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Who's Hiring in Economics?

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By Jennifer Jacobson

If you're a professor of economics, chances are you got a breather this past academic year when it came to hiring colleagues, but it was a decidedly mixed blessing.

According to the American Economics Association, the number of "new listings" of academic jobs in its Job Openings for Economists dropped from 1,589 in 2001-2 to 1,487 in 2002-3. John J. Siegfried, the group's secretary-treasurer and a professor of economics at Vanderbilt University, says the association does not tally junior openings versus senior ones.Department chairmen don't need such specifics, he says, to know that the job market has been slower than usual in the field and won't improve until the economy takes a turn for the better.

William D. Lastrapes hopes a rebound happens soon. The head of the 16-member economics department at the University of Georgia was not allowed to hire anyone this past academic year. Budget cuts, he says, prompted the administration to deny his one request to search for a new faculty member in macroeconomics and monetary economics.

Still, he hopes to expand his department. "We're a very small department for a university our size," he says. Most economics departments at the university's peer institutions have more than 30 faculty members. "We'd feel a lot more comfortable if we'd have 20," he says.

To that end, Mr. Lastrapes has asked for permission to conduct two searches for assistant professors -- one in macroeconomics and monetary economics, and the other in a field yet to be named. He figures his chances of getting the go-ahead for both positions are 50-50.

As for his department's graduate students, they didn't fare any better on the market than Mr. Lastrapes. The department produces three to five Ph.D.'s a year, and none of its three Ph.D.'s on the academic market this year landed tenure-track jobs. "It's tough if you're looking for jobs, given the budget situation in many states," he says. "There are plenty of people out there, just not enough jobs to give them all opportunities to work."

One such opportunity came through in the economics department at the University of Houston. The 21-member department just hired an assistant professor of labor economics, says David Papell, a professor in the department and its graduate director. The dean ended up canceling the department's second search -- for an assistant professor of international macroeconomics -- because of budget cuts. On the positive front, three of the department's graduate students (it usually produces five Ph.D.'s a year) landed tenure-track jobs in 2002-3.

Mr. Papell says the department has asked the dean for the go-ahead to fill the position in international macroeconomics this academic year. "I'm not too optimistic." he says. "The budget doesn't look good."

At Rutgers University at New Brunswick, the economics department is anxiously awaiting word on whether it can do some hiring in 2003-4, since it was not allowed to last year. Barry Sopher, chairman of the 30-member department, had hoped to hire three people at all ranks in international economics, macroeconomics, and public economics, and will try to hire again in those fields in the fall.

Despite the hiring slowdown, job candidates in economics don't face a market glutted with Ph.D.'s, as is the case in the humanities. In fact, departments that do have the money to hire say the market for top candidates remains highly competitive.

At the University of Pittsburgh, Jean-Francois Richard, chairman of the 23-member economics department, hired two assistant professors in 2002-3, one in mathematical economics and another in macroeconomics. But its first choice for an assistant professorship in econometrics turned down the university's offer. And the department was also unable to find a suitable candidate for an endowed chair.

In the fall, Mr. Richard hopes to search for two assistant professors -- one in econometrics and the other in an open field -- as well as another professorship at an open rank and in an open field, and the endowed chair he was unable to fill.

Although his requests have not yet been approved, he says, "We lost quite a few people a few years ago ... to really top places -- the University of Chicago, Harvard. We seem to have a good reputation and people look at us. The dean made a commitment to rebuild the department and has been holding to it even in difficult times."

The economics department at Arizona State University also ran into trouble filling two positions this past academic year. Arthur Blakemore, the chairman, says his 30-member department wanted to hire two associate professors of macroeconomics but was able to land only one of its two top candidates. "We lost one person late in the recruiting season and decided not to continue" with the search," he says.

For the fall, he has asked the university for permission to conduct four searches at all ranks and in open fields, but will concentrate on macroeconomics. "I'm optimistic about being able to search for four," he says, but adds: "I'm not sure we will fill four. It's very competitive for people with experience and for the very top junior people."

As a job candidate, Ivan Jeliazkov saw both the good and the bad of the recent hiring season. He earned his Ph.D. in 2002-3 in economics -- econometrics is his specialty -- from Washington University in St. Louis and applied to nearly 95 colleges and universities for tenure-track jobs. Five to 10 of them canceled their searches, he says. "State schools were in trouble because of state budgets. Private schools were in trouble because of the stock market. The squeeze was basically on both sides."

Still, he managed to snag three tenure-track offers and accepted one at the University of California at Irvine, where he will be an assistant professor this fall.

THE HIRING REPORT

How have the tough financial times in academe affected faculty hiring? In a series of articles, we look at the job market in English, physics, history, mathematics, and economics.