Why So Many Children of Doctors Become Doctors: Nepotism vs. Human Capital Transfers

Abstract

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. University of Wisconsin Press and The Board of Regents of the University of WisconsinSystem are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Journal of Human Resources. ABSTRACTIn this paper we document a statistically significant, marginally greater probability of admittance into (at least one) medical school for children of doctors as compared to children of nondoctors. This fact can plausibly be explained as resulting from nepotism, in various forms, as well as from human capital transfers from first to (would-be) second generation doctors. After controlling for acquired human capital and other attributes of medical school applicants, we cannot reject nepotism as a cause-children of doctors are nearly 14 percent more likely to be admitted into medical school than are comparable nonfollowers.Medical schools have been accused, with some justification, I believe, of discrimination against minority groups and favoritism towards relatives of AMA members. Perhaps this explains why doctors' sons more frequently seem to follow in their fathers' footsteps than do sons of other professional men.

A study to assess the perceptions of first year medical students for choosing medical school as a career

“…There were however few studies that assess the generic factors which make Medicine itself of interest to medical students and to potential Medicine students specified by Livingstone MM et al 15 In the present study there were more male students in comparison to females as shown in Table 1, but in the study done by Ferimann there was the increasing proportions of female students and about the problems in medical school of male and ethnic minority students quoted by Wars V, Robert et al 17,18 There had also been a growing awareness that medical students typically come from relatively high social classes as quoted by Grenhalgh, Seyan and Boynton and Mc Manus, many from Medical families Horton, Lents and Laband, Mc Manus, Billings and concern that such individual have different motivations and interests in medicine as a career stated by Gough, Mc Manus, Lurngston and Kotana. 15,[19][20][21][22][23][24][25] In the present study also there was higher high socio economic status group. In the present study father's education was graduation and post-graduation 43 (41.35%) and 29 (27.89%) which was similar to the study done by Hunkar Korkaz in which most fathers were educated with a university degree and the fathers worked in professional occupations.…”

References

“…Thus it has been di¢ cult to identify whether a group's higher earnings are due to higher productivity or due to discrimination by employers. 18 For instance, Lentz and Laband (1989) …nd that college graduates who are the children of medical doctors tend to enjoy a 10% greater probability of admission to medical school, conditional on a number of controls. However, Chevalier (2001) attributes the relatively higher earnings of British graduates with the same career choice as their parents to the intergenerational transmission of human capital.…”

“…Given that our candidates took the exam within the last ten years, and that candidates could be as young as 23 years of age but are usually not much older than 30 (Bagues 2005, Bagues and Esteve-Volart 2007b), 32 we can restrict Corps members in our analysis to those born before 1960. 33 In Table 3 we show the number of Corps members (…rst row), the number of Corps members who were born before 1960 (and thus are relevant to our analysis) (second row), and the number of male Corps members born before 1960 (third row).…”

Following (Not Quite) in Your Father's Footsteps: Task Followers and Labor Market Outcomes

“…Lentz and Laband (1989) document a 14% increase in the likelihood of being accepted to medical school among the children of doctors that cannot be explained. Scoppa (2009) finds evidence that in Italy the children of public sector employees have a substantial advantage in gaining employment in public sector jobs themselves.…”