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Alma mat(t)er(s): Determinants of early career success in economics

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  • Sergey V Popov

Abstract

We study 6000 author-publication observations to investigate predictors of early career success in six fields of economics. Concentrating on top researchers enables us to control for the effects of ability and effort, and focusing on the start of their careers minimizes distortions from reputation feedback. Our results reveal that the most important predictor for early career success is the ranking of an author’s PhD granting institution, followed by his first placement. Our insights suggest that a counterfactual decrease in the Alma mater of a high ability author, who graduated from a top 10 university, by as little as 10 to 20 ranks, reduces his probability of getting a top 5 publication significantly by 13 percentage points. Lowering the ranking of his Alma mater by another 80 ranks decreases his chances of getting a top publication by a factor of three. Our findings suggest that the economics publication market values Alma mater signals, discounting newcomers graduating from- or working at lower ranked departments.

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  • Sergey V Popov, 2022. "Alma mat(t)er(s): Determinants of early career success in economics," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(12), pages 1-31, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0278320
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0278320
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    Cited by:

    1. Inácio Bó & Chiu Yu Ko, 2021. "Competitive screening and information transmission," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 23(3), pages 407-437, June.
    2. Jakob Kapeller & Matthias Aistleitner & Stefan Steinerberger, 2017. "Citation Patterns in Economics and Beyond: Assessing the Peculiarities of Economics from Two Scientometric Perspectives," ICAE Working Papers 60, Johannes Kepler University, Institute for Comprehensive Analysis of the Economy.
    3. Simon Ek & Magnus Henrekson, 2019. "The Geography and Concentration of Authorship in the Top Five: Implications For European Economics," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 66(2), pages 215-245, May.
    4. Matthias Aistleitner & Jakob Kapeller & Stefan Steinerberger, 2018. "Citation Patterns in Economics and Beyond," Working Papers Series 85, Institute for New Economic Thinking.
    5. Sascha Baghestanian & Sergey V. Popov, 2018. "On publication, refereeing and working hard," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(4), pages 1419-1459, November.
    6. Vicente Safón, 2019. "Inter-ranking reputational effects: an analysis of the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) and the Times Higher Education World University Rankings (THE) reputational relationship," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 121(2), pages 897-915, November.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • A11 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Role of Economics; Role of Economists
    • I23 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Higher Education; Research Institutions
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • J44 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Professional Labor Markets and Occupations

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