Absolutely. But the simple fact is that high falutin’ mega prestige professor is not likely to be found at Podunk Directional State U, if for no other reason, top privates have more dept money to spread around. High falutin’ prof might not care about the extra money personally, but their grad students will certainly benefit from the extra riches. Compare for example, Stanford grad students who receive lotsa funding vs. Cal’s grad students who are on strike for more $ and benefits which Stanford already offers.
I think this is more of an issue in humanities and social sciences where there’s greater reliance on university funding. The difference in STEM is relatively minor.
Mostly applies to international students hoping to study in the US, or to US students who lack much econ or math background and still want to pursue an econ PhD.
Currently, the major credential (after getting a 168-170 on the quant part of the GRE + very strong math grades (A’s in Real analysis, etc.) and a strong econ course background) needed to get into a top econ PhD program (MIT, Harvard, Stanford, UCB, Princeton, UChicago, Yale, and a few others) is a 2 year predoc at one of the aforementioned schools or a 2 year RA at the Fed.
My kid is in an Econ PhD program (not one of the top ones—guess I should tell kid they will be unemployable at the end lol). Almost Everyone in the program has a masters. My kid was told their math background was “weak”-was 1 course shy of a math double major with Econ from undergrad and took the one missing class while applying. Was also accepted to an applied math PhD program. The first year of the Econ PhD was pretty much entirely math proofs.
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Hardly! The only advantage the top few programs have in terms of employment opportunities are for kids who are determined to stay in academia and want to land a tenure track job at a T10.
Plenty of much-more-high-paying-than-academia jobs to go around for econ PhD grads.
Amusing that the fall back career path for econ PhDs chasing tenure track jobs is a much higher paying industry job.
Not many academic fields have that luxury.
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However, some end out in the adjunct positions at community colleges that don’t pay much.
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Yeah kid isn’t planning to stay in academia, based on the last conversation we had. I’m not worried at all. 
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Fir engineering, industry jobs are the default. The main reasons that they go to academi are those who like teaching, and the fact that there is a lot more freedom in research in academia. Research in industry is constrained and determined by the needs and interests of the company, while academics have far more freedom in choosing their own directions.
Considering that PhD is, first and foremost a research degree, the ability to do the research that one wants can be a very strong incentive, which outweighs income. My wife, a CS professor, has standing offers at a number of companies (including FAANG), but chose to stay in academia, despite receiving maybe 1/2-2/3 the income that she would get in an industry position. She loves her research, and no company would allow her to do what she is doing in research. Of course, most CS PhDs make a different choice.
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Sounds like you better get into an Ivy+ college to ensure a bright future for yourself.
With that in mind, it might make sense for you to spend more time studying and working on your anxiety, and less time trying in vain to enlighten the great unwashed masses here on CC. After all, you found a paper … and stuff.
Not Larry Summers.
In field like economics, in which industry pays a lot more than academia, you would be hard pressed to find a low-paid adjunct teaching economics anywhere. So, while it is unlikely that somebody with a PhD from, say, UIC, will get a TT job at Chicago or Berkeley, they have a very good chance of a TT job at one of the 300 or so colleges and universities that are ranked lower than UIC in Economics (as ranked by economists), and get a pretty good salary.
The article I cited “The Academic Origins of Economics Faculty” only looks at the origins of faculty at “T-90” research universities. There are more than 250 research universities in the USA and a few hundred great universities and colleges which are either undergrad-only of undergrad + masters, universities with limited PhD programs, and others.
Nobody with a PhD in economics from one of those 250 research universities will need to teach as an adjuncts for a pittance. There are economics faculty at CCs, but if they have a PhD in economics, they’re either TT or tenured. There is a good chance that their PhD is from a low-ranked program, but they are getting a pretty good salary, tenure is practically guaranteed, and they have decent benefits.
Most community college professors that I know are pretty happy with their jobs, often happier than those at four-year colleges.
The adjuncts in economics are much more likely to be found in top universities, they are generally high paid industry people, and they are usually getting a lot of money for teaching that one class.
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So you’re saying PhDs in econ are so highly valued that most who want TT get them somewhere? I’m skeptical. Cite for that?
No, I’m saying that the job market overall for economists is good enough that those who do not get TT jobs do not have to get underpaying non-TT jobs to survive. Those who could not find a well paying TT or non-TT job can get jobs in industry. So most who want a well-paying job as as an economist can get a well-paid job as an economist (some 95%).
In economics, like in every academic field, most PhDs will end up in a lower-ranked place then where they did their PhD. However, in fields with high demand, like economics, even graduates of the lowest ranked PhD program can get industry jobs. According
Two thing lead to having large numbers of Phds working as low-paid adjuncts:
A. Lack of non-academic jobs, and
B. Unwillingness of PhDs to consider non-academic jobs, even if academic jobs pay a pittance.
Neither is true for economics PhDs.
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Another reason that some private colleges are more prestigious is because the prestige of publics is usually restricted to their state, while privates have always done their best to market themselves nationally. So OSU is considered by most Ohioans to be the more prestigious than almost any college out there. While they may have heard of HYPSM, you can bet that the vast majority of people in the state will respond “what, there is a university called Brown ? Next you’re going to tell me that there is a university called ‘Blue’”, they will think that UPenn is the same as Penn State, and never have heard of Vanderbilt or Duke.
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I find that the Brown grad isn’t necessarily going to compete with an Ohio State grad in the state of Ohio. The Brown grad is using the Brown network and also applying to companies that come to campus. They will rely on that network throughout their careers for jobs. Only a few times will they get a significant reception due to graduating from Brown and the presumably better first job they achieved than an Ohio State grad, or even say a Kent State, Bowling Green or Akron grad. Do people go on to med school from The Ohio State or the Ohio regional universities? Sure. However, the farther down the resource list one goes, the fewer people that are applying to med school and the fewer resources and examples there are.
As far as this article, let’s take this guy as an example. He’s in the Chicago PhD program. He went to Brown and worked for a professor who is a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Maybe the top Buckeye student could do something similar. It seems like it would be harder to get to know your professors with much higher average class sizes.
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I’m sure the top Buckeye could do something similar. My kid attended a little LAC ranked in the top 100 or so-nothing remarkable. Also did an REU at a top 20 one summer. Kid applied and was interviewed for a Harvard RA position like the one your example did. Kid ended up RA at the Fed and certainly did work with NBER economists who have continued to ask kid to work with them on projects and continue to mentor. It doesn’t require the Brown degree to do that much, anyway.
Late to the discussion but I agree that there are very very few unemployed Econ PhDs and unlike in some other disciplines you don’t find them trying to cobble together a bunch of adjunct courses to survive.
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Hmmm. some friends of mine both teach at Harvard (PhD’s, one in music and one in CS). The one teaching CS tops well over $500K in consult fees every year (plus salary). The one teaching music…not so much. 
You can have your cake and eat in too in academia, and yes, they both did there grad school at Harvard (where they met).
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