David Phillips

Students on the Job Market A list of economics students on the job market

Since I am placement director for ND's Econ Department, let me tell you about our job market candidates this year (in alphabetical order). It's a fantastic group of young economists, please do not hesitate to contact me for any questions. They are all listed here:

economics.nd.edu/graduate/stu...

High Schools Tailored to Adults Can Help Them Complete a Traditional Diploma and Excel in the Labor Market (November 2024) - Over 18 million adults in the United States lack a high school credential. While some go on to attain the GED, diplomas are potentially more valuable. A network of high schools helps...

The newest AEJ: Policy @aeajournals.bsky.social, "High Schools Tailored to Adults Can Help Them Complete a Traditional Diploma and Excel in the Labor Market" by David Phillips @phillipsecon.bsky.social, Patrick Turner, and former @LEOatND pre-doc Becca Brough www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...

American Economic Journal: Economic Policy Vol. 16 No. 4 November 2024

The November 2024 issue of AEJ: Economic Policy (16, 4) is now available online at aeaweb.org/issues/782.

The AEA has released data on econ job openings for 2024 (as of Oct. 27). Compared to 2023:
- Total openings down 9.3%
- US academic openings down 11.7%
- US adjunct/visiting openings up 4.0%

Lots more info available here, including non-US openings:
#EconSky
www.aeaweb.org/joe/communic...

Henry Downes visited us at Miami a few weeks ago and gave a really impressive seminar on his JMP! Check him out if you are hiring in labor, public, history, and/or demography. henrymdownes.com

I’m telling you, Henry is fantastic—but you don’t have to take my word for it! 👇👇👇👇👇👇

One thing we do that I think is kind of crazy is throw students into their own research after coursework; ie a senior thesis or third year paper.

Students almost always flail when this happens. Way better to do an apprentice model: work with others on a paper first, then do your own.

We are thrilled to curate a Special Issue on “Field Experiments to Reduce Inequality” in the European Economic Review!

Guest editors: @lergetporer.bsky.social @michelebelot.bsky.social @henninghermes.com @fpeter.bsky.social & @simonwiederhold.bsky.social  

Details: tinyurl.com/38hzxdte

#EconSky

This is a great line: "like a four year old with access to unlimited postgrad labor, a true scientist will never stop asking 'but why?'"

Deadline for Early Career Research Awards approaching

The deadline is fast approaching for our 2024 Early Career Research Awards. Applications are due Jan. 21.
Early Career Research Awards go to researchers within six years of earning a Ph.D. for policy-related research on employment issues. Funding for each award is $7,500. Details at link. 📈📉

Submit for the NBER Children's program's spring meeting, May 2-3. Papers are due March 1.

All are encouraged to apply--please share!

conference.nber.org/confsubmit/b...

People way underestimate how much of a hit to statistical power results from typical quasi-experimental methods. (the answer is X<=144; poll from the other place since I can't here)

Totally agree that experiments have drawbacks. But scarce researcher time has to be allocated across methods. And when most applied economists think of advantages of a typical experiment relative to a typical quasi-experiment, "better statistical power" is rarely on their list and it should be.

"We also compare observational to experimental research and find that the quality of experimental economic evidence is notably higher." Our profession massively undervalues the advantage that the typical experiment has in statistical power compared to the typical quasi-experiment.

What pops out to me is the dramatic difference in power between experiments and non-experiments in Table 2.

But they replace Captcha with the montage at the beginning of "Up" and only let you pass if you cry.

Please share! Applications now being accepted for the 2024 National Research Center on Poverty and Economic Mobility Early-Career Mentoring Institute, co-sponsored by IRP & the UC Davis Center for Poverty & Inequality Research, with additional support from The National Research Center on (1/5)

Snow xkcd.com/2866

Inequality in Beliefs: Guest Post by Madeline Duhon Human capital Parental beliefs

Today's job market post by Madeline Duhon uses data from India, Kenya, the USA, and Ghana to show how socioeconomic status can shape differences in parental beliefs about child academic achievement blogs.worldbank.org/impactevalua...

Out in the December edition of AER: Insights, "Hiring Frictions and the Promise of Online Job Portals: Evidence from India," by our own Nilesh Fernando @nileshfern.bsky.social and Niha Singh (along with Gabe Tourek): www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...

I am putting together an ASHEcon session focused on health behaviors and RCT's, broadly defined. We have 3 discussants and 2 papers lined up. We are looking for one more paper, please reach out to me (jreif@illinois.edu) if you have something that could fit.
#EconSky

Here it is! Our new standing RFP for causal research proposals on crime/CJ! This replaces our previous practice of invite-only submissions for most research.

Please share with your networks, including PhD students.

craftmediabucket.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/Caus...

Yeah, that's where my knowledge ends...economics needs a book of counter-example utility functions/preference relations...

(I'm trying to sort out if the symmetry is required by differentiability or just more generally a feature of any preferences that you can represent with a utility function...not immediately obvious to me...)

Could you formalize this with some weird non-differentiable preferences....like two stage utility function that is Leontief over tasks (diapering, baking, etc.) and and tasks are either perfect substitutes or totally irrelevant within task?

📢Please share! 📢As the National Research Center on Poverty and Economic Mobility, IRP, in collaboration with ASPE’s Office of Human Services Policy, is currently accepting applications for 2024-26 extramural large research grants for up to $50,000. (1/4)

In our new NBER WP, we estimate historical intergenerational mobility for men **and women** using hundreds of millions of census-to-census links from the Census Tree. 🧵 👇https://www.nber.org/papers/w31918

with Zach Ward, Joe Price, & Haley Wilbert

Academics everywhere:

Let me just submit this manuscript before the start of the holidays, summer, or new semester.

But also

How dare the editor of this journal send me a review request just before the start of the holidays, summer, or new semester.

Out in @nber.bsky.social today, "Family Trees and Falling Apples: Historical Intergenerational Mobility Estimates for Women and Men," from our own @kaseybuckles.bsky.social and graduate student Haley Wilbert, along with Joe Price and Zach Ward. www.nber.org/papers/w31918

Combining empathy with economics: Eric Sims wins the Arts & Letters 2023 Sheedy Excellence in Teachi... Economics professor Eric Sims' skill of combining economics with empathy has also been recognized by his students and colleagues, and it ultimately led ...

A beautiful, intimate portrait of my friend, co-author and, even, boss Eric Sims who will be awarded the Sheedy Excellence in Teaching Award next week.

@ndecon.bsky.social

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