Opportunities for PhD Study at the Melbourne Institute
The Melbourne Institute offers a PhD program to aspiring researchers
This program is offered through the Graduate School of Business and Economics, emphasising independent, original work and collaboration with leading scholars. From 2011, the doctoral program offered through the The Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research will be a four-year program - a structure widely acknowledged as international best practice. Candidates will graduate with a Master of Economics and a PhD.
The Melbourne Institute is the first research institute to be set up in an Australian university for the purpose of conducting research into a wide range of macro-economic, micro-economic and social-economic issues.
Our current Phd students
Learning by Doing
A PhD candidate at the Melbourne Institute contributes as an integral member of a research team in one of the Melbourne Institute's research programs. This hands-on experience enhances research training and promotes the development of good research skills. Moreover, the diversity of active projects at the Melbourne Institute introduces students to the breadth and depth of research questions and methodologies.
International Visiting Scholars
Academic staff at the Melbourne Institute collaborate with a wide range of national and international scholars. There is an active international visiting scholar program as well as active seminar and workshop programs. PhD students are strongly encouraged, from the outset, to be part of the international community of scholars.
Australian Research Council (ARC) Supported Research
A number of opportunities are currently available across the Melbourne Institute's research areas.
 NHMRC Partnerships for Better health: Measuring, assessing and explaining hospital performance
The performance of hospitals is an important issue for Australia. Increasingly, hospital performance is being managed using a number of policies, including casemix funding, pay for performance, and performance management frameworks linked to funding and other incentives. The aim of this research partnership is to improve the generation and use of knowledge to measure, understand and improve hospital performance in Australia.
Contact - Professor Tony Scott
Medicine in Australia: Balancing Employment and Life (MABEL) The Australian Longitudinal Survey of Doctors
Background
The health workforce is now a key focus of government policy. The ever-increasing demand for health care, the ageing of the medical workforce, the increase in the number of women entering medicine and changes in doctors preferences in relation to their work life balance, all have an impact on the ability of the health care system to provide high quality and accessible health care. Despite this, there is little knowledge or understanding of how and why doctors make decisions about such things as how many hours they work, their location of work (including decisions about working in rural and remote areas) or when to leave the medical workforce and retire. These decisions have important implications for the populations access to health care and therefore their health status and the quality of care received.
The research
The research will examine the changing patterns of doctors working lives over time in order to better understand doctor shortages and surpluses and the pivotal role of doctors in the health care system. Changes in doctors family circumstances, job satisfaction, earnings and the nature of their work will be examined in order to determine the most effective policy responses for maintaining the size, motivation and productivity of the trained medical workforce. The research will provide a rigorous analysis of the decisions which underlie the workforce distribution and work patterns of doctors. The survey results will provide important information in support of future policy development and evaluation.
Contact - Professor Tony Scott
The Effect of Competition and Doctor Heterogeneity on Prices Charged by Doctors
Prices charged by doctors can have important effects on health care costs, access to health care and health status. Prices charged by doctors can have important effects on health care costs, access to health care and health status. The aim of this research is to examine the determinants of prices charged focussing on the role of competition and individual doctor and practice characteristics. Unlike previouis studes, this research utilises data collected from individual doctors to allow for the impact of individual doctor heterogeneity. We use two unique data sources, one of which has detailed information on individual patient characteristics from doctor consultations, and the other is a panel dataset of individual doctors. The results will be important in understanding the pricing practices of doctors and their impact on health care costs.
Contact - Professor Tony Scott
Non-cognitive skills and human capital investments: the importance of individuals' sense of control
This project will assess the importance of individuals sense of control (i.e. locus of control or self-efficacy) in driving an array of human capital investments including: education, job search, migration, health, and job training. The study will be the first to incorporate a non-cognitive skill (locus of control) into an economic model of the investment decision. This allows us to use newly-available (or soon to be available) Australian data to test alternative theories about the mechanism linking non-cognitive skills and human capital acquisition. The results will advance our understanding of the way non-cognitive skills affect overall economic well-being and will inform policies promoting human capital investment.
Contact - Professor Deborah Cobb-Clark
The Efficiency of the Global Patent System
An efficient gloabal patent system is a critical economic policy for small, isolated countries such as Australia. To be efficient, the patent system should be globally consistent; simple and cost-effective to use; parsimonious in the grant of monopoly rights; and provide a level playing field for all inventors. Existing empirical evidence indicates that the patent system is currently inefficient and this has negative effects on our R&D sector. This project will be the first study in the world to combine a new international patent database with more in-depth local information from Australia, Japan, United States, Europe and Chinese Asia (China, Taiwan). The analysis will provide robust evidence to underpin international patent negotiations.
Contact - Professor Beth Webster
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Applying through the Graduate School of Business and Economics
Contact
More information about the program can be found on Graduate School of Business and Economics website or email gsbe-research@unimelb.edu.au
Notice about Applications
Applicants for the Doctoral Program in Economics are advised to contact the Research Higher Degree Manager via email gsbe-research@unimelb.edu.au or phone 613 8344 3521.
Successful applicants will be enrolled in the 2nd year of the Master of Economics program and will receive an offer for that course. Successful applicants will be assessed for Faculty coursework scholarship stipends and fee remissions to cover the first year of the 4-year program. Candidates in the 2nd year of the program will be eligible for the full range of research higher degree scholarships.
