Human capital, collegiality, and stardom in economics: empirical analysis

Abstract

This study investigates the importance of collegiality (i.e., good colleagues) and the quality of human capital investment in fostering the development and growth of stars in the field of economics, where stardom is measured by way of receipt of the John Bates Clark Medal, arguably the second-most prestigious award in economics. We provide a vignette as a foundation for both qualitative and quantitative analysis using Egghe’s g-Index. Our results indicate that three institutions, namely Chicago, Harvard and MIT, with secondary consideration to Princeton, generally rank highest in fostering the growth and development of stars in the field of economics.