Joe C. Davis

The scholarly output of economists: A description of publishing patterns

This paper analyzes the research productivity of a cohort of economists over the 15 years following receipt of their doctorate degrees, contrasting their results in publishing articles, books, and textbooks after controlling for the individual characteristics of the economists in the sample. Specifically, this paper considers the quality of graduate school, the type of employment, the general area of dissertation research, and the gender of each individual in the cohort. Primary conclusions indicate that scholarly journals are the most important research outlet, and that book production is a complementary activity to output in scholarly journals. Moreover, publishing success is closely related to the quality of the graduate school attended as well as the type of employer. According to this research, women do not face a statistically significant disadvantage to publishing. Finally, the analysis documents that midway through the 15-year time span covered by this study, output begins to decline, reflecting the post-tenure drop-off in research productivity.

Right-to-work laws and union density: New evidence from micro data

Although union density is much lower in Right-to-Work (RTW) states than in states permitting union shops, most studies have found that after correcting for omitted-variable and simultaneity biases, RTW laws do not have independent impact on union density. However, these studies typically use data sets which include certain government, agricultural, supervisory and transportation workers who are not subject to RTW legislation thus diluting the effect of RTW laws. When these employees are excluded from the data set, we find that RTW laws do significantly affect union density in the private sector.

Determinants of Variations in Journal Publication Rates of Economists

We track a cohort of economists over a 16-year period following receipt of the Ph.D. Using a multivariate model, we assess the influence on publishing success before and after tenure of graduate school attended, dissertation topic, type of employer, gender, and co-authorship.