Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0 Series: Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers Creation-Date: 2007-06-21 Number: 07-048/3 Author-Name: C. Mirjam van Praag Author-Email: c.m.vanpraag@uva.nl Author-Workplace-Name: University of Amsterdam Author-Name: Bernard M.S. van Praag Author-Email: b.m.s.vanpraag@uva.nl Author-Workplace-Name: University of Amsterdam Title: The Benefits of Being Economics Professor A (and not Z) Abstract: Alphabetic name ordering on multi-authored academic papers_new, which is the convention in theeconomics discipline and various other disciplines, is to the advantage of people whose lastname initials are placed early in the alphabet. As it turns out, Professor A, who has been afirst author more often than Professor Z, will have published more articles and experienced afaster growth rate over the course of her career as a result of reputation and visibility.Moreover, authors know that name ordering matters and indeed take ordering seriously:Several characteristics of an author group composition determine the decision to deviatefrom the default alphabetic name order to a significant extent.

This discussion paper has been published in Economica, 75(300), 782-96. Classification-JEL: A11; A140; J32; J44 Keywords: performance measurement; incentives; economists; name ordering File-Url: https://papers.tinbergen.nl/07048.pdf File-Format: application/pdf File-Size: 291601 bytes Handle: RePEc:tin:wpaper:20070048