Discussion Papers on Economics,
University of Southern Denmark, Department of Economics

Abstract: Most creatives acquire professional talents by learning from others, but in most settings it is difficult to estimate the existence of long-term effects. This paper explores the transmission of skills over a period of more than seven centuries by focusing on the case of music composers. We ask the question: how does a composer’s quality influence the quality of the composers he or she teaches? Our analysis builds on a unique dataset of 17,433 composers from around the world since the fourteenth century. By comparing actual teacher–student pairs with plausible counterfactual pairs and by using a two-stage framework, we show a strong effect of quality transmission. Moreover, we find quality transmission persists across multiple generations: from teacher to student, and subsequently to student’s student and so on. Our results provide new insights on drivers of creativity over the very long term, as well as the influence of teachers on students’ achievements.

Keywords: creativity; transmission of ideas; music history; teacher influence

JEL-codes: I21; J24; N30; O31; Z11

Language: English

46 pages, June 8, 2022

Full text files

dpe7_2022.pdf?rev=a3...C8ED1421676AF9FD2BE1  Full text

Download statistics

• University of Southern Denmark, Department of Economics
• Home page for this series

Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Astrid Holm Nielsen ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ().

RePEc:hhs:sdueko:2022_007This page generated on 2024-09-13 22:17:01.