How expensive is a college degree? Usually, the answer is based on what students pay in tuition and fees compared to what they earn after graduation. Very little is known about the economic cost of running an electrical engineering program compared to, say, a history department, or the resource consequences of steering more students into these…

This paper establishes five new facts about instructional costs in higher education using department-level data from a broad range of institutions. Costs vary widely across fields, ranging from electrical engineering (90% higher than English) to math (25% lower). This pattern is largely explained by differences in class size and faculty pay. Some…

The private return to postsecondary investment varies widely by field, but the resources required by different fields are not well known. This paper establishes five new facts about college costs using novel department-level data. First, costs vary widely across field, ranging from electrical engineering (109 percent higher costs than English) to…

In our study, we have put forward the argument that foreign language teaching, especially German language teaching has not been in the desired levels, and that German Teaching Departments are inadequate in training teachers. We have tried to prove our argument with numerical data in different aspects. First of all, we presented the list of order…

Academic couples make up a significant portion of the academic labor market. Unlike other dual-career households, academic couples must not only find employment in the same region, but often in the same institution. Previous work has not considered how outcomes may be different when dual career households work for the same employer. In the first…

The education sector especially higher education in Nigeria faces financial challenges. The recurrent cost of university education constitutes about 95% of the total cost incurred by the government in Nigeria. However, the Nigerian government is unable to meet the UNESCO recommendation that 26% of national budgets should be allocated to education.…

Career development is an important issue, and there are aspects of finding the right position that are particular to science faculty. This article offers a checklist of questions to ask in an academic job interview. Some queries are more appropriate for the chairperson and other administrators; others are better asked of faculty or students. With…

Describes a three-tier merit-pay system that rewards excellence, reinforces competence, and yet motivates professional growth among the lowest performers. Also discusses drawbacks. (PD)

Examination of several methods of identifying faculty salary inversion (pay of some junior faculty exceeding that of senior faculty) found no single best method. However, applicability of certain models to different disciplines at different funding levels was demonstrated. (SK)

Examined the extent to which labor-market conditions and the sex-composition of academic disciplines influenced average disciplinary salaries, based on the average, full-time 1988-89 salaries of new assistant professors for 16 academic disciplines. Findings from both cross-sectional and dynamic models indicated that both labor-market conditions…

Examined are the specific differences in the salary reward structures of eight clusters of academic disciplines included in Biglan's three-dimensional model of the academic profession. A total of 1,320 faculty at a large research university responded to the Faculty Activity Analysis questionnaire regarding the time spent in 11 categories of…

The applicability of the principle of comparable pay for comparable worth is discussed for college faculty jobs, not only for alleviation of sex discrimination but also for eliminating bias-related discrepancies between departments or specialties. (MSE)

Three models to describe university salary structure were assessed. Attention was focused on full-time, permanent faculty in ranks of instructor through full professor. Model I postulated that the internal labor market is uninfluenced by the external academic market. The results of model I were compared to the results of a model that adjusted for…

Measures of income and salary inequality used by economists were examined and applied against 1984-1985 faculty salary data. Attention was directed to salary inequality at each academic rank, as well as female-male inequality. The following measures were used: Lorenz Curve-Gini Coefficient, coefficient of variation, Theil's Index, and Atkinson's…

A preliminary report on the economic standing of American academics, based primarily on a national survey of faculty conducted in the spring of 1977, is presented. The economic position of professors is compared to other segments of the population, and income differences within the faculty are also examined. It is shown that since 1970-71, faculty…