This article measures scientific influence by means of citations to academic papers. The data source is the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI); the scientific institutions included are the top 110 U.S. research universities; the 12 main fields that classify the data cover nearly all of...

This paper analyzes how institutional differences affect university entrepreneurship. We focus on ownership of faculty inventions, and compare two institutional regimes; the US and Sweden. In the US, the Bayh Dole Act gives universities the right to own inventions from publicly funded research,...

Instructors are a chief input into the higher education production process, yet we know very little about their role in promoting student success. This is in contrast to elementary and secondary schooling, for which ample evidence suggests teacher quality is an important determinant of student...

One of the most pronounced trends in higher education over the last decade has been the increased reliance on instructors outside of the traditional full-time, Ph.D.-trained model. Nearly 43 percent of all teaching faculty were part-time in 1998, and at selective colleges, graduate assistant...

We estimate the career and location preferences of students in U.S. doctoral programs in a major STEM field – chemistry. Our analysis is based on novel survey conducted in 2017 of 1,605 current Chemistry doctoral students enrolled in the top 54 U.S. research intensive universities. First, we...

We document wide and persistent variation in women's representation and success across graduate programs in economics. Using new data on early career outcomes for recent graduates, including first job placement, publications and promotion, we compare (anonymized) departments on outcomes for...

Many studies have shown that women are under-represented in tenured ranks in the sciences. We evaluate whether gender differences in the likelihood of obtaining a tenure track job, promotion to tenure, and promotion to full professor explain these facts using the 1973-2001 Survey of Doctorate...

Around 1875 the U.S. had none of the world’s leading research universities; today, it accounts for the majority of the top-ranked. Many observers cite events surrounding World War II as the source of this reversal. We present evidence that U.S. research universities had surpassed most...

This paper uses the American Association of University Professors surveys for the period 1965 to 1976 to examine the effect of faculty unionism on faculty pay. It compares estimated effects of unionism on compensation from cross-section regressions of faculty pay on union organization and from a...