The Economics of Economics Journals: A Statistical Analysis of Pricing Practices by Publishers (Research Note)

Abstract

This study uses multiple regression analysis to investigate price determinants of the top-ranked economics journals.Holding other factors constant, the study found that the prices charged to libraries in the United States are significantly higher for journals from for-profit publishers and for those originating in Europe.The estimated price differential for European journals is too large to be attributed entirely to the extra cost of shipping the periodicals to the United States.Another finding was that there is a positive and significant correlation between a journal's impact (measured by frequency of citations) and its price.The results suggest that journal prices are not always cost based.One implication is that, as the main buyers in the market, libraries should not passively acquiesce to all price increases.Rather, working through their associations, libraries should require publishers of journals whose prices appear to be excessive to justify their pricing policies.• ide variation occurs in the prices of economics journals.Often, these differences cannot be explained by publishing costs alone.For example, the 1990 subscription price to libraries in the United States for the Journal of Econometrics was $575, while the rate for the Journal of Economic Issues was

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