A Benchmark Profile of Economics Departments in 15 Private Universities

During the spring of 1999, the authors completed a benchmarking survey of 15 economics departments in private universities as part of a strategic planning exercise. All are selective medium-sized institutions that experience roughly the same types of market pressures and compete for the same types of students. The authors report the information gleaned from the survey concerning such items as departmental resources, teaching loads, class sizes, departmental research expectations, and weights given to research, teaching, and service in salary determination and promotion. The authors believe that their results and methods might be useful to other economics departments engaging in benchmarking exercises.