Fame and the fortune of academic economists: How the market rewards influential research in economics

We analyze the pay and position of 1009 faculty members who teach in doctoral‐granting economics departments at 53 large public universities in the United States. Using the Web of Science, we have identified the journal articles published by these scholars and the number of times each of these articles has been subsequently cited in published research articles. We find that research influence, as measured by various measures of total citations, is a remarkably strong predictor of the salary and the prestige of the department in which professors are employed. We also examine the effect of coauthorship. Surprisingly, we find no salary penalty for sharing authorship; however, in terms of prestige of employing department, coauthorship is fully discounted.     

The Scholarly Status of Blacks in the Economics Profession: Have the National Economic Association and the Review of Black Political Economy Mattered?

This paper considers whether the National Economic Association and its journal the Review of Black Political Economy have enhanced the scholarly status of black economists. A bibliometric analysis reveals that while the typical black economist has never published in the Review of Black Political Economy, the share of black economists publishing in the Review of Black Economy approximates the share of all articles published on the economic and political economy of race by black economists, and the share of articles published in the Review of Black Political Economy by black economists appears higher than typical journals in economics—particularly for black economists employed at Historically Black Colleges and Universities. We also find that similar to other economics journals non-black economists dominate the share of published articles, and publications in the Review of Black Political Economy appear to be consistent with Lotka’s Law of scientific productivity suggesting that the journal is a standard outlet for research no different from any other science journal. Our results imply a plausible counterfactual that if the National Economic Association and Review of Black Political Economy did not exist, the scholarly status of blacks in the economics profession would have been lower than currently observed.     

Coauthorship and publication efficiency

This study extends a recent paper by Jean Louis Heck and Peter A. Zaleski [1991] on trends in economics journal publication from 1969–89. The primary purpose of the work is to analyze the impact on article production of an observed dramatically increasing tendency toward coauthorship among scholars in economics. A simple model is tested with total (per capita) articles as a function of time, American Economic Association (AEA) membership, and articles coauthored per year. Results suggest that the increasing trend toward coauthorship enhances productivity in total and per-capita article production. The authors would like to thank Gary Shelley, Janet K. Smith, Peter Zaleski, and an anonymous referee for comments on previous versions of this paper.     

Accounting for Multiplicity in Inference on Economics Journal Rankings

Nearly all journal ranking analyses assume that rank statistics of journal quality are deterministic, yet they are clearly random. The only study to recognize ranking uncertainty is Stern (2013), which calculates standard errors for a ranking of five‐year impact factors for 232 economics journals and performs inference using a series of univariate t‐tests. We revisit the Stern study but perform multivariate inference to control the overall error rate of the testing procedure. The results are compared and differences highlighted.     

A bibliometric account of Chinese economics research through the lens of the China Economic Review

Very few studies on the assessment and evolution of Chinese economics research draw on quantitative methods, namely bibliometrics. Bibliometrics is a powerful tool that helps to explore, organize and analyze large amounts of information in a quantitative manner. Selecting the most important economic journal focusing on the Chinese economy – the China Economic Review (CER) – we classified and assessed all the (512) articles that have been published in CER from its founding (1989) to December 2010. Based on these articles, and undertaking an exploratory statistical analysis on three databases – a ‘bibliographic’ database (512 articles), a ‘roots’ database (over 10 thousand citations), and an ‘influence’ database (over 3 thousand citations), we concluded that: 1) ‘Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth’; ‘Economic Systems’, and ‘International economics’ are the most important topics for Chinese economics literature; 2) there is a trend in Chinese economics research for growing ‘rigor’, associated to a noticeable rise in the weight of formal/mathematical-based articles; 3) the ‘International economics’ topic does not influence nor is it influenced by Chinese economics literature; and 4) Chinese economics literature is characterized by a certain level of endogamy, given that its range of influence is rather concentrated (geographically) in China and the USA.     

企业家精神的国内研究现状及未来展望——基于CSSCI期刊2005-2014年文献的内容分析

基于对2005-2014年中文社会科学引文索引（CSSCI）来源期刊中经济与管理科学类期刊上所发表的文章的检索结果,对在“企业家精神”相关问题上发表的期刊论文进行了描述性地统计分析,从论文数量年度变化、论文发表刊物情况、文献影响力、相关研究学者、研究机构、基金、研究方法、研究行业、研究主题等方面,考察了企业家精神国内研究现状。并基于统计结果,探讨了近十年企业家精神研究的不足,以及对未来研究方向的展望。     

Protection of industry

This paper reviews the literature on protection of industry and concentrates on selected journal articles that appeared over the period 1979–1993. The survey is organized according to the various instruments of protection in the manufacturing sector, and it is designed to acquaint nonspecialists with theoretical and empirical work in this area.     

马克思主义政治经济学研究对象的创新

国内教科书将马克思主义政治经济学研究对象限定为生产关系及其运动规律的做法,不仅背离经济学的一般含义,不符合马克思、恩格斯的本意,而且不适应马克思主义政治经济学与时俱进的需要.鉴于我国正在建设社会主义市场经济体制的现实,马克思主义政治经济学的研究对象的创新,需要借鉴西方经济学的研究对象.马克思主义政治经济学不仅要研究生产关系及其运动规律,也要研究一国稀缺资源的配置和利用,并通过分析一国稀缺资源的配置和利用方式,来研究一国特定的生产关系及其运动规律.     

Methods of ranking economics journals

This paper reviews and critiques some popular methods of ranking economics journals, compares results of some methods, and suggests new uses of two old methods. International economics journals are ranked and used to provide a vehicle for the analyses. Journal citations over a five-year period provide the data input for the analysis. This study illustrates the significance of the method used in how journals are ranked. The Bradley-Terry model is used to estimate the odds ratios one journal will cite another. The model is also discussed as a possible tool for finding the boundary between fields and field journals. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Fifty-Sixth International Atlantic Economic Conference in Quebec City, Canada, October 16–19, 2003.     

What are the possible future research directions for bank’s credit risk assessment research? A systematic review of literature

Banking prudence and efficiency to manage their risks in different business cycle and environment would help to alleviate crises and losses. Hence, the effective assessment of credit risk is an essential component of a comprehensive technique to credit risk assessment and critical to the long-run of not only banking institutions but also the economy as a whole. Therefore, it has received a great interest from scholars across finance and economics to investigate such assessments by banks in different countries using diverse theoretical underpinnings and methodologies. Hence, this paper is developed to review analytical conceptualisations of credit risks assessments that have been developed in the academic literature. By means of a systematic review, it provides a comprehensive analysis that encompasses approaches used in research papers. There has been no prior review on analytical conceptualisations in this area. Moreover, this review is done in a systematic manner, i.e. categorising journal articles into different categories such as purposes, perspectives and methodologies through a transparent and thorough process. Thus, it will be able to provide an objective review. Finally, the paper will outline the evolution of methodologies and theoretical underpinnings in credit risk management research and a landscape for possible future research directions.     

The treatment of racial and sexual discrimination in economics journals and economics textbooks: 1972 to 1987

This article examines two decades of scholarly literature on discrimination and two decades of discussion of discrimination in economics textbooks. At first discrimination was taken seriously and policy responses adequate to the problem were advocated. Today this is a minority position. The article first traces the way thatJEL policies concerning indexing and abstracting have contributed to this change. Next textbooks are analyzed to show how this change is manifested in commonly used curricular materials. Finally, political preferences are shown to undergird crucial arguments like those concerning minimum wages. Conclusions linking ideology to research agendas are put forward.     

Introduction: Advances in the Study of the Economics of Terrorism

Although the study of the economics of terrorism dates back to 1978, work on this topic was sporadic until 2001. Since the four hijackings on September 11, 2001, there have been many contributions both theoretical and empirical in this area of study. The purpose of this article is twofold: (i) to orient the reader to this area of study, and (ii) to introduce the five articles of this special symposium. These articles address diverse aspects of the economics of terrorism including the demise of terrorist groups, natural disasters and terrorism, cost of living and terrorism, terrorism and stock‐bond returns, and terrorism and piracy.     

The fallacy of Washington consensus and the role of the Government: interpreting some Chinese contributions to development policy from aspects of Chang’e 4

Students of economics may have heard of that economics, especially the kind of mainstream neoclassical economics taught in most universities on earth today, is an imitation of physical science in some fundamental fashion. However, few economists would imagine that economics can be as effective as physical science, not even in the remote future. China’s Chang’e 4 mission to the far side of the Moon provides a golden opportunity for economists to explore this fascinating possibility from the aspect of astrodynamics.

This article, inspired by thoughts of Justin Yifu Lin and Angang Hu among others regarding China’s economic reform, demonstrates that physics explaining the Three-Body Problem of classical mechanics may as well be understood as guiding principles when dealing with issues in development economics. Several aspects of ‘Washington consensus’ are examined in relation to the concerns raised by Chinese scholars. The study concludes that neoliberal interpretations of modern economics are basically inconsistent with the neoclassical framework outlined in standard economics textbooks.     

Price Discrimination in the Subscription Market for Economics Journals

We examine what factors affect the degree of price discrimination for an academic journal by analyzing data on 190 of the 208 economics journals indexed in the 2008 edition of Journal Citation Reports. We find that (i) the library‐to‐individual price ratio of a for‐profit journal is 37% higher than that of a comparable nonprofit journal because the price premium of a for‐profit journal in the library market is disproportionately larger than that in the individual market, (ii) journals with higher citations per page or impact factor are more price discriminatory, and (iii) Elsevier and Wiley‐Blackwell practice the highest degree of price discrimination of all publishers.     

East Asian rankings of economics departments

This paper updates a previous ranking of economics research output in East Asia based upon page counts of articles published in sixty quality journals. A salient feature of the results is that research productivity of economics profession in East Asia has improved substantially since the early 1990s. The research output of top-tier universities in East Asia these days appears comparable to that of major state universities in the United States about a decade ago.     

国内村民自治研究评估和趋势分析——基于CNKI期刊文献和国家社科基金项目的分析

文章以2003—2013年CNKI期刊关于村民自治研究的8103篇文献和国家社科基金项目为研究对象,采用文献计量分析方法,从论文发表年代和数量分布、论文发表的期刊、论文主题和高频关键词、论文的研究主体、项目时间和类型分布、立项机构分布和项目成果形式分布七个方面呈现村民自治研究的学术轨迹,并指出村民自治研究的不足之处和完善措施。最后分析了该领域进一步研究的方向。     

中国技术转移研究的现状和趋势分析

使用文献计量学的方法分析2001-2012年间在我国内地发表的2 607篇期刊论文,以评估国内技术转移的研究趋势。研究发现,技术转移相关论文和期刊数增长明显,论文涉及学科主要是管理学和经济学,清华大学是发文最多的机构,北京是发文最多的地区,技术转移、跨国公司、技术创新是国内技术转移研究的焦点,国内外技术转移的研究焦点并不相同,高校、技术进步、科技成果转化是国内技术转移研究的热点。     

Theory versus Application: Does Complexity Crowd Out Evidence?

Donald F. Gordon hypothesized that mathematical complexity in economics is inversely related to operational ism. Here we (i) operationalize Gordon's hypothesis, (ii) test for the significance of trends in complexity for the American Economic Review, Economic Journal, Journal of Political Economy, and Quarterly Journal of Economics, and (iii) test Gordon's hypothesis hy conducting analyses of the contents of articles from the American Economic Review (AER), as well as the contents of articles citing the AER articles. The results do not refute the hypothesis that complexity crowds out operationalism in economics. Additionally, the presence of significant, positive trends toward complexity suggests that the magnitude of the crowding out is on the rise in these journals.     

More on the dynamics of agricultural contribution to economic growth-Reply

In his note on my recent two articles in this journal, Professor Addington Coppin states that the results obtained for estimating agricultural contribution to economic growth in various economies are sensitive to employing annual average growth rate data, end-of-period output shares, and geometric “weights” in some of the calculations. He suggests that the results would have been more accurate by employing (1) simple percentage changes in the level variables over the entire period of consideration; (2) beginning-of-period data on output shares; and (3) arithmetic weights. This reply addresses the logic and correctness of the approach undertaken in my research that strengthen the confidence in the results offered in my articles.     

In honor of Michael Grossman

This symposium is to celebrate the accomplishments of Michael Grossman on the occasion of his retirement from teaching. The articles selected are all written by Mike's former students and colleagues, and were presented in a session at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Southern Economic Association. Each of the articles celebrate Mike's scholarly legacy in developing the field of health economics.