Sherrilyn M. Billger

Principals as Agents? Investigating Accountability in the Compensation and Performance of School Principals

Although school accountability incentives and standards, such as district-mandated goals and state sanctions for poor performance, are increasingly common, few studies have investigated their effectiveness. The author of this paper seeks evidence on whether such policies affect public secondary principal pay and school performance. An analysis of cross-sectional variation in data from the 1999–2000 Schools and Staffing Survey indicates that accountability policies coincided with lower college matriculation rates and lower principal pay, particularly for the best principals. On the other hand, the policies were associated with higher student retention rates at the worst schools. Though principals at those schools may not have been directly rewarded through accountability policies, these principals appear to have acted as agents for students in danger of dropping out.

Does attending predominately-female schools make a difference? Labor market outcomes for women

This study explores the effects of attending predominately-female high schools on labor market outcomes. The existing literature about these schools is quite limited, and most research focuses on role-model effects at coeducational schools. Since returns to predominately-female high school attendance are likely to be upward biased due to selection, data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth are used to explore the determinants of such attendance. Girls who are raised Catholic, who are nonwhite, or who live in urban areas are more likely to enroll in predominately-female schools. Though women who attended these schools are no more or less likely to enter the workforce, they do earn a 19.7% higher wage than women who attended coeducational high schools. Controlling for personal characteristics as well as selection into predominately-female schools and into the workforce, the estimated wage differential falls to 12.6%.

Where Do New Ph.D. Economists Go? Evidence from Recent Initial Job Placements

We use data from the 2007-2008 Ph.D. economist job market to investigate initial job placement in terms of job location, job type, and job rank. Our results suggest gender differences in all three dimensions of job placement. Relative to their male counterparts, female candidates are less (more) likely to be placed into academic (government or private sector) jobs and, on average, are placed into worse ranked jobs. Foreign female candidates are also more likely than foreign males to stay in the U.S. When foreign students are placed outside the U.S., they are more likely to be in academia than in government or private sector, while the opposite holds when foreign students are placed in the U.S., which is largely consistent with a stylized theory model. Our results also reveal various country/region heterogeneities in the type, location, and rank of job placements.