Doctoral Dissertation Research: Fuel of Interest and Fire of Genius: Essays on the Timing, Direction, and Location of Innovation

University Of Iowa, Iowa City IA

Investigators

Abstract

Many argue that the promotion of innovation is one of the main social benefits of institutions of higher education. Relatively little is known, however, about the historic role of colleges in driving invention. This project creates unique data based on digitizing college yearbooks from the 1870s to the 1940s. The names of students from college yearbooks are matched to patent data, creating a picture of the role of colleges in promoting American ingenuity. These data show, for the first time, what share of patents come from college graduates and faculty. The yearbooks are also matched to historical censuses, answering questions about the mobility of college students. The yearbook data paints the clearest picture yet available of college participation by different demographic groups across time; the data reveal not only college attendance by women and African Americans, but also the college majors for these individuals, the sports and clubs in which they participate, and how their college experiences affect future labor market outcomes. Important questions regarding the impact of colleges cannot be adequately answered without the kind of detailed student- and faculty-level data created in the project. Most notably, the college yearbook data solves three major problems. First, it allows for the estimation of knowledge spillovers from colleges by linking new inventions to faculty and graduates and distinguishing them from individuals who have had only indirect interactions with a particular college. Second, since the historical yearbooks give student names and identifying information, it is possible to track graduates across time and space rather than assuming they remain co-located with their alma maters. Third, the college yearbooks include information on students? majors, fraternity and sorority membership, and club and sports participation, allowing for estimation of the returns to education by major over a time period for which data has traditionally been very sparse, as well as an examination of how social networks forged in college affect later labor market outcomes