One of the Economist’s Free Exchange columnists explains 11 things (s)he learned about the 20 best papers ever published in the American Economic Review:
3. Paul Douglas of Cobb-Douglas fame was a remarkable man. (A Quaker, he nonetheless joined the Marines at the age of 50, earning two purple hearts, before serving three terms as Martin Luther King Jr’s favourite senator. Most memorable, however, were his prewar tussles with his fellow Chicago aldermen, “the smartest bunch of bastards I ever saw grouped together”).
4. Remarkable though Douglas was, he and Charles Cobb did not invent the Cobb-Douglas production function.
5. Even if they had, perhaps they shouldn’t have.
And last:
11. The 20 best papers in the AER’s history average about 1.3 numbered equations per page.
