IIDL and Department of Economics, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón, Spain)

Abstract

In this paper, we analyse the performance of the Spanish public university system over the 2010–2019 period, which was particularly turbulent due to the tight budget constraints imposed on universities. To disentangle the main sources of performance change, we adopt a dynamic approach by decomposing it into efficiency change (catching up) and technical change (shifts in the frontier). In contrast to many studies on Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), we opt for Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA), employing the ray production function proposed by Löthgren (1997) to account for the multiple-output nature of HEIs. Additionally, to offer a more detailed examination of uncertainty quantification, we conduct inference within the Bayesian paradigm. Broadly, results point to an overall positive performance change over the entire period, particularly for technical change during 2010–2014. However, there were notable discrepancies across universities, which could be unlocked with certain precision via the posterior distributions of performance and its components.

Suggested Citation

  • Zaira García-Tórtola & David Conesa & Joan Crespo & Emili Tortosa-Ausina, 2024. "Unlocking University Efficiency: A Bayesian Stochastic Frontier Analysis," Working Papers 2024/05, Economics Department, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón (Spain).
    • Handle: RePEc:jau:wpaper:2024/05
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.doctreballeco.uji.es/wpficheros/Garcia_et_al_05_2024.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    efficiency; Bayesian; education; stochastic frontier; universities;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C61 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Optimization Techniques; Programming Models; Dynamic Analysis
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

    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:jau:wpaper:2024/05. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: María Aurora Garcia Gallego (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ueujies.html .

    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.