I thought I would share my undergraduate economics senior thesis, "Music Conservatories and Universities: An analysis of the educational background of professional orchestra musicians and earnings of music graduates" which was was recently submitted for consideration for honors in Northwestern University's Economics Department. I thought the results could be potentially interesting/helpful/relevant to some in the forum. I've copied the abstract below, but the full file should be attached.
Abstract:
One of the key decisions high school students interested in studying music in college must make is whether to attend a music conservatory or a traditional university with a strong music program. Using a novel dataset of seven of the best professional orchestras in the United States, I find that over 60% of top orchestral musicians received a degree from one of four highly rated music conservatories. However, since 1990, only 1.8% of conservatory graduates and just 0.4% of music graduates from top traditional universities currently perform in the best US professional orchestras. Using the sample of conservatories and traditional universities which graduated the best orchestral musicians, I further present descriptive earnings data for the median financially aided graduate at each institution. Music graduates from either conservatories or traditional universities earn less than half of the national median for bachelor’s graduates, but conservatory graduates also suffer a roughly 25% earnings penalty compared to music graduates from traditional universities. These results suggest conservatory bachelor’s graduates place a large premium on the chance to perform professionally in a top orchestra, which I estimate at just over $1 million.
Thanks You s s