Research

Job Market Paper


Reputation, Reputation, Reputation! Evidence from Academic Journals

Abstract: This paper investigates the impact and evolution of reputation. Using discontinuities that determine academic journals' rankings, I find that a shock to a journal's reputation has a long-lasting effect on citations of papers in that journal. This effect is stronger for positive shocks and among more influential journals. To determine whether the variation in citations is due to effects stemming from the selection of papers (selection effect) or the status of journals (value-added effect), I compare the differences in citations for papers published before and after the reputation shock. While both mechanism are relevant, I show that the selection effect is greatest for high tier journals, while value-added effect dominates the selection effect in medium tier journals.

Work in Progress


Abstract: Access to local public education system is one of the main reasons for migrant workers to move along with their children, besides higher wage rate in the urban cities. In the early 2010s, China has relaxed the stringent migration barriers to most cities, except for the top-tier ones, and has made lots of efforts for migrant children to enjoy local public schooling. We have seen an overall growth in the probability of migrating with the parents instead of being left-behind in the villages using individual-level data. In order to send their children to public schools, migrant parents who choose to work in a second-tier city are forced to forfeit around 15% wage payment compared to the earnings in top-tier cities. Counterfactual scenario where top-tier cities also allow migrant children to join local public schools predicts higher productivity due to agglomeration, bigger population size of top-tier cities and worsen congestion due to high population density.



Abstract: Transparency in judicial processes ensures fairness in the administration of justice. By exploiting a judicial reform in China that requires courts to stream trials online, I investigate the importance of transparent judicial process in judgement outcomes. I find that live recordings of trials acts as a strong mitigating factor in reducing unfair judgements of IP trials in China: it decreases the winning rate of advantaged groups such as local, state-owned and political connected firms.


Abstract: Unreliable papers are a significant issue in the academic and scientific community. They can erode trust in scientific research and scientists may waste valuable time pursuing or building upon false or unreliable findings. This paper studies an unintended impact of good reputation in unreliable papers detection. Using discontinuities that determine academic journals' rankings, I find that a shock to a journal's reputation affects number of retractions of journal. Being in a higher quartile increases detection of unreliable papers in the past and decreases publication of unreliable papers in the future. 


Abstract: Institutions in developing countries are offering cash rewards for publishing research papers to increase global visibility and improve academic ranking. However, it could have several potential negative implications such as data manipulation, plagiarism, or publishing multiple similar papers across different journals (salami slicing) to maximize rewards. Combining a novel data on Chinese universities’ publication reward policies and papers retraction data, This paper investigates the relationship between cash rewards and retraction of questionable papers. Result show that an increase in cash reward increases the number of questionable papers.