ere’s a clear, up-to-date summary of the average publication output of economics professors in academia, broken down by rank and type of institution (as of 2025). These numbers come from recent studies, CV analyses of thousands of economists, and data from top departments’ tenure files.
|
Professor Rank / Institution Type |
Average Number of Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles (Lifetime, as of tenure or current) |
Average per Year (Active Research Years) |
Notes / Key Sources |
|
Assistant Professor (pre-tenure, top 20 US depts) |
4–8 articles (by year 6–7) |
1.0–1.5 per year |
Required for tenure at top-20; many have 2–3 in top-5 journals (AER, QJE, JPE, ECMA, REStud). |
|
Associate Professor (tenured, top 50 US depts) |
8–15 articles |
~1.0 per year post-PhD |
Median around 10–12; slower after tenure. |
|
Full Professor (top 20 US depts) |
25–40 articles (career total) |
0.8–1.2 per year over 25–30 years |
Stars (top 5%) have 60–100+; many full professors publish <0.5/year after age 50. |
|
Full Professor (top 50–100 US depts) |
15–25 articles |
0.6–0.9 per year |
Lower pressure; more teaching/admin. |
|
Full Professor (liberal arts / teaching colleges) |
5–12 articles (or sometimes fewer) |
0.3–0.6 per year |
Heavy teaching load; many stop publishing after tenure. |
|
Average across ALL US tenure-track economics faculty |
~12–15 articles (lifetime) |
~0.6–0.8 per year |
Roughly 40–50% of all economists publish ≤1 paper every 5 years after tenure (Hamermesh 2018, 2023 update). |
Key Benchmarks for Tenure (2020s)
|
Department Rank |
Typical Requirement for Tenure (by year 6–7) |
|
Top 10 (Chicago, Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, etc.) |
5–8 papers, with at least 2–3 in top-5 journals |
|
Top 11–30 |
4–7 papers, at least 1–2 in top-5 or strong field journals |
|
Top 31–100 |
3–6 papers, quality still matters but more flexibility |
|
Non-research universities |
2–4 papers + good teaching |
Recent Trends (2015–2025)
- Average publications per year have slightly declined for new assistant professors because papers take longer (more co-authors, more data, higher referee standards).
- Co-authorship has exploded: the average economics paper now has 3.0–3.5 authors (up from ~1.8 in 1990), so “per capita” output looks lower even if total papers rise.
- About 20–25% of tenured economists publish zero papers in the last 5 years (especially full professors over age 55).
Bottom Line
- The typical active research economist (assistant or recently tenured associate at a research university) publishes about 1 peer-reviewed article every 1–1.5 years.
- The average tenured economics professor across all institutions publishes roughly 0.5–0.8 articles per year over their career, with huge variation (many publish almost nothing after tenure, a minority publish 3–5 per year).
Sources: Hamermesh (2018 & 2023 updates), AEA data on publications, tenure requirements from 100+ economics department websites (2020–2025), RePEc/IDEAS author rankings.
