Conventional wisdom in
academic circles suggests that it is easier to get tenure as an insider than it is
to attract an offer as an outsider. In this paper, I take a first step towards showing that, at least for
academic economists, there is an insider advantage. I analyze the research records
of economists with ten years of experience and compare the productivity of those
who recently changed employers (suggesting they were hired with tenure) to those
that did not (suggesting internal promotion.) I show that the productivity of
“outsiders” is higher than the productivity of “insiders” at all but the top 10
economics institutions in the world. The economic significance of the estimates
is substantial, but the statistical precision suggests that more work is required
to draw strong conclusions.