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To be or not to be a teacher: Czech teachers’ salaries from an opportunity costs perspective in a broader context
Münich, Daniel ; Straka, Jan
In this paper we present new evidence on how very low the teaching profession’s wage attractiveness is in primary and secondary schools in the Czech Republic. We show that 70-90% of university educated employees receive higher salaries than an average teacher. Teachers with 15 years’ experience earn only half of what their university educated peers do. The low financial attractiveness of the teaching profession is reflected in the low interest among young people, especially talented ones, in becoming teachers. We present our findings within a broader and longerterm economic context, showing the causal chain from the level of motivation to become a teacher, to the quality of teachers, quality of education, level of education of the population and, as a result, the long-term growth of the economy and the country’s well-being in general.
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Evaluation Principles: Effective evaluation and financing system for research, development and innovation
Münich, Daniel
The objective of Ipn project “Effective evaluation and financing system for research, development and innovation“) is to replace from 2015 the existing Methodology of evaluating the results achieved by research institutions with a more effective system of institutional evaluation based on the international quality standards. The new evaluation in the form of informed peer-review will reflect the Ipn Audit recommendations as well as Long Term Evaluation Principles adopted by RVVI (Research, Development and Innovations Council). The new system will combine quantitative and qualitative evaluation of outputs and contributions of the creative activity of research institutions with clear and future oriented indicators in order to facilitate evaluation of their development dynamics, evaluate their outputs from the point of view of their quality, relevance, impact and effectiveness while respecting the departmental and institutional differences. It should enable periodic evaluation of the performance of Czech Research, Development and Innovation system as a whole and of its individual components in comparison with the global standards. The evaluation results should facilitate strategic management on the level of public administration as well as on the level of individual institutions and their departments. The evaluation process should be resistant to nepotism and should be supported by high quality international expert evaluators and bibliometrical criteria.
Slides: idr-465_1 -  PDF
Video: idr-465_2 -  MP4
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Where is the best research in the Czech Republic?
Jurajda, Štěpán ; Münich, Daniel
In the Czech Republic, a system of research and development (R&D) evaluation, which offers useful and adequate comparison of outputs across research workplaces and scientific fields, and which helps indentifying research excellence, remains missing. Therefore, there is a lack of information on where high-quality research is concentrated, which is necessary for efficient governance of the R&D system. Despite the Council for Research, Development and Innovation maintains a comprehensive database of R&D outputs, on the base of which an in-depth evaluation is clearly possible to perform in most scientific fields, the existing evaluations use this data far below its potential. To help in closing this gap, we used this database to conduct a relatively simple but comprehensive overview of R&D outputs of research organizations. The database allows us to derive a relatively objective criteria for the identification of workplaces with the highest concentration of excellent research outputs and at the same time reveal the amount of research published in scientific journals by scientific fields. The study has three main goals: i) To provide the academic community as well as the broader public with previously non-existent comparison of the extent of excellent scientific results in workplaces financed by public resources within scientific fields, (ii) To shed a light on the advantages, pitfalls and limitations of bibliometric analyses for the purposes of evaluation of research workplaces and scientific fields, and (iii) To draw attention to the serious flaws in the current evaluation mechanism which is central in the system of R&D governance in the Czech Republic.
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What if the government does not valorize pensions? Preliminary estimates of impacts on relative poverty of pensioners in the Czech Republic
Münich, Daniel ; Janský, Petr
The meeting of economic ministers that took place on February 27, 2012 considered steps to reduce the state budget deficit. It has been announced that: “... with regards to expenses reduction changes in valorization of pensions are considered, including the proposal to temporarily freeze pensions for two or three years.” Admittedly, proposals of this kind should always be accompanied by an impact assessment for relevant groups of people, however, they seldom do. The purpose of this study is to do that. The study quantifies the impact of lower pension valorization on the relative poverty rate of elder population. Even temporary reduction of the pension valorization rate could, in some pensioners’ households, result in a substantial growth of relative poverty. The estimates are based on data from the Czech Statistical Office SILC survey. The impacts of lower pension valorization vary distinctively according to different types of pensioners’ households. The study predicts that in the mean scenario, the ratio of people living below relative poverty level in households where at least one member is over 61 and receives a pension, will increase from today’s 3.6 to 5 percent. For pensioners over the age of 64 and living alone, and primarily in the case of women, a more significant increase can be expected from 13 to 20.8 percent. The impact of lower pension valorization would be noticeably less acute in the case of pensioners living together, those with additional income or those living in households with more members. Even if the pension valorization measures under consideration were to be implemented, the Czech Republic would still be one of the countries with the lowest relative poverty rate amongst its elder population.
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Mothers and daughters: heterogeneity of German direct investments in the Czech Republic
Münich, Daniel ; Srholec, Martin ; Moritz, M. ; Schäffler, J.
We assess heterogeneity of German affiliates in the Czech Republic and their mother companies in Germany. Using cluster analysis on micro firm level data from unique ReLoc survey, we identify five main groups of firms that can be interpreted as specializing in i) High-tech production; ii) Medium-tech production; iii) Low-tech production; iv) Interactive services; and v) Support services. The results are examined more closely by location, ownership and industry of the firms. Finally, we derive implications of these findings for technological upgrading.
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Impact of education on long-term economic growth and pension system deficits
Münich, Daniel ; Ondko, Peter ; Straka, Jan
Long-term economic growth has a significant impact on the quality of life in a country. The education of its citizens is an important factor influencing the growth. Nevertheless, the relationship between economic growth and education is very long-term and not apparent at the first glance. However, this long-term relation can be illuminated with the help of quantitative projections. For this purpose, we use empirical estimates presented in the recent OECD report by Erik Hanushek and Ludger Woessmann. If the Czech Republic puts in place educational reform that leads to the increase of average cognitive skill level of 15 year old pupils (as measured by PISA survey) by a mere 25 points - hence only a fourth of the standard deviation, GDP in the current value is estimated to cumulatively increase by 12 trillion CZK over the next 80 years, thus 357 percent of the current annual GDP of the country. Unfortunately, the decrease in average cognitive skills levels that took place in the Czech Republic in the last decade leads to a similar GDP loss. If we were able to improve the average cognitive skills levels to Finnish standards, the additional production would even reach 707% of today’s GDP. If the average cognitive skills levels of the children of parents without high school degrees could be brought up to the level of those whose parents have high school degrees, it would increase production by 152% of the current GDP. The potential benefits recalculated in terms of annual budget exceed the current state budget deficit or budget for education. Finally, the higher GDP growth would significantly reduce the cumulated pension deficit.
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Regional distribution of German-Czech multinationals on the domestic market
Moritz, M. ; Münich, Daniel ; Schäffler, J. ; Srholec, Martin
The article deals with the domestic location of German multinational firms which have affiliates in the Czech Republic. Due to the common border the Czech Republic represents an attractive target country for both vertical and horizontal direct investments. On the one hand, the still existing wage gap offers the opportunity to offshore activities abroad by reason of cost advantages. On the other hand, the increasing purchasing power of Czech customers provides favorable chances to acquire a new market. On the basis of a register of firms made available by the German-Czech Chamber of Industry and Commerce we present findings on the growing economic integration between the two countries. Almost 80% of the headquarters of German investors are located in the four federal states Bavaria, Baden-Wuerttemberg, Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia. The eastern German New Laender are far less engaged in investments in the neigh-boring country. We use count data models in order to account for the distribution of the dependent variable, i.e. the number of investors in the German domestic regions. Controlling for several economic factors it can be concluded that the headquarters of German multinationals investing in the Czech Republic are preferably located in areas with high regional GDP. The distance to the common border plays an important role for the decision to enter the Czech market. In addition, regions that are situated directly at the German-Czech border are involved at an above-average rate in foreign direct investment. Thereby, location patterns differ between manufacturing firms and both trading and service companies.
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