Tímarit um menntarannsóknir - 01.01.2011, Blaðsíða 18

18
Þórólfur Matthíasson
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and causes of the wealth of nations. London:
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Valgerður Húnbogadóttir. (2005).
Morgunblaðið 12. desember.
Heimildaskrá
Um höfundinn
Þórólfur Matthíasson er prófessor í
hagfræði við Hagfræðideild Háskóla
Íslands. Hann lauk embættisprófi í hagfræði
frá Hagfræðideild Háskólans í Ósló árið
1981 og Dr. Polit-prófi frá sama skóla árið
1998.
Netfang: totimatt@hi.is
About the author
Þórólfur Matthíasson is Professor of
Economics in the Department of Economics,
University of Iceland. He received the
Cand. Oecon. degree from the Department
of Economics, University of Oslo, in 1981
and the Dr. Polit. degree from the same
university in 1998.
E-mail: totimatt@hi.is
Education and distribution of knowledge
are public goods as long as the individu-
als exposed to them are limited in number.
Crowding cost becomes a real problem if
the number of those concurrently exposed
to an educational experience increases over
a given limit. Educational institutions seek
to minimise their own unit cost of opera-
tion, taking into account that crowding can
diminish the reputation of the institutuion.
The approach that is open to educational
institutions to signal their lack of crowd-
ing cost (i.e. quality) differs by school lev-
el. Lower level institutions can signal their
quality by referring to the success of their
graduates at higher level institutions. That
route is closed for the highest level institu-
tions. They can, and do, signal quality by
referring to the success of graduates in dif-
ferent trades. Institutions that do not have
patience or time to wait for former gradu-
ates to complete their working lives can,
and do, use the success of their employees
in field of academic competition as a signal
of success. The University of Iceland has
set itself the strategic goal of becoming an
internationally recognised research uni-
versity within a few years. This strategy
can be understood as a programme aim-
ing to create a distance between itself and
the seven or eight other institutions in Ice-
land that have the word University in their
name.

Abstract
Cost of knowledge dissemination and
priorities in the organisation of education