David Card, UC Berkeley and NBERStefano DellaVigna, UC Berkeley and NBER December 2012

Abstract

How has publishing in the top journals changed since 1970? Using a data set that combines

information on all articles published in the top‐5 journals from 1970 to 2012 with their

Google Scholar citations, we identify nine key trends. First, annual submissions to the top‐5

journals nearly doubled from 1990 to 2012. Second, the total number of articles published

in these journals actually declined from 400 per year in the late 1970s to 300 per year most

recently. As a result, the acceptance rate has fallen from 15% to 6%, with potential

implications for the career progression of young scholars. Third, one journal, the American

Economic Review, now accounts for 40% of top‐5 publications, up from one‐quarter in the

1970s. Fourth, recently published papers are on average 3 times longer than they were in

the 1970s, contributing to the relative shortage of journal space. Fifth, the number of

authors per paper has increased from 1.3 in 1970 to 2.3 in 2012, partly offsetting the fall in

the number of articles per year. Sixth, citations for top‐5 publications are high: among

papers published in the late 1990s, the median number of Google Scholar citations is 200.

Seventh, the ranking of journals by citations has remained relatively stable, with the notable

exception of the Quarterly Journal of Economics, which climbed from fourth place to first

place over the past three decades. Eighth, citation counts are significantly higher for longer

papers and those written by more co‐authors. Ninth, although the fractions of articles from

different fields published in the top‐5 has remained relatively stable, there are important

cohort trends in the citations received by papers from different fields, with rising citations to

more recent papers in Development and International, and declining citations to recent

papers in Econometrics and Theory.