Australian Research Output in Economics and Business: High Volume, Low Impact?

This paper investigates publication patterns of Australian academics in Economics & Business. I show that this discipline follows the general Australian trend of declining impact, measured as citations per paper, from the mid-1990s. However, the gap in Australia's ranking of publication quantity (number of papers) and publication quality (impact) is much wider in Economics & Business than in other disciplines. The discipline combines the highest ranking in quantity with the lowest ranking in quality. Seven possible explanations for this pattern are discussed.