The Matthew effect for cohorts of economists

This paper applies the Ijiri–Simon test for systematic deviations from Gibrat's law to citation numbers of economists. It is found that often-cited researchers attract new citation numbers that are disproportionate to the quality of their work. It is also found that this Matthew effect is stronger for economists who started their academic career earlier.

► The Ijiri–Simon test shows that citation numbers of economists systematically deviate from Gibrat's law.
► Often-cited economists attract a number of new citations that is disproportionate to the quality of their research.
► The Matthew effect is stronger for older researchers.