I can count on one hand the number of conservative or libertarian professors where I teach. We have about 100 professors. Your analysis, BC accords with my experience over 30 years of teaching at five different colleges and universities.
Presumably, your “customers” are the students. Students neither know nor care about the quality of the faculty. At elite schools they care about the reputation of the institution, which does not seem to be impacted by ideological bias. In other lines of business, there are mechanisms by which discrimination hurts the bottom line. It’s not obvious that there is any such mechanism in academia.
The post is not as clear as it could be on the way discrimination can survive:
1. An uncompetitive industry with big governance problems. The governance part is important. For a firm, that means shareholders can't get control. For nonprofits like a university, it means the beneficiary can't get control, e.g. California voters.
2. A consumption preference for discrimination. Professors and administrators like to discriminate against white and Asian men, and are willing to take lower pay in return for being able to do that.
" how does it happen that Alex and I and half the other staunch libertarian economists in the world are all in the same department?"
Great phrase!
Another possibility, though, is that you all find each other helpful in your work, like if a department hired only macroeconomists. Diversity can actually be a bad thing. It is most useful for the closed-minded, ironically enough, since they want to hire like-minded people most of all.
I can count on one hand the number of conservative or libertarian professors where I teach. We have about 100 professors. Your analysis, BC accords with my experience over 30 years of teaching at five different colleges and universities.
Got a notification about this and was wondering why you were being so mean to Max
I was surprised at the time by Alex's claims. They didn't seem to reflect reality.
Presumably, your “customers” are the students. Students neither know nor care about the quality of the faculty. At elite schools they care about the reputation of the institution, which does not seem to be impacted by ideological bias. In other lines of business, there are mechanisms by which discrimination hurts the bottom line. It’s not obvious that there is any such mechanism in academia.
The post is not as clear as it could be on the way discrimination can survive:
1. An uncompetitive industry with big governance problems. The governance part is important. For a firm, that means shareholders can't get control. For nonprofits like a university, it means the beneficiary can't get control, e.g. California voters.
2. A consumption preference for discrimination. Professors and administrators like to discriminate against white and Asian men, and are willing to take lower pay in return for being able to do that.
" how does it happen that Alex and I and half the other staunch libertarian economists in the world are all in the same department?"
Great phrase!
Another possibility, though, is that you all find each other helpful in your work, like if a department hired only macroeconomists. Diversity can actually be a bad thing. It is most useful for the closed-minded, ironically enough, since they want to hire like-minded people most of all.