Why is economics research so dominated by US universities?

[justanotherdaduser]

I was researching economics degrees in various universities, including some EU based ones, as DD recently started showing interest in this area and was wondering how come the field has become so completely dominated by US unis?

Looking at most cited papers or any other similar such measure of influence shows overwhelming majority of researchers affiliated to US institutions (surprisingly few Oxbridge)

For example : ideas.repec.org/top/top.person.nbcites.html

I studied economics a long time ago but don't work in this area and didn't really notice the change until now.

When and how did this happen? It wasn't always so. Definitely post Second World War, there were number of influential British and other European economists (affiliated to local institutions) that shaped debates here and in other parts of the world. But things seem to have changed I guess?

I read Economics in the 90s at Cambridge and my DD is about to read E&M at Oxford and I worked as an economist but not in academia, in public policy/political advisory and finance. So can't answer from an academia point of view.

When I did my degree there was a heavy US influence from economists like Milton Friedman and the Chicago school of economics. Keynes I think would have been the biggest British influence.

In the commercial and public policy world I have not experienced a strong US influence on debates at all, obviously the US is monitored closely as a major economy but debates have been around things like Brexit, lockdown, NHS and very much UK experience based. Over the period economics has become far more influenced by maths and econometrics is far more prominent than it was, largely as banks etc want a precise figure to put in their spreadsheets for future performance. So you get younger economists coming through who are very mathematical and the older ones are more policy based / looking at a wider range of issues and less commercially focussed.

Academia I don't know - Oxford only does part Economics degrees of which PPE is the biggest, rest are very small in numbers and obviously has a huge influence on British politics both to the right and to the left and several recent UK PMs. Cambridge as far as I know is involved in debates and their degree has certainly become more mathematical reflecting commercial demands. The professors there every 7th year go abroad or at least they used to and my old one is currently abroad. European lack of influence am not so surprised about as everything is done in English though the banks were full of Europeans speaking multiple languages with economics degrees. Also in the US and Europe its much more common to take a phD in economics than here which can rule out working abroad and for jobs in Europe fluency in multiple languages is generally required and expected to be in addition to a degree.

Have a friend who is a professor of economics in Germany and I think the salaries are considerably higher in the US and the salaries here are lower than in Germany so for people with no ties or a family willing to relocate the US could be tempting if money is a motivator. The US economy is much bigger than ours and wealthier so I'm not surprised they have a big influence - I think they were probably commercially focussed before us. The maths factor may be an influence too. Though others may know a lot more than me. It isn't something that would concern me at all though.

Hi, OP -

Economics isn’t my field but I am sure there are a number of internationally leading British economists. You don’t have to be in the top 5% of Highly Cited to have a very wide reach. I also speculate that certain subfields may be over-represented.

But yes, the list in your link roughly trends with the world rankings in Economics research. LSE is well represented but surprisingly Oxford and Cambridge, which are well thought of in the discipline (in different ways) are not.

Probably the US became the centre of gravity of economics research as America was becoming the world’s dominant economy

I am an academic, but I'm not an economist, so this is an educated guess rather than any inside knowledge, but I think the points the first poster made about salaries and working conditions might be relevant.

Staff retention in UK academia in internationally popular subjects with industry links is really hard, because for those who want to stay in academia, other countries can offer far higher salaries and better conditions. I know people (not in my own field, where stuff like this doesn't happen) who start their career in the UK, and once they get known as a talented researcher, have got emails out of the blue from US institutions offering them double their salary, a job for their partner, and incredibly generous benefits and research arrangements if they go there. Deals like that can be hard to turn down.With economics the US university doesn't even need to pay for lab equipment or transport a team of post-docs as you do in STEM subjects, so it's an attractive subject to 'buy in' talent for - this happens in philosophy a lot, for similar reasons. Of course there will be plenty of academics who want to stay in the UK for personal reasons, but with a subject like economics I imagine there's also another issue with retention which is the natural drift for a proportion to leave academia and become economists in other fields instead (which also creates a retention issue you don't have in, say, medieval history or French literature). So I imagine it is just harder to retain economists within a British university with both those pressures active.

There's also the issue that those who do make the jump to the US at senior level then get much more research time and facilitation - if you are a tenured professor in a wealthy US institution, a lot of teaching and admin is simply taken off your hands, leaving you more time to write your world-beating articles. If you're in the UK, even if you're at Oxbridge or a top RG uni, you are still spending a huge amount of time dealing with admin and doing a heavy teaching load, which makes it harder to churn out those high impact articles. Rather as in the UK, if you are in a university that still offers sabbatical leave, your chances of becoming a leading researcher are much higher than if you are at an institution which doesn't and just expects you to fit research into your spare time.

It's not a field I know - I'm sure there are world class economists in the UK (and as the poster above says, there are probably very eminent economists who aren't in the top 5%, perhaps because their research is world-leading but on a less trendy topic), but it's also not surprising to me that it's a field where the US can dominate.

My DH is an academic lawyer in Cambridge and heads up a business research centre. He’s often said that he thinks the Cambridge degree in Economics is too mathcy. His early and mid career interdisciplinary stuff was very much in the law and economics research realm. The research centre began in part at the Department of Applied Economics. DAE had its own library and set up but ceased to be separate some time ago.

DH second academic job was in law at the University of Chicago. He was very interested in their brand of law and economics despite it being more right wing than his own approach.

I’m not really an economist or social scientist, although I did study Economics at O Level, so I’m not sure I can comment in a more detailed way on economics research. However, interdisciplinary research at the DHs centre covers projects focusing on europe, far east, AI and is generally wide ranging. So lots of different perspectives are out there.

I'm not sure how common it is to move to the US but here is one famous economist Angus Deaton who moved to the US and is a nobel prize winner in economics and previously at Cambridge. I checked and salaries in the US appear to be double, at least Harvard vs Cambridge. The European ones don't look that different to me on checking.

https://deaton.scholar.princeton.edu/bio

I agree with the poster saying you work on global and all types of issues, its the debates I have heard that have been UK / Europe focussed but it probably depends where you work and what the aim is. I think its become too mathsy now but that may go with time as firms are discovering that the econometric models just default to long run averages for forecasting and there are often shocks which make them incorrect e.g. covid. And I've known mathematical economists who are brilliant at models but can't write a press release, report, understand policy implications, do speeches and I think the ideal is someone who can do everything. LSE is also very mathsy. The LSE economist I worked with asked me to help him build a mathematical model to see if he could afford children over a lifetime 😂Whereas ones educated in the Scottish universities were much better at a wide range of subjects. Though obviously only knew a small sample.

PS - you probably know this already, OP, but thought I'd mention since you say you're researching degrees... being in the department with the biggest superstars doesn't necessarily mean the best degree experience for the students. And the superstars may not do much undergraduate teaching at all - there's a very high chance if they're that prolific and globally rated they will be bought out on grants for years at a time.

There's also a lot of research which goes on behind the scenes like research for the World Bank on say the environment, for the London Stock Exchange or to form government policy which will not be officially published but is very interesting and quite a few economists prefer that to academic research papers as you can see your ideas implemented in reality.

At Cambridge there is lots of emphasis on teaching and teaching excellence. My DH often does more teaching than he’s obliged too as a prof and there’s no buy out of time or extra salary for heading a research centre n his case. You just work long days if you are committed to research and your students.

I also wouldn't be seeking out very famous economists as people to study under as they may not be available much, some of them will have egos to match and teaching is a completely different skill set. I just advised my daughter to visit colleges at Oxford and find where the professors were nice as you will be spending 3 years together. One of the most famous economics professors from my time at Cambridge was according to his students an alcoholic and used to turn up very drunk to teach them and his students used to try and avoid him.

If your aim is for your child to become one of the world's most referenced academics the statistical chances are pretty low but there are plenty of excellent other options in industry / politics and great careers for less famous academics as well. I would say moving between institutions internationally might give the best chance but the famous economists I have met often come from generations of economists and also the nicest ones give others credit for their contributions, and so probably aren't as famous.

I am also an academic, OP (STEM). Perhaps I should have mentioned that. I agree with most of the further comments above.

However, to the extent that I am drawn to Economics beyond a general educated person’s knowledge of the field it is the ‘mathsy’ stuff that attracts me. How valuable it is I am not in a good position to judge, but plenty of your 5% are from heavily
‘mathsy’ schools of Economics with LSE being the European exemplar

Penguinsa : I also wouldn't be seeking out very famous economists as people to study under as they may not be available much, some of them will have egos to match and teaching is a completely different skill set.

Sorry but this is just wrong. You are basically just academic bashing. Some people are good teachers, if they are in a teaching post they have to have some competence obvs. It surely goes without saying that you are interested in your students. Where do future researchers, teachers and leaders in the field both in academia and outside academic life start out? If you work in a social science field you don’t reside in an old fashioned ivory tower type of academia.

I'm not academic bashing at all. I'm just saying that sometimes people who are famous have big egos, not always and the ones I've known like that have almost all not been academics. Its just not a criteria I would consider when choosing a university course for a child. I spend quite a bit of time socialising with academics and they are all lovely.

Absolutely true - though as a Cambridge academic your DH is presumably entitled to apply for research leave every X years, as are most permanent lecturers in elite universities. (This isn't true at some less elite institutions, where sabbatical no longer exists and remaining research active is a big struggle.) But my point wasn't that academics at elite institutions aren't committed to teaching (they certainly are), but that there are structural mechanisms that mean that the (tiny minority of) research superstars get put on a track which can incentivise them to get less involved in teaching that others. But ironically they are often the ones with the most visibility outside that institution.

Let's imagine I'm a budding research star and I therefore am successful in getting an externally funded huge grant that gives me a 3 year or a 5 year full buyout. Obviously I'm going to take it - it's career changing and good for my institution. But that would mean I don't teach my students for those years. So if they've applied to my institution on the basis that "oh I wanted to be taught by foxglove as she is really famous and in the 1% most cited in her field", they'll be disappointed. For this reason, I've often heard colleagues saying at open days to applicants to think about course structure and not fixate on individuals who may be teaching you - because individuals may not be available for all sorts of reasons - they get grants, but they may also move institution, have babies, get sick, etc.

Now I've had one massive grant, I'm getting an internal reputation as a 'grant-getter' - there's then institutional pressure for me to apply for more grants (cos I'm now thought to be good at it) and because I've spent the last 3-5 years doing little or no teaching and focusing on research, my research CV looks amazing so I'm more likely to get another grant. And I'm now in demand to be a Co-I on other people's grants too. Many institutions (including ones I've worked in) have internal targets for how much grant-funding they're getting in and how many bids each department has in the pipeline, so my department is unlikely to say 'no, it's only fair that you get back to the teaching' and much more likely to say 'the powers that be would like you to apply for an even bigger grant in the next 2 years as this will be good for our Faculty stats'. (This is less the case at Oxbridge where the tutorial system creates an institutional focus on undergrad teaching, but even there things have changed massively in the time since I started out in academia, with far more emphasis on bidding for external funding being a good and expected thing.)

So this isn't to criticise research superstars or to suggest they're not committed to their students or good teachers. It's simply a fact about the university ecosystem in its current funding system that people who can attract grants will be incentivised to go down that route and if the result is they hardly teach, the institution will not care. (I have friends in different institutions around the country who have barely taught at undergrad level for the last 10 years as they've been successful in bringing in grant after grant - both are high profile and would be exactly the sort of person who students might see in lists of 'big names in the field' and so 'want to be taught by'.)

Ok fair enough. I do feel that these days teaching excellence is an important area for academics. The narrative has moved us in this direction whilst also giving us the ref to make sure we fulfil our research responsibilities

That's fine Librarybooker I don't know how bothered you are about privacy but I can probably work out who your DH is from the information given.

foxglovetree see where you are coming from. Although my DHs journey in academia hasn’t been much like this. Projects at his centre get funded by various grant applications, but budgets are tight. He’s not funded that way for his job and has faculty (different faculty from the research centre) teaching and college teaching.

Regarding sabbatical leave - don’t get me started on this lol 😂 Some people take terms off at the most inconvenient times necessitating extra work for their colleagues. It needs tightening up as a system. The DH usually takes his sabbatical accrued to an academic year and had to delay by a year once because of a cheekily chosen term by someone who got their bid in first.

It’s sad that so many unis don’t have sabbatical systems now. Research feeds into teaching, building blocks for the future

Thank you all for the many informative and helpful posts.

Just to clarify, I was not specifically looking for universities with stellar economic research department for my DD as it doesn’t matter much at undergraduate level (as others said), plus have no idea if she would like to do research later anyway.

Just noticed while searching that there are many fewer U.K. or European unis in that table (and several other similar such tables) than I expected and it surprised me.

I am thinking it matters (though, not for DD at the moment) because, it probably influences where young British economists interested in research would like to go. But also because economic research frequently shapes public policy and has an outsize impact on lives.

Inflation targeting, reliance on central bank to manage business cycles, giving up on state directed industrial policy and regional investments, so called ‘Washington consensus’, post-2008 austerity policies, executive compensation structure in most of English speaking world are all products of various economics papers in the last few decades.

I remember at one point, George Osborne was quoting directly from the (now infamous) Reinhard rogoff paper on debt and GDP growth.

So diversity of thoughts at the top table would benefit the world, I was thinking. In that table for example (and other similar tables), 50% papers are from US, about 10% from UK (including think tanks like IFS, CEPR etc), other European countries even fewer.

Also, very good point several PP mentioned about US compensation and overall package being much better attracting talents from everywhere. It clearly makes a difference - large number of authors associated with US universities come from all over the world, many British economists, but also French, Turkish, Indian, Mexican and so on.

Also valid point that economics has become maths heavy. It’s virtually impossible now to get published in reputable journals without being mathsy.

I’m not sure I mind. I don’t like to miss any opportunity to let people know that not all economists are of the kind that would appeal to our current government. I’m sure you find that ok 😀

Source Google/Wikipedia :

1. Historical Factors: The dominance of US universities in economics research can be traced back to the early 20th century when prominent American economists like Irving Fisher, Wesley Mitchell, and John Bates Clark made significant contributions to the field. This laid the groundwork for the development of strong economics departments and research institutions in the US.
2. Funding: US universities, particularly top-tier institutions like Harvard, MIT, Stanford, and Princeton, attract significant funding for research, both from government sources like the National Science Foundation (NSF) and private foundations. This funding enables these institutions to support cutting-edge research and attract top economists from around the world.
3. Prestige and Reputation: US universities have long been considered prestigious institutions for higher education and research. This reputation attracts talented economists from both within the US and internationally, further consolidating the dominance of US universities in economics research.
4. Collaboration and Networking: US universities foster a culture of collaboration and networking among economists, which leads to the exchange of ideas and the formation of research partnerships. This collaborative environment contributes to the productivity and impact of economics research conducted in the US.
5. Publication Opportunities: Many of the top economics journals, such as the American Economic Review, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, and the Journal of Political Economy, are based in the US or affiliated with US universities. Publishing in these journals is highly prestigious and can significantly enhance the career prospects of economists, further incentivizing them to conduct research in the US.
6. Diverse Research Environment: The US offers a diverse research environment with a wide range of institutions, research centers, and think tanks focusing on various areas of economics. This diversity fosters innovation and allows economists to pursue research interests across different subfields of economics.
7. Global Influence: The dominance of US universities in economics research contributes to the global influence of American economic thought and policy. Many policymakers, central bankers, and international organizations rely on research conducted by US economists to inform their decisions and policies.

In US universities, the application is for liberal arts and during the undergraduate years you can focus on economics and the maths required for economics. Therefore setting you up for Masters and phDs.
The UK universities with high rankings Economics undergraduate degrees required Astar Maths A level and if possible Further Maths. Therefore quite a few with poor maths teachings in their schools are not able to enter or their Maths are not up to par but if it was purely based on Economics Maths syllabus they would be fine eg. Trigonometry is not really used in Economics.

So what’s the status of those journals in point 5. in the Ref?

Re point 3. prestigious if your World perspective is that the UK is more focused on the US since Brexit. Reality, we are floundering between just like we always were EU or no EU membership

DS is just about to complete an economics PhD in the US .

He was actually offered funding for a PhD in the UK but was strongly advised to take a US offer (similarly ranked departments) to add breadth to his education and networks, and because of the different structure on the PhD. (6 years funding whereas I think in the UK it would have been three years.) Oddly financially he would have been better off in the UK as he would have been paid extra for any teaching or research. In the US he was part of an intake of 30. In the UK he might have been the only funded econ PhD in his year.

Almost all his peers in the US came from outside the US, and the Americans they had tended to leave early for well paid consultancy and finance sector jobs. Brits were a bit of a rarity, though some others arrived via British Universities. In postgrad economics and academia Italians seem to be everywhere. It may be because their path through from Bucconi, a private University, is more straight forward. In the UK students, unless they are truly exceptional, have to have funded a Masters in order to be able to launch successful PhD applications. (DS took his in EME - Econometrics and Mathematical Economics at the LSE, where home student fees are now £35,472 for 10 months before living costs. Oxford charges less per year but you have college fees and it is a two year course.)

The general rule is to ensure that you learn the maths you will need for the next stage, during the stage before. If you are aiming for a quantitate area of economics, either in the private sector or public sector/academia you are best off looking at the more quantitative undergraduate degrees (Cambridge, Warwick, LSE and UCL). LSE's EME Masters attracts a very international cohort, including Europeans, and both North and South Americans, as it is a way, for say someone who studied at a US Liberal Arts college, to bolster their technical skills before making PhD applications. DS was the only Brit of the 40 in his intake. (Americans at larger better known institutions make up the gap by taking courses from the taught element of the PhD during their UG years.)

Economic PhDs are lucky in that there is a good range of potential employers both in the private and public sectors. Unfortunately for DS, this year's job market was tricky for macro-economists as the US Federal Reserve, who normally soak up a large number of the available cohort, had very few vacancies, which meant that academic jobs elsewhere became unusually competitive. The private sector tends to recruit later so then becomes the fall back. The job market is a sort of UCAS on steroids, with DS applying to almost 250 jobs world wide via a single application. Being a Brit does not help in that British Universities will hire whichever applicant they consider the best, regardless of nationality, whereas Universities in other countries will often favour their own nationals. (I have also heard that those with a six year US PhD are at an advantage over those who have only had three years PhD funding in the UK, but I may be wrong.) There is also language. One reason to study for a PhD in the US is to cement your professional English, enabling you to apply for departments that teach in English. Many of DS' peers, if they were not able to land a job in the US/Canada/UK/Australia were quickly snapped up in their home countries. Much as DS tried to big-up his A* in GCSE German, he was not really in the running outside the Anglophone world. That said, he was offered a couple of surprise flyouts to Asia for departments where though they officially taught in English, not having the language would have been a huge barrier. (He assumes that the departments were wanting a European, especially one with mother tongue English, to bolster their international credentials.)

One oddity about UK academia which the academics on this thread may understand better seems to be that after you land a job, the clock apparently starts ticking and you need to deliver a certain amount of research work within three years in order to gain tenure. And that this is particularly difficult in economics where research, and publication can take a while, especially if you are having to balance it with quite a lot of teaching. On the other hand would be academics going through the UK educational system with double maths A levels and a specialised three year UG degree, exit the system earlier so have more time to add to their experience and CV. One reason for the Americans dropping out mid way through the PhD was that they were older and getting to the point where they wanted to settle down and start earning.

It all worked out fine for DS, and he is looking forward to September. 😀

Research is similar like film industry, sports etc, affecting by how "rich" you are. As UK is declining in the world economics, it is not surprise to see the losing of many dominant positions. It has been reported that many Russell group universities nowadays relying on international students to survive. It's even very difficult for talented domestic young people to get to top universities now.

I am not sure I fully agree. Universities in North America have their own problems.

One of the weird things about economics is that to a much more obvious extent, you earn more in the private sector, and more in the US, than you would in the UK. Yet Universities like the LSE seem to be able to attract a stream of well known academics who want to return to Europe, and despite starting salaries being half what they would be in the US, the UK seems to be seen as an attractive environment in which to start your career.

DS and his friends, as you would expect from a group of young curious and analytical would-be academics started to establish their own rules about who might be hired where. One well known University in the Californian state system was open. The job spec was a strange word salad of diversity, disadvantage and the needs of the Latinx community. DS did apply but as a white English man (I can't remember, but possibly de-colonisation was in there somewhere) his chances were zero to nil. Anywhere in Quebec was out (some new law about hiring Francophones) whilst the rest of Canada, as well as northern and western US Universities were seen as tricky.

It is inevitable in that institutions seeking to diversify their workforce will look to recruitment as a quick means of making progress. There are swings and roundabouts, like Universities in Asia seemingly wanting to hire staff from European cultural backgrounds, whilst DS' understanding of southern US geography improved when he started to get interviews. Overall there was a sense that the US academic scene is becoming increasingly political, and perhaps going beyond redressing imbalances.

Where did the edit function go?

My point was that US campus' seem to becoming less happy places, thus less attractive places to live and work. Making the UK relatively more attractive. Perhaps this is just social science. Or perhaps my rather third hand observation is wrong.