博士后经历与职位获得——学术劳动力市场回报的净效应及其异质性

Postdoctoral Experience and Academic Position Acquisition——Net Effect and Heterogeneity of Academic Labour Market Returns

随着学术劳动力市场竞争的加剧,博士学位获得者选择从事博士后研究在全球范围内变得日益普遍。然而,当前许多博士后不仅需要应对研究工作期间巨大的科研压力,而且在离开博士后职位后,就业前景也变得更加模糊,博士后经历在学术劳动力市场中的回报值得关注。研究基于2017年进站的工学和生物学博士后追踪调查数据,使用倾向值匹配、逆概率加权回归等方法,分析了博士后经历在学术劳动力市场的异质性回报。结果显示,博士后经历提升了获得精英学术职位的可能性,尤其是对于那些博士后期间科研进展顺利的博士后而言。进一步研究发现,博士后的部门和地点对于获得精英学术职位存在显著的异质性效应。一方面,相比于非精英学术机构,精英学术机构博士后更有可能获得精英学术职位。另一方面,与本土博士后相比,海外博士后在学术劳动力市场中具有一定优势,获得精英教职的概率显著更高。

With the increasing competition in the academic labor market,it has become more common worldwide for PhD holders to choose the work in postdocs research.However,many postdocs not only need to cope with the huge research pressure during their present work,but also feel uncertain about their career prospects in the future after leaving postdoctoral positions.The returns from the investment in postdoctoral experience in the academic labor market deserve attention.Based on the follow-up survey data of engineering and biology postdocs who started work in doctoral workstations in 2017,this study uses propensity-score matching(PSM),inverse-probability weighting regression and other methods to analyze heterogeneous returns to postdoctoral work experience in the academic labor market.The results show that postdoctoral work experience is conducive for the students to the likelihood of obtaining an elite academic position,especially for those who made smooth research progress during their postdoctoral period.Subsequent research finds that the access to elite academic positions varies significantly depending on the department and locality where a postdoc has worked,indicating a substantial heterogeneous effect:on the one hand,postdocs who have worked in a prestigious academic institution are more likely to obtain an elite academic position than those who have worked in a less famous academic institution;and on the other hand,compared with local postdocs,postdocs who have studied overseas have certain advantages in the academic labor market and the probability for them to obtain an elite teaching position is obviously higher.