ISET would like to congratulate Professor Muhammad Asali on the publication of his new article, entitled “A Tale of Two Tracks,” in the Education Economics journal.

The paper makes an interesting contribution to the broader literature on the academic labor market. In particular, it provides new theoretical foundations for understanding the coexistence of contingent (teaching) positions and tenured-professor positions in academia. It also helps understand the observable, and widening, wage gaps between tenured (professors) and contingent faculty (teachers).

Moreover, the study provides original ways to calibrate the optimal wage gap and ratio of teachers to professors in academia, using publicly available information about the academic publication enterprise and the academic labor market.

Professor Asali’s paper is another indicator of ISET’s continued success; the institute was recently ranked amongst the top 10% of all universities studying the economics of CIS countries.

The working paper version of the study, IZA DP No. 11423, can be found here.