IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/edecon/v10y2002i2p145-163.html

Academic Standards as Public Goods and Varieties of Free-Rider Behaviour

Author

Listed:
  • Denton Marks

Abstract

Economists have long recognized that goods allowing non-rival enjoyment accompanied by costly exclusion - pure public goods - present a challenge to efficient production because beneficiaries tend to understate their willingness to support such goods: such 'free-riders' realize that they cannot be denied access and may choose to enjoy without providing appropriate contribution. 'Academic standards' help identify the quality of academic performance (e.g., research, educated students), but the benefit they confer (e.g., reputation) strongly resembles a public good with its corresponding tendency to elicit free-riding and inefficiently low levels of production or support. This paper explores the manner in which such standards confer benefit, exhibit public good characteristics, and elicit free-riding and 'underproduction' in various parts of the academic community. It examines the resulting challenge to the maintenance of academic quality and the difficulty of discouraging free-rider behaviour.

Suggested Citation

  • Denton Marks, 2002. "Academic Standards as Public Goods and Varieties of Free-Rider Behaviour," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(2), pages 145-163.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:edecon:v:10:y:2002:i:2:p:145-163
    DOI: 10.1080/09645290210126896
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/09645290210126896
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/09645290210126896?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cooter, Robert, 1998. "Expressive Law and Economics," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 27(2), pages 585-608, June.
    2. Michael S. McPherson & Morton Owen Schapiro, 1999. "Tenure Issues in Higher Education," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 13(1), pages 85-98, Winter.
    3. Geoffrey M. Hodgson, 1998. "The Approach of Institutional Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(1), pages 166-192, March.
    4. Rothschild, Michael & White, Lawrence J, 1995. "The Analytics of the Pricing of Higher Education and Other Services in Which the Customers Are Inputs," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(3), pages 573-586, June.
    5. Elinor Ostrom, 2000. "Collective Action and the Evolution of Social Norms," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 137-158, Summer.
    6. Charles M. Tiebout, 1956. "A Pure Theory of Local Expenditures," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 64(5), pages 416-416.
    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. Silva Pedro Luís & DesJardins Stephen L. & Biscaia Ricardo & Sá Carla & Teixeira Pedro N., 2025. "Public and Private School Grade Inflation Patterns in Secondary Education," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 25(2), pages 305-342.
    2. Geraint Johnes & Kwok Tong Soo, 2017. "Grades across Universities over Time," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 85(1), pages 106-131, January.

    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. Joan Roselló Villalonga, 2017. "Does Decentralization in the Provision of Higher Education Increase Quality of Education?," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 220(1), pages 13-55, March.
    2. Dennis N. Epple & Richard Romano, 2003. "Neighborhood Schools, Choice, and the Distribution of Educational Benefits," NBER Chapters, in: The Economics of School Choice, pages 227-286, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Jean-Michel Plassard & Nhu Tran Thi Thanh, 2009. "Liberté de choix des élèves et concurrence des établissements : un survey de l'analyse du pilotage des systèmes éducatifs par les quasi-marchés," Revue d'économie industrielle, De Boeck Université, vol. 0(2), pages 99-130.
    4. Grajzl, Peter & Murrell, Peter, 2016. "A Darwinian theory of institutional evolution two centuries before Darwin?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 346-372.
    5. Brendan Markey‐Towler, 2019. "The New Microeconomics: A Psychological, Institutional, and Evolutionary Paradigm with Neoclassical Economics as a Special Case," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 78(1), pages 95-135, January.
    6. Cater, Bruce & Lew, Byron & Pivato, Marcus, 2009. "Why tenure?," MPRA Paper 14823, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Jean‐Robert Tyran & Lars P. Feld, 2006. "Achieving Compliance when Legal Sanctions are Non‐deterrent," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 108(1), pages 135-156, March.
    8. Quentin David, 2009. "The Determinants of Research Production by U.S. Universities," DEM Discussion Paper Series 09-16, Department of Economics at the University of Luxembourg.
    9. Claudia Keser & Andreas Markstädter & Martin Schmidt, 2014. "Mandatory minimum contributions, heterogeneous endowments and voluntary public-good provision," CIRANO Working Papers 2014s-47, CIRANO.
    10. Onyeiwu, Steve & Jones, Robert, 2003. "An institutionalist perception of cooperative behavior," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 233-248, July.
    11. Davis, Lewis S., 2010. "Institutional flexibility and economic growth," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 306-320, September.
    12. Tore Ellingsen & Erik Mohlin, 2026. "A Model of Social Duties," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 134(5), pages 1307-1346.
    13. Keser, Claudia & Markstädter, Andreas & Schmidt, Martin, 2017. "Mandatory minimum contributions, heterogeneous endowments and voluntary public-good provision," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 291-310.
    14. Lewis, John, 2009. "Hitting and hoping?: Meeting the exchange rate and inflation criteria during a period of nominal convergence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 508-524, December.
    15. Vatn, Arild, 2005. "Rationality, institutions and environmental policy," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 203-217, November.
    16. Cason, Timothy N. & Gangadharan, Lata, 2013. "Empowering neighbors versus imposing regulations: An experimental analysis of pollution reduction schemes," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 65(3), pages 469-484.
    17. Gagliardi, Francesca, 2008. "Institutions and economic change: A critical survey of the new institutional approaches and empirical evidence," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 416-443, February.
    18. Javier Leonardo Garay Vargas & Juan Bautista Pavajeau, 2021. "Ideas erradas, acciones equivocadas : cómo el contexto internacional impide la generación de desarrollo," Books, Universidad Externado de Colombia, Facultad de Finanzas, Gobierno y Relaciones Internacionales, number 151.
    19. Apffelstaedt, Arno & Freundt, Jana & Oslislo, Christoph, 2022. "Social norms and elections: How elected rules can make behavior (in)appropriate," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 148-177.
    20. Christopher C. Klein, 2007. "Efficiency versus Effectiveness: Interpreting Education Production Studies," Working Papers 200703, Middle Tennessee State University, Department of Economics and Finance.

    More about this item

    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:taf:edecon:v:10:y:2002:i:2:p:145-163. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CEDE20 .

    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.