Expenditures and Postsecondary Graduation: An Investigation Using Individual-Level Data from the State of Ohio

Using detailed individual-level data from public universities in the state of Ohio, I estimate the effect of various institutional expenditures on the probability of graduating from college. Using a competing risks regression framework, I find differential impacts of expenditure categories across student characteristics. I estimate that student service expenditures have a larger impact on students with low SAT/ACT scores, while instructional expenditures are more important for high test score students and those majoring in scientific/quantitative fields. The individual-level nature of these data allows me to address measurement error and endogeneity concerns the previous literature has been unable to deal with

Banana Splits and Banana Slips:The European and Trans-Atlantic Politics of Bananas

GATT; international trade; liberalization; regulation; WTO; Uruguay round

Do Expenditures Other Than Instructional Expenditures Affect Graduation and Persistence Rates in American Higher Education

[Excerpt] Rates of tuition increases in both private and public higher education that continually exceed inflation, coupled with the fact that the United States no longer leads the world in terms of the fraction of our young adults who have college degrees, have focused attention on why costs keep increasing in higher education and what categories of higher education expenditures have been growing the most rapidly. In a series of publications, the Delta Cost Project has shown that during the last two decades median instructional spending per full-time equivalent (FTE) student in both public and private 4-year colleges and universities in the United States grew at a slower rate than median expenditures per FTE student in many other categories of expenditures (research, public service, academic support, student services, and scholarships and fellowships).1 Similarly, the Center for College Affordability and Productivity reports that during the same time period, managerial and support/service staff at colleges and universities grew relative to faculty. Do such changes reflect increased inefficiency and waste or do some non instructional categories of employees and expenditures contribute directly to the educational mission of American colleges and universities? In this paper, we use institutional level panel data and an educational production function approach to estimate whether various non instructional categories of expenditures directly influence graduation and persistence rates of undergraduate students in American colleges and universities. We find, not surprisingly, that the answer is several of these expenditure categories do influence students’ educational outcome, but that the extent that they matter varies with the socioeconomic backgrounds and the average test scores of the students attending the institutions

By most objective measures, Europe must now be classed as a declining power

How has the European Union’s influence on the global stage changed since the turn of the century? Douglas Webber presents findings from a study of Europe’s power in seven key policy areas. He finds that on every area with the exception of regulatory policy, the EU’s power has either remained steady or declined since 2003. While some of this decline is attributable to the economic problems associated with the Eurozone crisis, it is also a mark of the difficulty EU leaders have experienced in negotiating common positions at the European level

Executive Pay and Firm Performance: Methodological Considerations and Future Directions

This paper is an investigation of the pay-for-performance link in executive compensation. In particular we document main issues in the pay-performance debate and explain practical issues in setting pay as well as data issues including how pay is disclosed and how that has changed over time. We also provide a summary of the state of CEO pay levels and pay mix in 2009 using a sample of over 2,000 companies and describe main data sources for researchers. We also investigate what we believe to be at the root of fundamental confusion in the literature across disciplines – methodological issues. In exploring methodological issues, we focus on empirical specifications, causality, fixed-effects, first- differencing and instrumental variables issues. We then discuss two important but not yet well explored areas; international issues and compensation in nonprofits. We conclude by examining a series of research areas where further work can be done, within and across disciplines

Do Expenditures Other Than Instructional Expenditures Affect Graduation and Persistence Rates in American Higher Education?

Median instructional spending per full-time equivalent (FTE) student at American colleges and universities has grown at a slower rate the median spending per FTE in a number of other expenditure categories during the last two decades. We use institutional level panel data and a variety of econometric approaches, including unconditional quantile regression models, to analyze whether noninstructional expenditure categories influence first year persistence and graduation rates of American undergraduate students. Our most important finding is that student service expenditures influence graduation and persistence rates and their marginal effects are larger for students at institutions with lower entrance test scores and more lower income students. Put another way, their effects are largest at institutions that have lower current persistence and graduation rates. Simulations suggest that reallocating some funding from instruction to student services may enhance persistence and graduation rates at those institutions whose rates are currently below the medians in the sample.higher education, productivity, graduation rates

Job Loss and Effects on Firms and Workers

This paper serves as an introduction and (incomplete) survey of the wide-ranging literature on job loss. We begin with a discussion of job stability in the US and the commitment between firms and workers, and how this has changed in recent years. We then focus on the short and long-term consequences to workers (i.e. wages, health outcomes) following a layoff, and the effect which mass layoffs have on future firm performance. The changing nature of these relationships over the past several decades is a central theme of this paper. We review the common data sources used to examine these questions, and identify many influential papers on each topic. Additionally, we discuss alternative policies to the typical mass layoff, such as worksharing

Zwischen programmatischem Anspruch und politischer Praxis: Die Entwicklung der Arbeitsmarktpolitik in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland von 1974 bis 1982

"Dieser Beitrag untersucht zuerst die Entwicklung der Arbeitsmarktpolitik in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland seit 1974. Er behandelt hauptsächlich Fragen der Förderung der beruflichen Bildung, die Zumutbarkeit von Arbeitsplätzen, die den Arbeitslosen durch die Arbeitsämter angeboten werden, und die Finanzierung arbeitsmarktpolitischer Maßnahmen. ... Die Kürzung arbeitsmarktpolitischer Maßnahmen - gerade in Rezessionsphasen - beleuchten das Auseinanderklaffen zwischen programmatischem Anspruch und praktizierter Arbeitsmarktpolitik in der Bundesrepublick. Im zweiten Teil des Beitrages werden sieben Thesen untersucht, die zu einer Erklärung dieser Divergenz zwischen programmatischem Anspruch und politischer Praxis beitragen können."Arbeitsmarktpolitik - Kritik, Berufsbildung - Förderung, Zumutbarkeit, Arbeitsmarktpolitik - Finanzierung

Are College Costs Worth it? How Individual Ability, Major Choice, and Debt Affect Optimal Schooling Decisions

This paper examines the financial value over the course of a lifetime of pursuing a college degree under a variety of different settings (e.g. major, student loan debt, individual ability). Using a lifecycle simulation approach, I account for ability/selection bias and the substantial probability that entering college freshmen will not eventually graduate, two critically important factors when evaluating the value of pursuing a college degree. I find that financial proposition of attending college is an unambiguously good investment for the vast majority of individuals with low to average college costs, although majors with a lower expected return do not pay off until middle age. However, when the financial costs of attending college are high (defined here as roughly $30,000 per year), the gains from attending college are far more tenuous, particularly among those with below median ability and those pursuing an Arts/Humanities degree. I estimate the net present discounted value of attending college to vary between$95,000 and $275,000 depending on the major (STEM, Business, Social Sciences, Arts/Humanities) pursued

Risk-Sharing and Student Loan Policy: Consequences for Students and Institutions

This paper examines the potential costs and benefits associated with a risk-sharing policy imposed on all higher education institutions. Under such a program, institutions would be required to pay for a portion of the student loans among which their students defaulted. I examine the predicted institutional responses under a variety of possible penalties and institutional characteristics using a straightforward model of institutional behavior based on monopolistic competition. I also examine the impact of a risk-sharing program on overall economic efficiency by estimating the returns to scale for undergraduate enrollment (as well as other outputs) among each of ten educational sectors. I find that even a relatively small incentive effect of a risk-sharing would lead to a substantial decline in overall student debt. There is considerable heterogeneity across sectors, with 4-year for-profit institutions accounting for the majority of the savings. My estimates suggest that a risk-sharing program would induce a modest tuition increase, but that there is unlikely to be a substantial loss of economic efficiency in terms of costs due to a reallocation of students across sectors