Dear colleagues,

The Department of Economics cordially invites you to the WU Economics Research Seminar on Wednesday, October 12^th, with

David de la Croix

(UCLouvain)

on

“Nepotism vs. Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital in Academia (1088-1800)”

Abstract: We build a comprehensive database of father-son pairs in academia, measure their publications,  and develop a general method to disentangle two determinants of occupational persistence: nepotism vs. inherited human capital. This requires jointly addressing measurement error in human capital and selection from nepotism. Exploiting multi-generation correlations and parent-child distributional differences, we identify the structural parameters of a Markov process of intergenerational transmission with nepotism. The human capital elasticity is lower than in standard multi-generation estimates ignoring nepotism. Nepotism was lower in science vs. law, in Protestant institutions, and declined during the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment, testifying to the rise of meritocracy.

Date: Wednesday, October 12^th

Time: 4.30 to 6 pm (CET)

Location: building D4, ground floor, room D4.0.133

With best regards,

Harald Oberhofer

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Univ.-Prof. Dr. Harald Oberhofer

Department of Economics 

WU Vienna University of Economics and Business

Phone: +43/1/31336-4984

Fax: +43/1/31336-4984

Email: harald.oberhofer@wu.ac.at

Webpage: https://www.wu.ac.at/ie/mitarbeiter/harald-oberhofer/

Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO)

Phone: +43/1/7982601-468

Fax: +43/1/7989386

Email: harald.oberhofer@wifo.ac.at

Webpage: http://www.wifo.ac.at/harald_oberhofer