Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/113815.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The environmental cost of the international job market for economists

Author

Listed:
  • Chanel, Olivier
  • Prati, Alberto
  • Raux, Morgan
Abstract
We provide an estimate of the environmental impact of the recruitment system in the economics profession, known as the "international job market for economists". Each year, most graduating PhDs seeking jobs in academia, government, or companies participate in this job market. The market follows a standardized process, where candidates are pre-screened in a short interview which takes place at an annual meeting in Europe or in the United States. Most interviews are arranged via a non-profit online platform, econjobmarket.org, which kindly agreed to share its anonymized data with us. Using this dataset, we estimate the individual environmental impact of 1,057 candidates and one hundred recruitment committees who attended the EEA and AEA meetings in December 2019 and January 2020. We calculate that this pre-screening system generated the equivalent of about 4,000 tons of avoidable CO2-eq and a comprehensive economic cost over e3.5 million. We contrast this overall assessment against three counterfactual scenarios: a more efficient in-person system, a hybrid system (where videoconference is used for some candidates) and a fully online system (as it happened in 2020-21 due to the COVID-19 pandemic). Overall, the study can offer useful information to shape future recruitment standards in a more sustainable way.

Suggested Citation

  • Chanel, Olivier & Prati, Alberto & Raux, Morgan, 2021. "The environmental cost of the international job market for economists," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 113815, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:113815
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/113815/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Milan Klöwer & Debbie Hopkins & Myles Allen & James Higham, 2020. "An analysis of ways to decarbonize conference travel after COVID-19," Nature, Nature, vol. 583(7816), pages 356-359, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Martin Thomas Falk & Eva Hagsten, 2023. "Reverse adoption of information and communication technology among organisers of academic conferences," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(3), pages 1963-1985, March.
    2. Laura DIACONU (MAXIM), 2021. "The behaviour of airlines’ passengers in the context of COVID-19 pandemic," CES Working Papers, Centre for European Studies, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, vol. 13(2), pages 230-242, July.
    3. Antonio Cavallin Toscani & Atalay Atasu & Luk N. Van Wassenhove & Andrea Vinelli, 2023. "Life cycle assessment of in‐person, virtual, and hybrid academic conferences: New evidence and perspectives," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 27(6), pages 1461-1475, December.
    4. Kranz, Johann & Zeiss, Roman & Beck, Roman & Gholami, Roya & Sarker, Saonee & Watson, Richard T. & Whitley, Edgar A., 2022. "Practicing what we preach? Reflections on more sustainable and responsible IS research and teaching practices," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 116677, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    5. Rashieda Davids & Pauline Scheelbeek & Nafiisa Sobratee & Rosemary Green & Barbara Häesler & Tafadzwanashe Mabhaudhi & Suparna Chatterjee & Nikhil Srinivasapura Venkateshmurthy & Georgina Mace & Alan , 2021. "Towards the Three Dimensions of Sustainability for International Research Team Collaboration: Learnings from the Sustainable and Healthy Food Systems Research Programme," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(22), pages 1-24, November.
    6. Alexandra Xan C. H. Nowakowski, 2023. "Same Old New Normal: The Ableist Fallacy of “Post-Pandemic” Work," Social Inclusion, Cogitatio Press, vol. 11(1), pages 16-25.
    7. Bazzo Vieira, João Pedro & Vieira Braga, Carlos Kauê & Pereira, Rafael H.M., 2022. "The impact of COVID-19 on air passenger demand and CO2 emissions in Brazil," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 164(C).
    8. Misha Teplitskiy & Soya Park & Neil Thompson & David Karger, 2022. "Intentional and serendipitous diffusion of ideas: Evidence from academic conferences," Papers 2209.01175, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2024.
    9. Sari Ferika Ozer & Avci Nilgün & Nazli Murat & Curkan Samet Can, 2023. "Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Academic Travels," European Journal of Tourism, Hospitality and Recreation, Sciendo, vol. 13(1), pages 14-25, December.
    10. Antoine Hardy, 2024. "Decarbonizing research laboratories? The tensions associated with the commensurability of carbon and how it opens up the boundaries of responsibility attribution," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Springer, vol. 105(1), pages 179-198, August.
    11. Clarisse Aujoux & Kumiko Kotera & Odile Blanchard, 2021. "Estimating the carbon footprint of the GRAND project, a multi-decade astrophysics experiment," Post-Print hal-03228304, HAL.
    12. Eileen G. Merritt & Jennifer J. Brousseau & Marc J. Stern & Lara J. Hansen, 2022. "Walking the Walk toward Increasing Access and Reducing Emissions: The Promise and Challenges of Virtual Climate Adaptation Convenings," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-22, October.
    13. Aksel Biørn-Hansen & Daniel Pargman & Elina Eriksson & Mario Romero & Jarmo Laaksolahti & Markus Robért, 2021. "Exploring the Problem Space of CO 2 Emission Reductions from Academic Flying," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-20, November.
    14. Minami Kito & Hirotaka Takayabu & Keisuke Nansai, 2023. "Carbon‐neutral pathways to 2050 for Japan's aviation industry in the absence of a mass supply of sustainable aviation fuels," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 27(6), pages 1579-1592, December.
    15. Omar Mubin & Fady Alnajjar & Abdullah Shamail & Suleman Shahid & Simeon Simoff, 2021. "The new norm: Computer Science conferences respond to COVID-19," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(2), pages 1813-1827, February.
    16. Dobruszkes, Frédéric & Mattioli, Giulio & Mathieu, Laurette, 2022. "Banning super short-haul flights: Environmental evidence or political turbulence?," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    17. Jussi S. Jauhiainen, 2021. "Entrepreneurship and Innovation Events during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The User Preferences of VirBELA Virtual 3D Platform at the SHIFT Event Organized in Finland," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-22, March.
    18. Paul Lehmann & Silke Beck & Mariana Madruga de Brito & Erik Gawel & Matthias Groß & Annegret Haase & Robert Lepenies & Danny Otto & Johannes Schiller & Sebastian Strunz & Daniela Thrän, 2021. "Environmental Sustainability Post-COVID-19: Scrutinizing Popular Hypotheses from a Social Science Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(16), pages 1-21, August.
    19. Liu, Jin & Tian, Jiayu & Lyu, Wenjing & Yu, Yitian, 2022. "The impact of COVID-19 on reducing carbon emissions: From the angle of international student mobility," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 317(C).
    20. Lamb, Tracy L. & Ruskin, Keith J. & Rice, Stephen & Khorassani, Leili & Winter, Scott R. & Truong, Dothang, 2021. "A qualitative analysis of social and emotional perspectives of airline passengers during the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Air Transport Management, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    job market for economists; international job market; carbon footprint; environmental impact; comprehensive economic cost;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A11 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Role of Economics; Role of Economists
    • J44 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Professional Labor Markets and Occupations
    • Q51 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Valuation of Environmental Effects
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:113815. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.