Do Better Journals Publish Better Estimates?

David Slichter () and Nhan Tran
Additional contact information
David Slichter: Binghamton University, New York
Nhan Tran: University of Pittsburgh

No 17960, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Are estimates typically closer to the true parameter value when those estimates are published in highly-ranked economics journals? Using 14,387 published estimates from 24 large literatures, we find that, within literatures, the mean and variance of parameter estimates have little or no correlation with journal rank. Therefore, regardless of what the true parameter value is that a literature is attempting to estimate, it cannot be that estimates in higher-ranked journals are on average noticeably closer to it. We discuss possible explanations and implications.

Keywords: meta-analysis; scientific methods; science of science (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A11 C13 C18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-06
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp17960.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17960

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().