This article reviews methodological issues confronting authors and users of cconomic impact studies of public colleges and universities. Questions addressed includc the following: How should economic impact of regional public collegcs and univcrsities be defined? What considerations should govern thc definition or the geographical study area? How should tax support of publicly supported institutions be addressed? The article includes perspectives from recent literature considering these questions from both short-term and long-term perspcctives. Resolution of these issues depends upon careful delineation and cornmunication of thc alternative states of world between which the hypothetical impact is measured. CONOMIC IMPACT STUDIES CONTINUE TO BE AN IMPORTANT PUBLIC RELA-E tions tool for state colleges and universities (Dean 1991), especially in Limes of budgctary shortfalls and rescissions. Yet, such studies arc frequenlly criticized as biased in approach and conclusions. Some critics decry past studies as publicizing only the positive (Knapp et al. 1990). Others point out that such studics too frcqucnlly employ definitions which inflatc the impacts (Elliott et al. 1987; Bluestone 1993). Still others argue that past methodology has ignored univcrsitics' contributions to the stock of human capital and regional economic dcvclopmcnt (c.g., Berger and Black 1993; Bluestone 1993). A recent article in this journal (Hcdrick ct al. 1990) examined (and refuted) oftcn heard contentions that ncgativc regional effects of auxiliary activities of higher education institutions outweigh psitivc effects associated with their spending. Roger Beck is an associate professor of agribusiness economics at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale; Donald Elliott and John Meisel are professors of economics at Southern Illinois University ai Edwardsville; and MichaelWagner is an independent research consultant. The authors wish to thank anonymous referees ,for their comments and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. Any remuining errors are the responsibiliiies of the authors.
An economically viable rural American is generally accepted as a desirable national goal, but few policy guidelines or comprehensive programs1 for attaining this goal have been developed. One reason for the current “piece-meal” approach in pursuing rural development goals is the lack of knowledge about basic economic interactions between the factors influencing the level and distribution of economic activities in rural areas. A second reason is the tendency to design rural development research and extension programs to attain quick payoffs which results in descriptive studies which emphasize what rather than why certain events are occurring in rural areas.
Weak economic conditions in rural areas are reflected in labor markets. In rural Illinois counties the labor force,defined as those employed plus those looking for work, declined by an average of one percent per year from 1980 to 1987, and the average annual loss of the employed labor force was even greater (1.4 percent). The urban counties of Illinois had growth in both the labor force and the employed labor force of 0.6 percent per year over the same time period! The purposes of this study are: (l) to demonstrate the applicability of using a modification of shift -share analysis to examine the recent economic performance of Illinois counties heavily dependent on production agriculture, (2) to determine whether any specific sectors in farm dependent counties exhibit competitive advantages, and (3) to examine the effect of growth in base sectors on the performance of nonbase sectors.
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