Results for “department why not” 147 found
Conservatives vs. conservatism
Attacking conservatism, Greg Anrig writes:
I think it’s fair to equate Heritage with the conservative movement…the whole unitary executive concept about executive power began to be
formulated in the Reagan Justice Department. Those guys were pretty
much all conservatives, wouldn’t you say, Tyler?
I find the clarity here extraordinary, namely how much Anrig focuses upon labeled individuals and groups of individuals. Conservatism (yes, the concept, truly understood, includes some well-known liberals) stresses that institutions and ideas are what matter, not which group of people is in power. When institutions are bad, and the general tenor of public ideas is off base or depraved, it is not better to be governed by "conservatives," and arguably it is worse. Of course conservatives, once they achieve power, will view political matters in terms of people just as Anrig does ("we can’t let those guys back into Treasury"), if only because natural political selection eliminates those conservatives who do not.
That is one reason why conservatives so often act against conservative ideas, and why conservative politicians so often lie. In fact the better a conservative politician sounds to conservative listeners, the more inconsistent those ideas will be with the actual process of governing.
If you are a conservative looking to improve the world, one option is to improve the quality of religion in society. You should consider politics an inherently corrupting activity for conservative ideas; yet this fact, taken alone, does not prove it is better to follow left-wing ideas.
Addendum: Here is a link to Matt and Ezra on same.
Across the web
1. How have Moneyball draftpick predictions held up? Try this too.
2. Season two of Veronica Mars comes out on DVD Tuesday, but newcomers must start with Season one.
3. I have been trying to develop a theory of when some people get offended by the boasting of others. In a personal ad it is OK to say you are a doctor, but not OK to say how much you earn.
4. Department of Duh: The number one search query on AOL is "Google."
5. Rousseau and Hume once played a chess game; Rousseau’s play crushed Hume’s weak understanding of the Philidor Defense in this short sacrificial gem.
6. Why Poincare’s possibly-now-proven conjecture matters.
Kenneth Arrow on academic freedom
Bowen: There was a study done recently by an economist at Santa Clara University,
Daniel Klein, showing disproportionate numbers of registered Democrats
versus registered Republicans in various departments at the University of California, Berkeley,
and Stanford. [The study’s findings are available at
http://www.ratio.se/pdf/wp/dk_aw_voter.pdf.] He has concluded that this
kind of ideological imbalance has a negative impact on the education of
students. He implies that
there is a temptation to hire one’s own. Conservative activist David
Horowitz has made much the same kind of statement, saying that faculty
are preaching rather than teaching. And why? Because there’s a gross
imbalance between liberals and conservatives in the professoriate. Effectively,
they are calling for government regulation of the academy [TC: Klein is not, this is inaccurate]. Do you worry
about calls for legislation at the state level to correct this
situation? Does this worry you as an economist or as a professor?
Arrow:
You know, it certainly does worry me. It would worry me a lot if
legislation passed. There was a concern at one time that there would be
repression of the left. And now there are concerns that the left is
taking over. It’s hard for me to judge, of course, but I must say that
my department contains
a number of Republicans. And they were appointed by a democratic group,
whose members said these guys are good, and we’ve got to hire them. And
so far, I have not seen it work the other way, but I’m a little
concerned about where it could swing. In this case, the criticism seems
to be just wrong, because I think the departments hire on the basis of
merit. And I think it’s nonsense to say that we’re discriminating
against Republicans. We hire them all the time. On the other hand,
there was a department here that until the 1960s would not appoint a
Jew. And, finally, the university did interfere, you see, in that case.
The dean took over the department. He took away the power to appoint
from the department and changed its composition in three or four
years. In fact, I was amazed how rapidly he was able to turn things around
to strengthen an already very good department. To defend the autonomy
of that department would not have been something I would have been very
happy to do.
Bowen: The economics department at the University of Chicago
has had a reputation for many years for being quite conservative. Do
you think that’s the exception that proves the rule that you hire, as
you said earlier, on the basis of merit, not on the basis of party
identification of ideology?
Arrow:
There are people in that department who are not conservative. It’s a
very good department. Most of the conservatives are really quite
outstanding. I think they flock together. I
don’t think it’s entirely the case where you pick your own kind. I
don’t think the economics department here is reproducing itself.
They’re different politically and methodologically. I think
methodological problems have been bigger more often than political
issues. I do not believe the
university, the central administration, should be totally unconcerned
about appointments. I used to believe that the department had to be
completely autonomous. It took me a couple of years to realize that
that was not right.
I can remember an instance at Chicago
in which there was an incident involving a professor of economics who
was sort of a village atheist type. He was a very good economist, but a
little eccentric. He believed that religion was one of the big
oppressive things in this world. This fellow saw a priest in class. He
went and gave his whole lecture on the evils of the Catholic church.
The next time the priest came, he gives another lecture. The priest
finally quit the class, and the professor said that he could finally go
on with the course.
Well,
you know, the priest went to the chair of the department who had a very
good record on academic freedom at the university. And the chair said
it was a question of academic freedom. He wouldn’t interfere with this
professor.
TC: Does anyone have data on Stanford?
Chiswick refutes Chiswick
Barry Chiswick, head of the economics department at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a respected scholar of immigration, had a surprisingly poorly argued op-ed in the NYTimes. Here’s the opening paragaraph:
It is often said that the American economy needs low-skilled foreign
workers to do the jobs that American workers will not do. These foreign
workers might be new immigrants, illegal aliens or, in the current
debate, temporary or guest workers. But if low-skilled foreign workers
were not here, would lettuce not be picked, groceries not bagged, hotel
sheets not changed, and lawns not mowed? Would restaurants use
disposable plates and utensils?On the face of it, this assertion seems implausible.
… If the number of low-skilled foreign workers were to fall, wages would increase. Low-skilled American workers and their families would benefit…
Bizarrely, the rest of his op-ed explains why these statements are mostly wrong! First, the lettuce:
A farmer who grows winter iceberg lettuce in Yuma County, Ariz., was
asked on the ABC program "Nightline" in April what he would do if it
were more difficult to find the low-skilled hand harvesters who work on
his farm, many of whom are undocumented workers. He replied that he
would mechanize the harvest. Such technology exists, but it is not used
because of the abundance of low-wage laborers. In their absence,
mechanical harvesters – and the higher skilled (and higher wage)
workers to operate them – would replace low-skilled, low-wage workers.
In other words, if the number of low skilled workers were to fall the lettuce would no longer be (hand) picked and low-skilled American workers would not benefit from an increase in wages!
What about lawn mowing and hotel cleaning?
Facing higher costs, some homeowners would switch to grass species
that grow more slowly, to alternative ground cover or to flagstones.
Others would simply mow every other week, or every 10 days, instead of
weekly…Few of us change our sheets and towels
at home every day. Hotels and motels could reduce the frequency of
changing sheets and towels from every day to, say, every third day for
continuing guests, perhaps offering a price discount to guests who
accept this arrangement.
And how about this for a pathetic attempt to get the environmentalists on board the anti-immigration bandwagon?
Less frequent lawn mowing and washing of hotel sheets and towels would reduce air, noise and water pollution in the bargain.
Note how reduction in services, denied in paragraph one, has now become a virtue!
Chiswick also points out that:
With the higher cost of low-skilled labor, we would import more of some
goods, in particular table-quality fruits and vegetables for home
consumption (as distinct from industrial use) and lower-priced
off-the-rack clothing.
That is correct, but this is another reason why restricting the immigration of low-skilled workers will not much increase the wages of low-skilled Americans.
Chiswick makes statements in his op-ed like the "increase in low-skilled workers has contributed to the stagnation of wages for all such workers." But unlike my Open Letter he never tries to quantify these assertions. Yet he surely knows that an 8% decline is on the high end of such estimates and a zero percent decline on the low-end.
Quantifying, however, would put the immigration and wages issue in perspective which is that immigration is at worst a small contributor to the decline in the wages of low-skilled workers. Indeed, economists are agreed that technology, not immigration, is by far the more important force which is why any serious attempt to raise the wages of low-skilled workers must begin with efforts to raise skills.
In my TCS article I said:
Immigration makes immigrants much better off. In the normal debate
this fact is not considered to be of great importance — who cares
about them? But economists tend not to count some people as worth more
than others, especially not if the difference is something so random as
where a person was born.
Chiswick, however, lets the economists down. He never once mentions the benefits of immigration to the immigrants.
In defense of the university
I have never been much of a university-basher, and in my new book Good and Plenty I attempt to explain why:
The university also injects diversity into the broader societal discovery process. Faculty tenure is based on two principles: free inquiry and intellectual autonomy. Taken together, these principles also could be described by the less favorable sounding phrase "lack of accountability." A tenured faculty member simply is not very accountable to deans and department chairs. This absence of accountability, while it comes under heavy criticism, is part of the virtue of the university. The university works by generating and evaluating ideas according to novel and independent principles, relative to the rest of society. Direct commercial considerations drive most sources of ideas in society, including corporate research and development, commercial culture, advertising, and celebrity culture. The university is an alternative and complementary mechanism for producing and evaluating social ideas. In the university professors are, at least in theory, insulated from direct commercial pressures. Most academic rewards are determined by peer evaluation.
Tenure and non-accountability work especially well for a process that depends on intellectual or creative superstars. The average producer might use lack of accountability to shirk, or to pursue self-indulgent ideas of little value. But the superstars will use lack of accountability to pursue their own visions without outside hindrance. We like to think of "creative freedom" as good, and "lack of accountability" as bad, but in fact they are two sides of the same coin. If most of the value added comes from the superstars, the gains from their freedom may exceed the losses from the shirking of the average producer. Given that most artistic experiments are failures, effective discovery procedures often succeed by supporting the extremes, rather than trying to generate a good outcome in every attempt.
Since we should evaluate institutions as a bundle, the excesses of the university, which include conservatism and overspecialization, should be seen as part of a broader picture. All methods of producing ideas involve biases. The question is whether these biases tend to offset or exaggerate the other biases — usually commercial — that are already present in the broader system. To the extent the biases are offsetting, the benefits of the university are robust. Counterintuitively, one of the great virtues of commercial society is its ability to augment non-commercial sources of support, including the university. Academic institutions, whatever their particular failings, increase the diversity of the social discovery process, including in the creative arts.
Pledge Drive
It’s that time of year again, our NPR moment. Do you enjoy Marginal Revolution’s blend of economic commentary, book reviews, art recommendations and fun ideas? Please consider making a donation. You can donate through Amazon or via the PayPal link in the upper left hand corner. Any amount would be appreciated. Use the PayPal link for donations over $50. We are also happy to accept donations via snail mail. Send to:
Marginal Revolution, c/o Alex Tabarrok
Department of Economics, MSN 1D3
George Mason Universtiy
Fairfax, VA, 22030
For donations of $100 or more we would be pleased to send you an autographed copy of one of our books, your choice (including my forthcoming book Judge and Jury available in February).
If you are in a position to be especially generous and wish to make a larger contribution through a legally recognized non-profit entity (for tax reasons),
please let us know, this can be arranged.
Why are we asking for donations? MR is never going to be a paying venture but donations help us
to cover our costs. More importantly, donations help to solve a serious economic problem. Efficiency says that goods with zero marginal cost should have a zero price but without prices not only is the incentive to produce diminished but so is information about what to produce. (See Coase’s 1946 classic, The Marginal Cost Controversy, JSTOR). Donations allow prices to be set at MC while at the same time providing a (noisy) signal about where true economic value lies. In particular, Tyler and I know that we can appropriate more of our marginal product from professional work than we can from blogging yet it is conceivable that our marginal product is higher in blogging. Thus, to decide how much to invest in this venture we markup donations to get an estimate of our social value and we put positive weight on social welfare in our utility function.
Happy Holidays!
Thomas Schelling, new Nobel Laureate
Note my biases, Schelling was my mentor at Harvard.
Tom is an unassuming guy, who looks as if he sells Hush Puppies at the local mall. But he is one of the sharpest people you will meet. He delivers the killer point, argument, or anecdote with striking regularity. Even in his eighties he is sharp as a tack. He has a deeply philosophical and humanistic approach to economics. What are his contributions?
1. The idea of precommitment. You can be better off, either individually, or institutionally, if your choices are limited in advance. This is a key idea in monetary policy (many governments seek to tie the hands of their central banks), the theory of bargaining (try buying a used car, and see if the salesman doesn’t talk about "the boss upstairs"), and industrial organization (firms may invest in capacity to precommit a market position and deter rivals). You find the precommitment frequently in movies as well, especially where kidnapping is involved; what is that Mel Gibson flick again? Here is an excellent Jon Elster piece on the ambiguities of precommitment. Here is my piece on similar themes.
2. The paradox of nuclear deterrence. Ever see Dr. Strangelove? Tom developed the idea that deterrence is never fully credible (why retaliate once you are wiped out?). The best deterrent might involve precommitment, some element of randomness, or a partly crazy leader. I recall Tom telling me he was briefly an advisor to Kubrick. Here is someone else’s essay on the paradox of deterrence.
3. Focal points. People coordinate by directing their attention to commonly recognized points of importance. If a meeting time for lunch is not specified, you might assume 12 noon. If someone mentions "economics blog," of course MarginalRevolution.com comes to mind. And so on. Much social coordination occurs in this manner. I once asked me class: "If you had to hide a one hundred dollar bill in a book, so that your friend would find it, but you could not announce the book, which volume should you choose?" Many said The Bible but of course the game theorist picks Schelling’s The Strategy of Conflict.
4. Behavioral economics and the theory of self-constraint. One of Tom’s best pieces is "The Mind as a Consuming Organ," American Economics Review, 1984. Here is a lecture of his on self control. Will Wilkinson cites a bit of that essay. Tom made it respectable for economists to talk once again about happiness.
Tom has been an underrecognized father of behavioral economics. His work on addiction, memory, and personal control was pathbreaking and came nearly twenty years before the "behavioral revolution" in economics. He analyses the tricks people use to control their wills. For Tom, self-control is often a more important determinant of happiness than is wealth. Tom once told me his work sprung from his own attempts to quit smoking, which he did finally manage. Several times.
5. The economics of segregation. Tom showed how communities can end up segregated even when no single individual cares to live in a segregated neighborhood. Under the right conditions, it only need be the case that the person does not want to live as a minority in the neighborhood, and will move to a neighborhood where the family can be in the majority. Try playing this game with white and black chess pieces, I bet you will get to segregation pretty quickly. Here is a demo model for playing the game.
6. Later in his life Tom turned his attention to issues of global warming. He has been skeptical of the idea that global warming involves insuperably high economic costs. Here is a short essay by Tom on the topic. Here is his excellent AER piece on the same topic.
Tom is not well-represented on the web, here is one photo, but the associated links are mostly broken. Here is Tom’s piece on Hiroshima. Here is the Wikipedia bio, note Wikipedia already reports he won the prize. Here is a great interview with Tom. Here is Tom’s work on the Copenhagen Consensus.
A few bio facts: Like so many other prestigious American economists, Tom worked for the Marshall Plan in its early stages. He spent most of his career at Harvard, first in the economics department, later in the Kennedy School. He had close ties with the Rand Corporation. He was an advisor to Kissinger during the Vietnam War but quit in disgust. He is now emeritus at University of Maryland. I have always interpreted Tom’s political views as those of a conservative Democrat.
Here is a piece I wrote with Dan Klein and Timur Kuran, Salute to Schelling: Keeping it Human. In this piece, recently published, we asked the Committee to give the Prize to Tom. Here are Tom’s books, they are all worth reading.
Comments are open, you can add more; Tom could have won more than one Nobel Prize for all his contributions.
A short recent history of FEMA
Courtesy of Kevin Drum, read the whole thing. Hindsight is easy, but what should FEMA be doing?
My view is the following. Many levees are genuine public goods, and should receive government support, from the federal government (e.g., Army Corp; here is a brief history of their involvement) if need be although perhaps not ideally. FEMA should not be in the business of flood insurance, nor should FEMA reimburse local governments for snow plowing. Here is a Cato critique of FEMA. Here is a libertarian article on why a limited governmental response to the Chicago fire was best. Here is another libertarian critique. Here is an AEI article that FEMA invests too much in earthquake safety. Here is an argument that FEMA should not have been made part of the Department of Homeland Security.
Here is a recent piece on cuts to levee subsidies; the news will hurt the Republicans. Here is a short piece on how revenue from airport privatization could have been used to shore up New Orleans levees.
Libertarian readers, do you care to argue the levee should not have been subsidized? Do you favor real privatization, not as a Port Authority or Federal Reserve may be private, but in the true market sense? (Here is a short history of the Louisiana levee authorities; their status has evolved over time.) If you take that position, you have a few alternatives:
1. We rely too much on unreliable levees, and privatization/non-subsidization would reveal their true social costs and induce people to move elsewhere.
2. A privatized, non-subsidized levee would engage in a successful long-term contract with city residents; see the Demsetz-Williamson debate. The government still would have to force residents to make the relevant tax payments, for free rider reasons.
3. A levee contract could be written without use of coercive taxation; see this piece on assurance contracts.
4. A private levee authority would invest in water safety out of fear of being sued. Furthermore these ex post legal incentives would be reliable and would not involve more government intervention than ex ante regulatory incentives.
5. A private levee authority would be forced by its insurance company to build good protection and also hold huge capital reserves. Their cost of capital and costs of production would remain lower than the government’s. You can hold this position in conjunction with #3, or believe that coercive taxation would remain necessary. But in any case it probably requires reliance on #4.
I am not willing to defend any of these five positions, but what do you say readers? The current government system, obviously, does not have a sterling record. Comments are open.
Epigenomes
As scientists discover more about the "epigenome," a layer of biochemical reactions that turns genes on and off, they’re finding that it plays a big part in health and heredity…
The epigenome can change according to an individual’s environment, and is passed from generation to generation. It’s part of the reason why "identical" twins can be so different, and it’s also why not only the children but the grandchildren of women who suffered malnutrition during pregnancy are likely to weigh less at birth.
"Now we’re even talking about how to see if socioeconomic status has an impact on the epigenome," Szyf said.
The link is mine, but read more here. Here is further explanation.
My favorite things Texan
Music: How about Blind Willie Johnson, a pinnacle of the blues tradition? Buy it here. Can I overlook Scott Joplin and his "Euphonic Sounds"? Lightnin’ Hopkins? Woody Guthrie (if only he had read Economics in One Lesson…)? Leadbelly? Janis Joplin? Roy Orbison? Jimmie Rodgers? Charlie Christian? Ornette Coleman? Buddy Holly? Here is a longer list.
Painting: Robert Rauschenberg? Look at this one with the goat, I believe it is in Stockholm. I bet you, like I, say naaaah, but the field is thin. I’ll opt for his "Bed" as an important work, however.
Literature: Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian is the obvious choice, or try Katherine Anne Porter.
Food: Texas barbecue has a strong influence (sausage!) from German migrants. That is also why Tejano music has so much accordion, with a hat tip to Poland as well.
Comedian: Steve Martin. All of Me and Planes, Trains and Automobiles both make me laugh.
The bottom line: I love Texas, but I am surprised that the weight of achievement is so unbalanced toward music and food. By the way, I’m in El Paso, doing research for my next book.
Addendum: Several readers write to tell me Guthrie is not a Texan…
Yes Virginia, I do believe in the Commerce Clause
Fafnir does constitutional law.
"Insolent pot!" says Giblets. "Be more vendible!"
"Giblets why are you yellin at that pot plant?" says me.
"Giblets
is trying to turn it into commerce," says Giblets. "But buying and
selling it is too much work. He wants it to be commerce NOOOOOWWW!"
"Silly
Giblets, everything is commerce!" says me. "Let’s step into this
maaaagical schoolbus and we will learn all about Our World Of Commerce!"…
This snowman is not commerce. But we can make him commerce with this ol top hat we found… and if we just believe!
Now all the children of the world clap your hands an say together now:
"I do believe in an expanded Commerce Clause, I do believe in an
expanded Commerce Clause!"Hooray, now our snowman is
commercial an alive an singin an dancin around! "Happy birthday!" says
the snowman. He is quickly arrested and detained. Commercial snowmen
are strictly controlled by the Department of Snowman Security.
Real (Estate) Rent Seeking
The Justice Department may file suit against the National Association of Realtors (NAR) to prevent them from excluding discount brokers from access to the regional MLS systems. I’m hardly a fan of antitrust but the market for realtors is a racket. Six percent to sell a house? Outrageous!
Putting aside the outrage the market for realtors is terribly wasteful. Consider, house prices are much higher in California than in Idaho but commissions are stable at around six percent. Thus, even though the realtor’s job, brokering a deal, is the same in California as in Idaho, a realtor in California will make much more per-house. As a result, there are far too many realtors in California and many of them will spend an entire year selling only a handful of houses. Indeed, many realtor’s spend most of their time prospecting for clients rather than actually selling houses – this is a huge waste of resources.
The same relationship holds over time as over space. That is, when house prices go up we don’t see a fall in commission rates. Instead, we see more entry. Since the same number of houses are being bought and sold, the extra realtors don’t make the buyer or seller better off and sadly the realtors aren’t better off either – instead the excess return is siphoned off in wasteful prospecting for clients.
Unfortunately, no one really understands why commissions are stable. The answer is not monopoly. It’s very easy to enter the market for realtors. So why don’t commissions fall? One can certainly point to some restrictive practices by the NAR but I don’t think that is the whole or even the major part of the story.
A clue to the puzzle is that we also see stable commission rates in law (contingency fees) and in services (tipping). Why is the appropriate tip 15% at an expensive restaurant and at a cheap restaurant? Does the tuxedoed waiter really have a harder job than the diner waitress? Maybe (indeed, I have argued along these lines elsewhere) but the commonality across these very different markets tells me something else is going on.
Is it signaling? Would you distrust a realtor offering lower commissions? Again, maybe, but it’s hard to believe that with so much money at stake there aren’t enough people willing to take a risk on a discount realtor for long enough for reputations to be established. I think part of the problem in the realtor market is that other realtors can easily discriminate against discount brokers by pushing their clients one way or the other – that says the antitrust actions will probably not be very effective. But this doesn’t explain stable commissions in law or waiting.
It’s a puzzle and one worth solving. Comments are open.
Underappreciated economists, a continuing series
Julio Rotemberg. OK, so being tenured at Harvard Business School is not the same as lost in the woods. But you don’t hear enough about him in the economics profession, when in fact he is one of our most creative thinkers.
My favorite Rotemberg paper is "A Theory of Inefficient Intrafirm Transactions," American Economic Review, 1991. It is poorly written and the model is clumsy but I love the idea. Firms do not exist to lower transactions costs, rather they usually raise transactions costs (price aside, wouldn’t you rather go buy a new computer from a retail outlet than try to order one through your purchasing department?). An asset is brought into a firm when an entrepreneur sees that the asset is currently underpriced. The firm buys the asset to capture future rents, but don’t expect ex post transactional efficiency to result. That being said, it makes sense to allow this process to continue, given the absence of serious alternatives to market bidding, however imperfect it may be.
Rotemberg’s paper on altruism explores the idea that you often feel altruism for your co-workers, but you rarely feel altruism for your boss. This will limit the degree of hierarchy; furthermore some firms may fear inter-employee altruism, knowing that it will be used against them. His paper on fairness constraints on market pricing is a brilliant, sprawling mess on a vitally important topic. Why do firms hold poorly publicized temporary sales? They want one group of customers to think the firm cares about their welfare, while those who buy after the sale ends feel no regret at paying the higher prices.
Here is a previous installment in this series on Brian Loasby.
Those Pesky Charter School Reports
- What exactly are charter schools? A charter school is a public school that has more lax legal requirements about funding, staffing and curriculum. For example, many states allow charter schools to hire non-certified teachers. Somebody who wants to operate a charter school must usually obtain permission from a local or state government. The ease of starting and operating a charter school varies from state to state. Arizonais a charter school hothouse, while other states have none. Depending on state law, the charter school must file reports and be inspected by state officials. Charter schools often receive funding from state or local governments.
- Why would someone start a charter school? The reasons vary, but parents are often frustrated with existing schools and school reformers want a shot at operating a school along innovative teaching principles. School reformers see charter schools as offering more options and, sometimes, a step towards competition in education.
- Why do people hate charter schools? Critics see charter schools as taking away resources from standard public schools and as havens for poorly qualified teachers. A few see charter schools as opportunities for people to concentrate on serving privileged students, and are a betrayal of the ideal of public education. Some charter school proponents say that charters threaten the power of teacher’s unions because the law permits schools to have non-certified teachers. Click here to read a thoroughly anti-charter school essay by Amy Stuart in the Washington Post.
- Who goes to charter schools? This is tough because the data on charter schools is often not available to the public (MR readers should email me if they can find quality raw data). In the 1990s, the student body at charter schools seemed to resemble other schools in the area. (Click here.) A more recent Department of Education report suggests that slightly more white students attend charter schools than at other schools in the same area. The big point, which a lot of people have missed, is that charter schools have not turned out to be sanctuaries for wealthy, highly privileged students. The major migration that many feared never happened. My guess is that wealthier students already live in neighborhoods with high quality schools, either public or private, and have no reason to take a risk on a controversial new type of school. Those who work at charter schools should email me to tell me if my hunch is true.
- The Big Question: Do charter schools help students learn more than traditional schools? Reading a few reports, I’d say that charter schools have a mixed record so far. They definitely aren’t disasters (but some individuals schools are bad) but they haven’t shown themselves to be vastly superior to either public or private schools (even though some excellent schools are charter schools). The key in reading these reports is to look for comparisons of similar students. If you simply look at average test scores of charter schools, you miss the point because education researchers know that learning is tied to factors that schools can’t control – academic aptitude/IQ, family, peer effects, etc. Eduwonk and the Constrained Vision Blog have recent posts pointing out that charter schools do OK on some measures, comparable to public schools. Their conclusions are based on findings from recent reports that were said to be devastating critiques of charter schools.
In my opinion, fans and critics miss the best thing about charter schools – bad schools close. Since people are under no obligation to attend these schools, they will actually close if they are poorly managed and do a disservice to their students. Critics see a closed charter school as a victory. Yes, it is a victory, but not for charter school opponents. It is a victory for education in general – a poorly run institution has stopped operating, something you rarely see in other schools.
Update: A reader reminds that I have omitted discussion of Hoxby’s analysis showing that charter schools do well when you control for the types of students who attend the school, which lists data sources. Click here to read the Hoxby paper. When I wrote above about scarcity of data, I was thinking of a single data set available from a data bank such as the ICPSR, not about studies that assemble data from multiple print and electronic sources. Thanks, Yesim!
Does academia discriminate against right-wingers?
Jonathan Klick — a smart economist, not unsympathetic to markets, writes me the following:
I’ve been thinking a bit about all the stuff regarding the small number of folks on the right in academics in the mainstream press and on blogs, and I think people have missed an important point regarding cross sectional variation — I think the fact that you also see relatively few people on the right in the arts supports the supply side view of the empirical regularity more than the discrimination view. That is, there’s not really any differential barrier to entry into music, visual arts, writing, etc. for right wingers and yet those fields look at lot like academics in terms of personnel make-up. To my mind, this supports the view that, by and large, relatively fewer of the right’s brightest want to go into academics than is the case with the left.
I agree, but with one caveat. Many academic entrants are initially undecided in their political outlook, but social pressures sway them to the left. That being said, so many academic leftists have held their views from an early age. Academic life and discourse have, if anything, moderated their stances toward the center.
Both academic life and left-wing attitudes are correlated with the same basic status markers. Whether or not Democrats and academics are in fact more tolerant of others, at the very least they pretend to be. They also are, or at least pretend to be, more thoughtful, nuanced, intellectual, and internationalist [TC: This doesn’t stop them from being wrong about many things.] Most importantly, they take pride in identifying with these values. This will put most academics into the Democratic camp. Those that cannot become Democrats — such as myself — will often be libertarian or "independent" rather than registered or self-identifying Republicans. The Republican "pride markers" are, for many academic tastes, too nationalistic, religious, and involve too much "tough talk."
So the market-oriented or "right-wing" anthropologists will, ex post, experience negative bias in academia. Minority points of view are not always treated fairly. But that bias is not the initial reason why they are so outnumbered in the first place.