Research Assistants, Sorting, and Career Outcomes: Evidence from the NBER Working Paper Series
37 Pages Posted: 7 Oct 2024
Date Written: September 02, 2024
Abstract
Research assistant (RA) positions play an increasingly important role in the economics profession, both for generating research and for nascent researchers to acquire skills, gather experience, and build professional networks. Despite this, we know little about the demographics of RAs, access to RA positions, and the impact of RA experience on downstream career outcomes. Using an original dataset on RAs collected from the acknowledgments of working papers published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, I (i) present novel, large-scale descriptive evidence on RAs, (ii) show that there exist strong sorting patterns between RAs and supervisors (PIs) along gender, race, and ethnicity, and (iii) provide evidence that gender alignment between RAs and PIs has a meaningful impact on the career outcomes of RAs.
JEL Classification: A14, A23, J15, J16
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation