scholarly journals How to Write an Effective Referee Report and Improve the Scientific Review Process

2017 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 231-244 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan B. Berk ◽  
Campbell R. Harvey ◽  
David Hirshleifer
Keyword(s):  
Review Process ◽  
Research Effort ◽  
American Economic Review ◽  
Quarterly Journal ◽  
Scientific Review ◽  
Average Lead ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Economic Studies

The review process for academic journals in economics has grown vastly more extensive over time. Journals demand more revisions, and papers have become bloated with numerous robustness checks and extensions. Even if the extra resulting revisions do on average lead to improved papers—a claim that is debatable—the cost is enormous. We argue that much of the time involved in these revisions is a waste of research effort. Another cause for concern is the level of disagreement amongst referees, a pattern that suggests a high level of arbitrariness in the review process. To identify and highlight what is going right and what is going wrong in the reviewing process, we wrote to a sample of former editors of the American Economic Review, the Journal of Political Economy, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, Econometrica, the Review of Economic Studies, and the Journal of Financial Economics, and asked them for their thoughts about what might improve the process. We found a rough consensus that referees for top journals in economics tend to make similar, correctable mistakes. The italicized quotations throughout this paper are drawn from our correspondence with these editors and our own experience. Their insights are consistent with our own experiences as editors at the Journal of Finance and the Review of Financial Studies. Our objective is to highlight these mistakes and provide a roadmap for how to avoid them.

An Investigation of the Results of the Annual Review of Ineligibles and Non-Rehabilitants

1979 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-34
Author(s):  
Paul Cooper ◽  
Reed Greenwood ◽  
Stephanie Davis
Keyword(s):  
Vocational Rehabilitation ◽  
Review Process ◽  
Research Effort ◽  
Fiscal Year ◽  
Annual Review ◽  
Cooperative Research ◽  
Ready Access ◽  
Time Required ◽  
The Cost

The annual review of ineligibles and non-rehabilitants is a mandatory study for all public vocational rehabilitation agencies to insure that all individuals are given ready access to the benefits of the program. In a cooperative research effort, three vocational rehabilitation agencies provided the data necessary for a study of the cost and effectiveness of the annual review process. As part of this study, the participating agencies provided data for each of their clients reviewed in Fiscal Year 1977. This data consisted of information· regarding the type of review, the outcome of the review process, and the amount of counselor time required to complete the review. The results of the study indicated that the annual review was not only ineffective but extremely costly in terms of counselor time as a technique for insuring benefits to eligible individuals.

scholarly journals Efficiency of credit unions in Brazil: an analysis of the evolution in financial intermediation and banking service

2020 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 289-308
Author(s):  
Manuela Gonçalves Barros ◽  
Marcelo Botelho da Costa Moraes ◽  
Alexandre Pereira Salgado Junior ◽  
Marco Antonio Alves de Souza Junior
Keyword(s):  
Financial Intermediation ◽  
Credit Unions ◽  
Banking Services ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Banking Service ◽  
Low Efficiency ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Over Time

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the efficiency in financial intermediation and the cost efficiency in banking service of credit unions in Brazil, based on essentially accounting variables, and to analyze the temporal evolution of the efficiency of these cooperatives. Design/methodology/approach With a sample of 315 cooperatives over the period from 2007 to 2014, this research uses a two-stage process: application of regression models with panel data to verify which variables are related to the defined outputs, with the reduction of 31 variables to 8 variables in both models; and application of the data envelopment analysis method to obtain an analysis of credit unions’ efficiency. Findings The results demonstrate a high level of efficiency in financial intermediation, with low variation over time, associated with a low efficiency in the banking service, in which few cooperatives have remained efficient over time. In addition, the cooperatives with highest efficiency in financial intermediation were also the most efficient in providing services. Research limitations/implications This research has some limitations about the capacity of the proxies used to capture the real effect of the variables and assumptions of economic relations resulting in restrictions to generalize the results. Practical implications Cooperatives are usually analyzed under just one dimension. By separating the analysis into financial intermediation and banking services, cooperatives that are more efficient in each dimension can be identified, in addition to analyzing the evolution over time. The authors found that efficiency tends to be lower in banking services, and few cooperatives remain at the highest level of efficiency over time in both models. Social implications Credit unions provide an important service in the banking and credit market. Therefore, understanding its operation and the characteristics that influence its efficiency allows a better management of the cooperatives themselves and a greater understanding of this important segment of the financial market.

Twentieth Century Publication Performance in Five Leading Economics Journals, a Comment

1995 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Golden ◽  
Fred Carstensen
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
American Economic Review ◽  
Quarterly Journal ◽  
Economics Journals ◽  
Economic Journal ◽  
Over Time

This paper ranks the top thirty Ph.D.-awarding economics departments (out of a sample of over one hundred) by decade based upon both pages and numbers of articles published in five leading periodicals. These include the American Economic Review, Econometrica, Economic Journal, Journal of Political Economy, and the Quarterly Journal of Economics. Conclusions drawn are that several departments that have not ranked highly in recent publication studies performed strongly before 1950 and the home journal advantage of Chicago and Harvard has eroded over time. Also, only seven institutions appear in all nine publication lists.

The cost of homelessness: Assessing change over time

2003 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Spano ◽  
P. Toro ◽  
M. Goldstein
Keyword(s):  
Change Over Time ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Over Time

Media Bias in der internationalen ökonomischen Forschung - Ein Literaturüberblick

2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 24-37
Author(s):  
Christian-Mathias Wellbrock
Keyword(s):  
Media Bias ◽  
American Economic Review ◽  
Quarterly Journal

Das Thema der verzerrten Medienberichterstattung wird in der ökonomischen Literatur meist unter dem Begriff „Media Bias“ zusammengefasst. Der Beitrag gibt einen Überblick zum Stand der Forschung über Definitionen, Formen, Ursachen, Ansätze zur Messung sowie Folgen von Media Bias. Der Fokus liegt dabei auf hochrangigen internationalen wissenschaftlichen Fachzeitschriften im Bereich der Ökonomik, die in der letzten Dekade eine Vielzahl an Studien unmittelbar zu diesem Thema veröffentlicht haben (u. a. American Economic Review, Quarterly Journal of Economics). Über den Bericht des aktuellen Forschungsstands hinaus identifiziert der Beitrag thematische Schwerpunkte und zentrale Herausforderungen der bisherigen Forschung und benennt Felder für zukünftige Forschung.

The Internet Trap

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Hindman
Keyword(s):  
The Internet ◽  
Net Neutrality ◽  
The Public ◽  
Attention Economy ◽  
Digital News ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Over Time

The Internet was supposed to fragment audiences and make media monopolies impossible. Instead, behemoths like Google and Facebook now dominate the time we spend online—and grab all the profits from the attention economy. This book explains how this happened. It sheds light on the stunning rise of the digital giants and the online struggles of nearly everyone else—and reveals what small players can do to survive in a game that is rigged against them. The book shows how seemingly tiny advantages in attracting users can snowball over time. The Internet has not reduced the cost of reaching audiences—it has merely shifted who pays and how. Challenging some of the most enduring myths of digital life, the book explains why the Internet is not the postindustrial technology that has been sold to the public, how it has become mathematically impossible for grad students in a garage to beat Google, and why net neutrality alone is no guarantee of an open Internet. It also explains why the challenges for local digital news outlets and other small players are worse than they appear and demonstrates what it really takes to grow a digital audience and stay alive in today's online economy. The book shows why, even on the Internet, there is still no such thing as a free audience.

Changing Role of Agriculture in Income and Employment, and Trends of Agricultural Worker Productivity in Indian States

2020 ◽  
pp. 183-189
Keyword(s):  
Green Revolution ◽  
Positive Trend ◽  
Worker Productivity ◽  
Indian States ◽  
Agricultural Worker ◽  
The Sixties ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Changing Role

The productivity of land has been often discussed and deliberated by the academia and policymakers to understand agriculture, however, very few studies have focused on the agriculture worker productivity to analyze this sector. This study concentrates on the productivity of agricultural workers from across the states taking two-time points into consideration. The agriculture worker productivity needs to be dealt with seriously and on a time series basis so that the marginal productivity of worker can be ascertained but also the dependency of worker on agriculture gets revealed. There is still disguised unemployment in all the states and high level of labour migration, yet most of the states showed the dependency has gone down. Although a state like Madhya Pradesh is doing very well in terms of income earned but that is at the cost of increased worker power in agriculture as a result of which, the productivity of worker has gone down. States like Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura, though small in size showed remarkable growth in productivity and all these states showed a positive trend in terms of worker shifting away from agriculture. The traditional states which gained the most from Green Revolution of the sixties are performing decently well, but they need to have the next major policy push so that they move to the next orbit of growth.

scholarly journals Determining the critical period for weed control in high-yielding cotton using common sunflower as a mimic weed

2019 ◽  
Vol 33 (6) ◽  
pp. 800-807 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham W. Charles ◽  
Brian M. Sindel ◽  
Annette L. Cowie ◽  
Oliver G. G. Knox
Keyword(s):  
Weed Control ◽  
Critical Period ◽  
Yield Loss ◽  
Field Studies ◽  
Growing Degree Days ◽  
Degree Days ◽  
Weed Density ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Planting Season

AbstractField studies were conducted over six seasons to determine the critical period for weed control (CPWC) in high-yielding cotton, using common sunflower as a mimic weed. Common sunflower was planted with or after cotton emergence at densities of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 plants m−2. Common sunflower was added and removed at approximately 0, 150, 300, 450, 600, 750, and 900 growing degree days (GDD) after planting. Season-long interference resulted in no harvestable cotton at densities of five or more common sunflower plants m−2. High levels of intraspecific and interspecific competition occurred at the highest weed densities, with increases in weed biomass and reductions in crop yield not proportional to the changes in weed density. Using a 5% yield-loss threshold, the CPWC extended from 43 to 615 GDD, and 20 to 1,512 GDD for one and 50 common sunflower plants m−2, respectively. These results highlight the high level of weed control required in high-yielding cotton to ensure crop losses do not exceed the cost of control.

scholarly journals Computing the Exact Number of Similarity Classes in the Longest Edge Bisection of Tetrahedra

Mathematics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. 1447
Author(s):  
Jose P. Suárez ◽  
Agustín Trujillo ◽  
Tania Moreno
Keyword(s):  
Data Structure ◽  
Stability Condition ◽  
Open Problem ◽  
Integer Arithmetic ◽  
Exact Number ◽  
Similarity Class ◽  
The Stability ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost

Showing whether the longest-edge (LE) bisection of tetrahedra meshes degenerates the stability condition or not is still an open problem. Some reasons, in part, are due to the cost for achieving the computation of similarity classes of millions of tetrahedra. We prove the existence of tetrahedra where the LE bisection introduces, at most, 37 similarity classes. This family of new tetrahedra was roughly pointed out by Adler in 1983. However, as far as we know, there has been no evidence confirming its existence. We also introduce a new data structure and algorithm for computing the number of similarity tetrahedral classes based on integer arithmetic, storing only the square of edges. The algorithm lets us perform compact and efficient high-level similarity class computations with a cost that is only dependent on the number of similarity classes.

Value-based dentistry: Putting the patient first

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 126-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sreenivas Koka ◽  
Galya Raz
Keyword(s):  
Risk Management ◽  
Quality Improvement ◽  
Quality Of Care ◽  
Dental Care ◽  
Time Cost ◽  
Safety Risk ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Over Time

What does ‘value’ mean? In the context of dental care, it can be defined as the quality of care received by a patient divided by the cost to the patient of receiving that care. In other words: V =Q/C, where Q equals the quality improvement over time, which most patients view in the context of the outcome, the service provided and safety/risk management, and C equals the financial, biological and time cost to the patient. Here, the need for, and implications of, value-based density for clinicians and patients alike are explored.

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