How Economics Shapes Science

How Economics Shapes Science
Author: Paula Stephan
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 318
Release: 2015-09-07
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0674267559

The beauty of science may be pure and eternal, but the practice of science costs money. And scientists, being human, respond to incentives and costs, in money and glory. Choosing a research topic, deciding what papers to write and where to publish them, sticking with a familiar area or going into something new—the payoff may be tenure or a job at a highly ranked university or a prestigious award or a bump in salary. The risk may be not getting any of that. At a time when science is seen as an engine of economic growth, Paula Stephan brings a keen understanding of the ongoing cost-benefit calculations made by individuals and institutions as they compete for resources and reputation. She shows how universities offload risks by increasing the percentage of non-tenure-track faculty, requiring tenured faculty to pay salaries from outside grants, and staffing labs with foreign workers on temporary visas. With funding tight, investigators pursue safe projects rather than less fundable ones with uncertain but potentially path-breaking outcomes. Career prospects in science are increasingly dismal for the young because of ever-lengthening apprenticeships, scarcity of permanent academic positions, and the difficulty of getting funded. Vivid, thorough, and bold, How Economics Shapes Science highlights the growing gap between the haves and have-nots—especially the vast imbalance between the biomedical sciences and physics/engineering—and offers a persuasive vision of a more productive, more creative research system that would lead and benefit the world.

The Economics of Race in the United States

The Economics of Race in the United States
Author: Brendan O'Flaherty
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 491
Release: 2015-06-08
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0674368185

Brendan O’Flaherty brings the tools of economic analysis—incentives, equilibrium, optimization—to bear on racial issues. From health care, housing, and education, to employment, wealth, and crime, he shows how racial differences powerfully determine American lives, and how progress in one area is often constrained by diminishing returns in another.

Career and Family

Career and Family
Author: Claudia Goldin
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 344
Release: 2023-05-09
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0691228663

In this book, the author builds on decades of complex research to examine the gender pay gap and the unequal distribution of labor between couples in the home. The author argues that although public and private discourse has brought these concerns to light, the actions taken - such as a single company slapped on the wrist or a few progressive leaders going on paternity leave - are the economic equivalent of tossing a band-aid to someone with cancer. These solutions, the author writes, treat the symptoms and not the disease of gender inequality in the workplace and economy. Here, the author points to data that reveals how the pay gap widens further down the line in women's careers, about 10 to 15 years out, as opposed to those beginning careers after college. She examines five distinct groups of women over the course of the twentieth century: cohorts of women who differ in terms of career, job, marriage, and children, in approximated years of graduation - 1900s, 1920s, 1950s, 1970s, and 1990s - based on various demographic, labor force, and occupational outcomes. The book argues that our entire economy is trapped in an old way of doing business; work structures have not adapted as more women enter the workforce. Gender equality in pay and equity in home and childcare labor are flip sides of the same issue, and the author frames both in the context of a serious empirical exploration that has not yet been put in a long-run historical context. This book offers a deep look into census data, rich information about individual college graduates over their lifetimes, and various records and sources of material to offer a new model to restructure the home and school systems that contribute to the gender pay gap and the quest for both family and career. --

The Economics of Justice

The Economics of Justice
Author: Richard A. Posner
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 436
Release: 1983-08-16
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9780674235267

Posner uses economic analysis to probe justice and efficiency, primitive law, privacy, and the constitutional regulation of racial discrimination.

The Share Economy

The Share Economy
Author: Martin L. Weitzman
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 180
Release: 1984
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674805835

Discussion of profit sharing as a means of combating cyclical unemployment and inflation (stagflation) in market economies - argues that profit sharing will produce full employment without inducing inflation; discusses marginal value economic theory of wages and its effect on the labour market; briefly examines advantages of profit sharing, employee Motivation, etc., and the need for accompanying tax reform. Bibliography.

Competition in the Open Economy

Competition in the Open Economy
Author: Richard E. Caves
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 468
Release: 1980
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674154254

With the nations of the world becoming more interdependent, it is imperative to take international influences into account in understanding the organization of industry within a country. This book extends the structure/conduct/performance framework of analysis to present a fully specified simultaneous equation model of an open economy--Canada. By estimating a system of equations of all the major variables, the authors can identify which variables are dependent and which are independent. They are thus able to assess the relative importance of such factors as seller concentration, import competition, retailing structure, advertising expenditure, research and development spending, and technical and allocative efficiency in shaping the organization of industry in Canada. In addition, using both industry-level and firm-level data, the authors develop methods for assessing the effect of structural variables on diversification strategies and the consequences for market performance. They also study the effects of such variables on firms' access to capital markets. The book concludes with a discussion of the implications of the findings for government policy.

ECONOMIC SENTIMENTS

ECONOMIC SENTIMENTS
Author: Emma Rothschild
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 366
Release: 2013-02-04
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0674725611

A benchmark in the history of economics and of political ideas, Rothschild shows us the origins of laissez-faire economic thought and its relation to political conseratism in an unquiet world.

City Economics

City Economics
Author: Brendan O'Flaherty
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 616
Release: 2005-10-30
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674019188

This introductory but innovative textbook on the economics of cities is aimed at students of urban and regional policy as well as of undergraduate economics. It deals with standard topics, including automobiles, mass transit, pollution, housing, and education but it also discusses non-standard topics such as segregation, water supply, sewers, garbage, fire prevention, housing codes, homelessness, crime, illicit drugs, and economic development. Its methods of analysis are primarily verbal, geometric, and arithmetic. The author achieves coherence by showing how the analysis of various topics reinforces one another. Thus, buses can tell us something about schools and optimal tolls about land prices. Brendan O'Flaherty looks at almost everything through the lens of Pareto optimality and potential Pareto optimality--how policies affect people and their well-being, not abstract entities such as cities or the economy or growth or the environment. Such traditionalism leads to radical questions, however: Should cities have police and fire departments? Should tax preferences for home ownership be repealed? Should public schools charge for their services? O'Flaherty also gives serious consideration to such heterodox policies as pay-at-the-pump auto insurance, curb rights for buses, land taxes, marginal cost water pricing, and sidewalk zoning.

Equality, the Third World, and Economic Delusion

Equality, the Third World, and Economic Delusion
Author: Péter Tamás Bauer
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 310
Release: 1981
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674259867

Even in impoverished countries lacking material and human resources, P. T. Bauer argues, economic growth is possible under the right conditions. These include a certain amount of thrift and enterprise among the people, social mores and traditions which sustain them, and a firm but limited government which permits market forces to work. Challenging many views about development that are widely held, Bauer takes on squarely the notion that egalitarianism is an appropriate goal. He goes on to argue that the population explosion of less-developed countries has on the whole been a voluntary phenomenon and that each new generation has lived better than its forebears. He also critically examines the notion that the policies and practices of Western nations have been responsible for third world poverty. In a major chapter, he reviews the rationalizations for foreign aid and finds them weak; while in another he shows that powerful political clienteles have developed in the Western nations supporting the foreign aid process and probably benefiting more from it than the alleged recipients. Another chapter explores the link between the issue of Special Drawing Rights by the International Monetary Fund on the one hand and the aid process on the other. Throughout the book, Bauer carefully examines the evidence and the light it throws on the propositions of development. Although the results of his analysis contradict the conventional wisdom of development economics, anyone who is seriously concerned with the subject must take them into account.

Bumblebee Economics

Bumblebee Economics
Author: Bernd Heinrich
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2004
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9780674016392

The bumblebee spends its days gathering the resources needed by the hive -- honey for energy and pollen for protein. The author examines the intricate processes that make up this behavior, including discussions of thermoregulation and its behavioral application, and the way bumblebees choose flowers to harvest.