Adviser connectedness and placement outcomes in the economics job market

Abstract

We study the role of social networks in the academic job market for graduate students of Economics. We find that the connectedness of a student’s advisor in the coauthor network significantly improves her job market outcome. We use two identification strategies and find that a) higher Eigenvector centrality of an adviser leads to her student getting placed at a better ranked institution, and b) larger distance between an adviser and an institution decreases the probability that her students are placed there. Our study sheds light on the importance of social connections in a labour market where information frictions regarding job openings are virtually absent.