2017 - History of JEL Classification - Cherrier

Journal of Economic Literature 2017, 55(2), 545–579
https://doi.org/10.1257/jel.20151296
Classifying Economics: A History of the

JEL Codes†
Beatrice Cherrier*
In this paper, I suggest that the history of the classification system used by the
American Economic Association (AEA) to list economic literature and scholars is a
relevant proxy to understand the transformation of economics science throughout the
twentieth century. Successive classifications were fashioned through heated discus-
sions on the status of theoretical and empirical work, data and measurement, and
proper objects of analysis. They also reflected the contradictory demands of users,
including economists but also civil servants, journalists, publishers, librarians, and the
military, and reflected rapidly changing institutional and technological constraints.
Until the late 1940s, disagreements on the general structure of the classification dom-
inated AEA discussions. As the subject matters, methods, and definition of economics
rapidly evolved after the war, methodological debates raged on the status of theoreti-
cal and empirical work and the degree of unification of the discipline. It was therefore
the ordering and content of major categories that was closely discussed during the
1956 revision. The 1966 revision, in contrast, was fueled by institutional and tech-
nical transformations rather than intellectual ones. Classifiers essentially reacted to
changes in the way economists’ work was evaluated, the nature and size of the liter-
ature they produced, the publishing industry, and the use of computer facilities. The
final 1988–90 revision was an attempt by the Journal of Economic Literature (JEL)
editors to translate the mature core fields structure of their science into a set of codes
and accommodate the new types of applied work economists identified themselves
with. The 1990 classification system was only incrementally transformed in the next
twenty years, but that the AEA is currently considering a new revision may signal
more profound changes in the structure of economics. ( JEL A14)
* University of Caen and CREM. I am especially guidance have also helped me improve the paper. I also
grateful to Roger Backhouse, Steven Medema, and E. thank Ann Backhouse, Will Hansen, and Duke archivists
Roy Weintraub for their support and numerous sug- for invaluable assistance with the archives. This research
gestions, and to Drucilla Ekwurzel, John Pencavel, has benefited from financial support by the Institute
Roger Noll, and Steven Shavell for answering my ques- for New Economic Thinking. Errors remain my own.
tions and providing access to missing data. I have ben- I declare that I have no relevant or material financial
efited from helpful discussions with Bruce Caldwell, interests that relate to the research described in this
Philippe Fontaine, Yann Giraud, Harro Maas, Malcolm paper.
†
Rutherford, Aurélien Saidi, and Andrej Svorenčík. Four Go to https://doi.org/10.1257/jel.20151296 to visit the
anonymous referees and Steven Durlauf’s thoughtful article page and view author disclosure statement.
545
546 Journal of Economic Literature, Vol. LV (June 2017)
1. Introduction JEL codes to categorize papers, assuming a

stability that did not exist in most categories
C lassifying economics might appear to be

a routine and uncontroversial adminis-
trative task of no particular interest to econ-
(e.g., Gans 2000; Card and DellaVigna 2013;
Silva and Teixeira 2008; Duarte and Giraud
2016). And it is because the classification
omists.1 However, that is not the case. When matters that the AEA is currently contem-
John Pencavel, then editor of the Journal plating yet another revision (Rousseau 2013;
of Economic Literature ( JEL), initiated in AEA 2014).
1988 the revision that created the classifi- Classifications are the outcome of the
cations we use today, it took him two days process whereby individuals and institu-
to work out how to classify microeconomics. tions observe, list, name, order, and connect
But macroeconomics took no less than two things. Historians of the Linnaean nomen-
years of controversy. Previous revisions had clature of living species, Mendeleev’s peri-
also been very difficult, raising deep ques- odic table of chemical elements, Dewey’s
tions about the role of economic theory and decimal classification for books, or the
its relation to applied work, as well as about International Classification of Diseases,
the scope of microeconomics and macroeco- among others, have all emphasized how
nomics. Proposed changes to the codes were classifications are shaped by, and highlight,
seen as threatening or enhancing the status not only epistemological debates but also
and future prospects of classified fields, and social contexts and technological infra-
hence the careers of economists working in structures.4 This literature, however, deals
them.2 The history of the JEL codes is thus primarily with the scientific categorization
essentially a story of how economists have of physical objects. The classification of sci-
perceived their discipline. entific knowledge itself, which is what the
Though economists increasingly use key- JEL codes are doing, has received scant
word searches to locate material, the JEL
codes remain important. They provide a 4 On the 1753 Linnaean classification, see Larson (1971)
map with which to navigate the discipline on or Koerner (1999). Gordin (2002) replaces Mendeleev’s
the American Economic Association (AEA) 1969 periodic table in the context of St. Petersburg educa-
tional reforms in the 1860s and interprets it as a statement
website. They are used to publish and search in the type theory versus organic structure theory debates
job offers, skim job offers, assign grant appli- that pervaded organic chemistry in these years. On the
cations and submitted papers to referees, state of discussions on the influence Dewey should have
acknowledged in the making of his 1873 decimal classifica-
and search for book reviewers.3 Bibliometric tion, see Wiegand (1998). Bowker and Star (1999) present
studies of the characteristics of economists’ a history of the International Classification of Diseases.
publications, including size, age structure, Their book is notable in that it thoroughly examines the
informational, intellectual, political, and performative
coauthorship, subject matter, methodology, dimensions of categorizing natural or social entities. The
and citation patterns overwhelmingly rely on importance of classification as part of the information
infrastructure is perhaps best seen in the history of the
Memex, an imaginary mechanical device Vannevar Bush
1 Among the historical accounts of the AEA and its conceived of in 1945 to store individuals’ knowledge,
publishing activities, for instance (Coats 1969, 1971, 1985, including books, records, and conversation transcripts.
and Margo 2011), only Coats 1985 briefly mentioned early An ancestor of hypertext, the Memex would provide
attempts to classify members of the association. bookmarks and associative trails between elements. Each
2 See, for instance, the reactions to the recent individual was supposed to index each knowledge entry in
establishment of a JEL code for “Sports Economics”: his personal codebook. As Nyce and Kahn (1991) shows,
http://www.byuresearch.org/naasportseconomists/ Bush’s Memex was a pragmatic response to the informa-
http:/www.byuresearch.org/naasportseconomists/ tion overflow he felt bogged down researchers in the late
sea-new-orleans-2015/. 1930s, and to what he considered a poor organization of
3 See https://www.aeaweb.org/students/Fields.php. information in libraries.
Cherrier: Classifying Economics: A History of the JEL Codes 547
attention.5 Classifying scientific methods, the attempt to classify literature and per-
practices, literature, and even personnel, as sonnel within the same system created an
the AEA has done for a century, creates dif- ongoing tension. Finally, as with any other
ferent kinds of challenges. information system, the AEA classification
The history of the JEL codes recapitulates was heavily constrained by technological
longstanding debates on the relative status of infrastructure —the use of punchcards and
theory and applied work, on the relevance of then rapid developments in computing and
various approaches (historical, mathemati- information retrieval systems—as well as by
cal, experimental, game theoretic), and helps the technological and commercial evolution
document the fate of many fields across the of academic publishing and, not least, by
twentieth century. Yet the AEA classification budgetary constraints.
does not provide a pure image of the disci- My narrative is chronologically organized.
pline. Instead, it is a compromise between Nevertheless, I will reprise three major
looking forward and looking backward, points as the story unfolds. First, the evolu-
between AEA officials’ sometimes conflict- tion of the JEL codes reflected changes in
ing visions of their science and the multiple the ways theory and applied work interacted.
and contradictory demands they face: editors Second, the codes point to the transforma-
needed a way to select reviewers and refer- tion of the subject matters of the discipline
ees; recruitment committees needed a way and the rise and fall of different approaches
to classify job candidates and their output; to economics. Third, they reflect changes in
the government wanted a system to draft the external pressures on the discipline and
economists into the war effort, and later to information technology. With these issues
recruit specialists into the various bureaus in mind, the paper examines the major revi-
concerned with monitoring and managing sions, undertaken in 1938–44, 1955–56,
economic affairs; librarians needed help in 1966, and 1988–90, with a new one pending.
indexing papers and books; and the National In each case, various demands, AEA classi-
Science Foundation (NSF) needed a clas- fication suppliers’ visions, and technological
sification to quantify and evaluate national and institutional constraints interacted dif-
scientific expertise. Some of these demands ferently. The first efforts by AEA members
were internal to the profession, and others to classify economic literature and personnel
were external. Some dealt with literature, were influenced by war: government agen-
where it was not clear whether it should be cies needed to draft economists into the
classified by subject matter or approach, and war effort and rebuilding the country. This
others with the classification of economists external use appeared irreconcilable with
themselves. The latter requirement created economists’ desire for a scientific taxonomy,
additional s elf-identification constraints, and with the result that several classifications
were crafted (section 2). The next revision
5 One notable exception is Hounshell’s 2013 study
was driven primarily by the fundamental
of Columbia sociologist Karl Lazarsfeld’s method files, a transformation in economics that took place
classification system for scientific articles that relied on his after the war. Debates were therefore dom-
identification of the alternative methods a social scientist inated by heated epistemological disputes
could pursue. Vidal (2011) traces the changing status of
psychology in the eighteenth century, in particular with among AEA officials. This time, it was the
respect to anthropology, by studying its location in various impossibility of reconciling the visions of
science classifications provided in French encyclopédies. different AEA officials that led to the devel-
And Weldon (2013) explores the intellectual and social
forces that shaped the Isis classification for the history of opment of several classifications (section 3).
science. In contrast, the 1966 revision was about
rationalization. Multiple classifications did für Nationalökonomie und Statistik, one of

not immediately disappear, but they were the oldest economics journals. “The gen-
brought closer. The revision was dominated eral method seems to me to be serviceable;
by the need to harness the swelling tide of and, I believe, may result in an economy
literature under strict budgetary constraints. of space. The periodical literature I should
The perceived solution was automating the group independently under topical head-
AEA’s bibliographic efforts. Old epistemo- ings, e.g., all the articles on ‘British Fiscal
logical debates resurfaced, but they were Policy’ under the title ‘Workmen’s compen-
heavily constrained by the need to adapt the sation . . . etc.,’” he explained.7 The first
classification to computerization (section 4). issue, published March 1911, used the fol-
The latest revision (1988 –90) was prompted lowing categories:
by economists’ frustration with the lack of
space for new approaches. The JEL board of General Work, Theory, and its History
editors saw the stabilization of the discipline Economic History and Geography
Agriculture, Mining, Forestry, and Fisheries
around a micro/macro/quantitative methods Manufacturing Industries
core, applied in a set of fields, as an opportu- Transportation and Communication
nity to create a set of codes that could serve Trade, Commerce, and Commercial Crises
multiple functions. The making of the core Accounting, Business Methods, Investments,
categories, the consolidation of theoreti- and the Exchanges
Capital and Capitalistic Organizations
cal, empirical, and policy approaches, and Labor and Labor Organizations
the negotiations around which fields to list Money, Prices, Credit, and Banking
absorbed most of their energy (section 5). I
conclude by speculating on the challenges This list was then modified in subsequent
the new revision faces. issues, with no public statement ever being
made about its rationale.8
1.1. Beginnings: Classifying Literature and
Although this original list was aimed at
Personnel (1911–48)
organizing literature, it was the growing—
1.1.1 Internal and External Demands yet now largely forgotten—need to classify
AEA members that prompted open discus-
The AEA’s first classification was the sion of the methodology of classification.
result of Davis Rich Dewey’s pragmatic The AEA had always published an annual
and lonely attempt to arrange published alphabetical directory of members, but the
reviews, book notes, and annotated titles
according to their subject matter.6 The idea
7 Dewey to Kemmerer, November 26, 1910, box 66.
had emerged in the fall of 1910. As Dewey
Unless otherwise specified, all the archives references are
was struggling to get the first volume of the from the Records of the American Economic Association,
American Economic Review (AER) out, he Economists’ Papers Archive, Duke University. Archive
thought of drawing on the kind of structure material is referenced at the end of each paragraph or each
subsection. On the Jahrbuch, see Menger (1889). Book
found in Johannes Conrad’s Jahrbücher reviews were organized by subject matter, rather than by
alphabetical order, which reflected historical economists’
interest in classification issues.
6 For a detailed account of Davis Dewey and subse- 8 In the volume information, these categories were
quent AER editors, see Coats (1969). On the beginnings of listed in alphabetical order rather than in a specific order
the AER, see Coats (1969) and Margo (2011). Dewey was reflecting seniority, importance, or suggestive of any hier-
the older brother of psychologist and educational reformer archy between categories. Doctoral dissertations were
John Dewey. They are not siblings of the architect of the listed by university. A competing list was that used by the
decimal system. He was a professor of economics and sta- Harvard editors of the Quarterly Journal of Economics,
tistics at MIT who specialized in economic history. founded in 1886, to classify new books.
first free-standing biographical Handbook in the country. Princeton psychometrician

of the American Economic Association was Carl Brigham, the inventor of the SAT, was
not published until 1936. Yet, although entrusted with writing up the economics
the 1938 directory listed AEA members’ checklist. He knew that categorizing econo-
self-reported “fields of interests” along with mists was “of utmost importance in national
other data, secretary James Washington defense,” but he found the task so arduous
Bell felt the alphabetical listing offered no that, after other social sciences had returned
systematic way of knowing members’ spe- their classifications, he requested that secre-
cialties. The need for such information was tary Bell “give [. . .] immediate attention to
not merely intellectual and educational, it this problem.”
was also prompted by the executive com- External pressure did not abate with the
mittee’s desire the preserve the associa- end of the war. In 1944, roster executives
tion’s scholarly and scientific character in again asked Bell to provide a description of
spite of heterogeneous membership (Coats “economists,” with an associated list of spe-
1985, p. 1708).9 cialties, and requests to revise it regularly
Systems that categorize economists were appeared over the next decade. The stakes
also increasingly requested by outside bod- were different, but no less high. Aware that
ies. Business and governmental recruiters scientists had been a crucial asset in the
needed job candidates listed by skills and war, the Office of Defense Mobilization
specialties.10 Increasing pressure was put insisted on maintaining a national register
on the AEA to provide an adequate classifi- of “scientific manpower.” The government’s
cation of its members as the war in Europe requirement that all scientists be regis-
escalated and the likelihood of American tered according to their field of expertise
involvement increased. Scholarly institu- thus became permanent.11 At the same
tions, including the Social Science Research time, government officials intended to set
Council (SSRC) and the American Council up a civil patronage system alongside the
of Learned Societies (ACLS), understood science–military partnership, under the

that scientists would soon be drafted to help leadership of well-known natural scientists
with national-defense planning. In an effort such as MIT engineer Vannevar Bush. As
to control the process, in the spring of 1940 would quickly become clear from the failed
they recommended the establishment of “a attempt to establish a social science division
national agency for the registry and procure- within the newly created National Science
ment of scientific personnel.” Christened the Foundation (NSF) in 1950, economists’
National Roster of Scientific and Specialized scientific credentials were still much chal-
Personnel, the governmental organiza- lenged, in particular the apolitical character
tion immediately set out to send a general of their knowledge, their ability to identify
questionnaire and a disciplinary “technical “laws,” and even their social usefulness
check list” of subject matters to all scientists
11 The responsibility for maintaining this National
Register of Scientific and Technical Personnel was trans-
9 It was around that time that the introduction of a ferred to the NSF in 1953, which again solicited econo-
new and more democratic procedure for electing officers mists to update their own classification during the 1960s
inspired proposals to restrict voting rights to “properly (see section 4). In 1952, the ACLS and the Office of Naval
qualified” members, for example, PhDs. Research additionally produced a National Register of
10 For instance, civil servants approached the AEA after Humanities and Social Sciences. It listed some 9,000 econ-
the passage of the Classification Act of 1923, which sought omists with at least a master’s degree, classified according
to standardize jobs and salaries across its various depart- to subject-matter groups derived from the AEA classifica-
ments and agencies (Coats 1985). tion (see, Wellemeyer 1953, AEA 1957).
(Solovey 2013).12 Aware of this “salesman- He explained that his cloud of keywords
ship” issue, AEA officials understood that reflected his need to list potential reviewers,
the classifications requested by various and that he feared that too exhaustive a clas-
governmental agencies might help raise (or sification would entail classifying most books
lower) the public image of the discipline. into more than one category. Bell entertained
very different ideas, circulating several com-
1.1.2. Divergent Visions of the Purpose and
prehensive and logically ordered schemes,
Structure of Classification
some explicitly designed to emulate the
For several years, AEA officials proved genus–species biological taxonomy devel-
unable to cater to the needs of their members, oped by Carl Linnaeus during the nineteenth
business recruiters, and governmental organi- century. “I had hoped that we might work
zations. Bell had officially opened a consulta- out a logical, fairly exclusive list of catego-
tion to craft a classification for both literature ries,” he wrote, and “I still think it is possi-
and personnel for use in the next handbook, ble if you adopt the main head-subhead,
but by March 1940, significant divisions had genus–species device. Highly complicated
already emerged within the AEA Executive flora and fauna can be done under such a sys-
Committee and its consultants over the struc- tem, and I think human products and human
ture such a classification should adopt. Very interests can too.” He therefore viewed the
few economists wanted the classification to Linnean scheme as a way to tame complexity,
reflect a particular philosophical stance on though he did not delve into epistemological
the structure of the discipline, such as those issues on the comparability of natural and
offered by John Neville Keynes, John Stuart human objects. His initial draft included nine
Mill, or Vilfredo Pareto. The one prominent categories, each divided between three and
exception was William Jaffé, who suggested ten subcategories (see figure 1). 13
that Léon Walras’s division of economics One of Bell’s proposals even outlined an
among pure science, applied science, and explicit organizing principle: the first three
social economics should serve as blueprint categories were grouped under a head-
for the revision. Instead, contributors tended ing, Methodological Economics, and the
to adopt a pragmatic stance, best summa- rest under Areas of Research, Including
rized by James W. Angell of Columbia: “the Specialized Theories, Technique, and
general test of the classification ought to be Material. When Paul Homan was appointed
convenience in courses now taught and lit- editor of the AER in the spring of 1940, he
erature now appearing, rather than the log- looked for a middle way in between Bell
ical requirements of the table of contents and Dewey’s systems. In August 1940, after
of a ‘Principles of Economics.’” Dewey pro-
posed an unsorted list of thirty-six subjects, 13 After Finance, there was Marketing and Trade;
including: Theory; American Economic Public Utilities, Transportation, Communications; Labor;
History; Business Cycles; Marketing; Oil Production Economics; and Other Fields. In subsequent
drafts, he took into account AEA members’ suggestions
Industry. His approach was that of an e ditor. and added new categories such as Land and Agriculture,
Populations and Migrations, Money and Banking, or
Risk and Securities. Bell’s optimistic attitude toward the
12 Solovey (2013, ch. 1) related how Wesley Mitchel Linnaean classification contrasted with ecological research-
carried a “unity-of-natural-and-social-sciences” plea in the ers’ gradual disillusionment. Kohler (2008) explains that,
name of the SSRC to defend social-science’s space within by the 1910s, ecology classifiers had come to realize that
the NSF, but to no avail. In the early 1950s, the physical their objects were not objects as natural as botanical or
sciences received more than 70 percent of all federal sci- zoological species were, that there existed no stable bio-
ence funds, the life sciences nearly 20 percent, and the logical mechanisms that allowed them to trace boundaries
social sciences stood at 3 percent. between categories.
1. Economics 3. Accounting; Statistics;

General economics (Qualitative Measurements)
Economic theory Business measurement
History of economic theory or economic Accounting theory
thought or economic doctrine Accounting practice
Institutional economics Statistical methodology
Mathematical economics Mathematical statistics
Business cycle theory Business cycle statistics and measurement
2. Economic History 4. Finance

Economic institutions
Business history
Industrial history
(Economic geography)
Figure 1. Excerpt from Bell’s Draft Classification, January 1940
Source: See footnote 14.
1. General Works 9. Business Cycles

2. Economic Theory and its History 10. Securities Markets, Investment, and
3. Economic History Insurance
4. Economic Geography and Regional 11. International Trade and Finance
Economics 12. Business Organization and Law, and
5. National Economic Systems and Politics Corporation Finance
6. Public Finance 13. Domestic Trade and Marketing
7. Statistics and Accounting 14. Land Economics, Agriculture, and Fisheries
8. Money, Credit and Banking ....
Figure 2. Excerpt from Homan’s Proposed Classification, August 1940
Source: See footnote 14.
what he described as “a trance-like period Homan opened their list of specialties with
of illumination,” he came up with a list of Business Cycles, Public Finance, Money
twenty-three subject matters without any and Banking, and Corporate Finance.
subcategories (see figure 2). Other proposals gave priority to Natural and
The way categories were ordered in these Physical Resources of Production, Labor,
proposals also revealed that AEA executives’ and Business or Industrial Organization.
definitions of economics diverged. Each A Keynesian focus on exchange and on the
system was headed with some kind of the- role of money in the production process was
oretical/general category, and two blocks of thus increasingly competing with the more
fields competed for the second tier. Bell and classical interest in real production and the
Pattern of Classification of Fields of Economics

Methodology General Special
(Analytical, historical, (Aggregative or macrocosmic (Segments or applied fields—
quantitative) approach—connective subjects— conventional subdivisions)
methods and application)
1. Economic Theory 4. Economic Systems; Planning 7. Money and Banking, etc.
2. Economic History; National and Reform; Co-operation 8. Business Finance, etc.
Economies 5. National Income, etc. 9. Public Finance
3. Statistical Methods 6. Business Fluctuations 10. International Economics
11. Business Administration
12. Indus. Org.; Pub. Reg.
13. Public Utilities, etc.
14. Industry Studies
15. Land Economics, etc.
16. Labor
17. Social Welfare, etc.
Figure 3. The AEA Classification, 1948
efficient allocation of resources (Backhouse categories—Economic Theory, Economic

and Medema 2009).14 History; National Economies, and Statistical
Methods—were identified as methodolog-
1.1.3 Many Classifications for Many Uses
ical. The next three—Economic Systems,
Although Bell’s sophisticated approach to National Income, and Business Fluctuations,
classification encountered repeated opposi- were introduced as “methodological subjects
tion—it was considered “too elaborate” by . . . more closely allied to problems of poli-
the executive committee—he was eventually cies and processes . . . a general, aggregative
to see his scheme adopted by the AEA in and macrocosmic approach to the study of
1948 (see figure 3).15 economics [that] combine[s] methods and
Presented in the pages of the AER with applications” (AEA 1948). Eleven “applied
an accompanying methodological note fields” followed. An effort had been made to
(a first), the new scheme exhibited an reduce the number of categories, which was
overarching organization. The first three achieved through the aggregation of several
subject matters into Business Administration
14 Jaffé to Bell, March 27, 1940; Angell to Bell, April and Industrial Organization; Public
20, 1940; “Preliminary Draft of Proposed Classification,” Regulation. Each major heading was item-
Box 89. “Classification 2nd Draft,” June 3, 1940; ized in two or three subheads. The commit-
“Classification of Fields of Specialization—Third Draft;”
“Draft Classification; A.E.A Executive Committee tee (AEA 1949) congratulated themselves
meeting, March 23, 1940;” Dewey to Bell, March 18, for eventually achieving a “genus–species”
1940; Homan to members of the Executive Committee, classification and argued that such architec-
August 1, 1940; “Proposed reclassification. . .” July 1840;
Box 89 folder “National Roster.” ture enabled the AEA to order both person-
15 The executive committee that approved the new nel (by genus) in handbooks and publications
scheme included Morris Copeland, Frank Fetter, Joseph (by species) in AER issues.
Spengler, Homan, and Fritz Machlup, who had replaced
Homan as AER managing editor in the years 1944 and This type of classification was, however, a
1945. far cry from that eventually adopted by the
roster. When reviewing the various propos- Economists’ reaction to Brigham’s scheme
als forwarded by AEA, Brigham immedi- epitomizes the challenges of accommodating
ately rejected Bell’s genus–species scheme various uses in one classification. When they
as too elaborate. “The purpose of the Roster remarked that the roster’s plan was “simple,
does not demand a clean-cut, logical system logical, but not comprehensive,” Brigham
of classification,” he explained. Rather, the again pointed out that his purpose had never
technological constraints of the users of the been comprehensiveness, but the quick
classification, e.g., civil servants and the mili- retrieval of a scientist’s profile. The necessity
tary, should be allowed to frame its structure: to tailor a classification to each use was even-
“a high degree of refinement does not lend tually acknowledged by Bell. When asked by
itself to the punched card system. We must, the roster to provide a description of what
therefore, start out with the punched card in economists did and to list their “branches”
mind and disregard to some extent certain of specialization, he and some colleagues
highly analytical concepts,” he wrote to Bell. carved out a new (and non-comprehensive)
Working from the perspective of suppliers as classification consisting of only seven cate-
well as demanders of specialized personnel, gories: Economic Theory; Money, Banking,
he decided to fashion two classifications. One and Finance; Industry; International Trade;
had been designed by AER editor Homan, Agricultural Economics; Labor Economics;
with the help of Douglas Brown, and was and Socio-Economics. Aimed at a large
intended as a list of 200 generic problems audience of nonacademic recruiters, his leaf-
studied by economists, from plant locations let briefly described each branch in simple
to producing chemicals, union organiza- terms.17 It was introduced by an occupational
tion, city planning, crop estimates, and radio summary that made it clear that the rationale
broadcasting. The other one was a list of behind this list was a definition of economics
commodities and manufactured articles that as the science of production:
included poultry, potatoes, and corn to wool,
flax, petroleum, zinc, fertilizers, alkalines, Economists study the whole process through
which man makes a living and satisfies his
explosives, drugs, and machineries, among wants for food, shelter, service or amusement,
many others. Each economist would pick as and the conditions favoring or hampering his
many commodities as possible “within the economic development. This includes where,
restrictions of a two-column punch,” and, how and what man produces, how goods and
for each one, would specify his principal services are distributed and paid for.
“method of attack” from a list of ten entries,
including extraction, manufacture, transpor- 600 anthropologists, 350 sociologists, and 3,600 historians
tation, marketing, pricing, and wages. The and political scientists. More questionnaires had been sent
to economists than psychologists (3,995 versus 3,443), but
shape of these two lists highlights that, while the response rate was lower. “National Roster of Scientific
economics emerged from the war as the sci- and Specialized Personnel;” Brigham to Bell, October 10,
ence of decision, it entered it as the science 1940; “Suggested Classification for Economists,” October
14, 1940; “Classification of Raw and Manufactured
of production.16 Products and Associated Industries,” October 18, 1940;
“Total Questionnaires Mailed. . . ” box 89, folder “National
Roster.”
16 At least, that was how it was viewed by public offi- 17 Those economists working in “Socio-Economics,”
cials, who identified it as a “critical occupation” along for instance, “stud[ y] broad developments as they affect
with psychology and statistics, the latter being then con- the economic welfare of the country. This includes such
sidered a distinct science. Consequently, economics subjects as population growth and movements; national
was one of the first sciences “circularized” in 1940–41. income by social group; the occupational distribution of
By mid 1941, 1,900 economists were registered by the people; the conservation and use of such natural resources
roster, versus 3,900 psychologists, 1,700 statisticians, as minerals, water power, and land; and regional planning.”
The brochure also emphasized that an accelerated in the late 1940s.19 New fields
MA or PhD was the best sign of economic thrived, including growth, development,
proficiency. Showing that a classification was and Keynesian analysis. Older subjects were
a highly strategic matter, Jules Backman, who approached differently, as new methods of
was then involved in a dispute with the New inquiry were adopted: input–output meth-
York State Tax Department over whether ods, activity analysis, econometrics and
economics was in fact a “profession,” pro- quantitative analysis, and other forms of
tested that this criterion was “pitched so mathematical modeling. The definition of
high that only giraffes can reach it. We need economics itself was shifting, with the tradi-
a description low enough that some of the tional focus on wealth and production being
calves can get in” (Coats 1985, p. 1709).18 gradually displaced by scarcity and problems
Early attempts to classify economic litera- of rational choice (Backhouse and Medema
ture and personnel were thus dominated by 2009). The marginalization of institutional-
the numerous internal and external demands ism reduced the diversity of approaches to
AEA officials faced in the 1930s and 1940s. economic problems (Morgan and Rutherford
These were sufficiently hard to reconcile, 1998). The number of AEA members nearly
so that several classification schemes were doubled between 1940 (4,000) and 1955
simultaneously designed, including sophis- (7,500). Their growing production of books,
ticated lists of subject matters, short lists of reports, and journals fostered the develop-
specialties, and lengthy lists of manufactured ment of commercial indexes, such as the
products. Many of these demands were Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature,
underpinned by outside pressure on econo- which covered selected material from the
mists to define their profession and warrant AER, the Quarterly Journal of Economics,
their scientific credentials. As the discipline and the Journal of Political Economy. At
underwent a massive transformation in the the AEA, literature indexing had been dis-
decade after the war, economists became continued before the war, but the literature
eager to fashion a classification that embod- expansion put pressures on editors to resume
ied a unified identity. Unfortunately, no con- this activity. In the early 1950s, Don Patinkin
vergence was to be found in AEA classifiers’ and Mark Perlman, among others, repeat-
endless methodological debates. edly asked that a “cumulative analytical bib-
liography” be edited. Keeping track of AEA
members was also difficult, as they worked
2. In Search of Unity: Fights Over the
not just in academia but also in education,
Soul of Economics (1952–62)
government, and the military. 20
Such changes were not restricted to eco-
2.1 New Demands Prompted by the
nomics. All social sciences had grown, expe-
Changes in the Nature and Scope of
rienced an empirical turn, and an expansion
Economics
War acted as a catalyst for the discipline.
The changes in economics’ methodol- 19 The best introduction to the postwar transformation
ogy and content initiated during the 1930s of US economics is Backhouse (2008). Weintraub (2014)
presents the major “metanarratives” whereby historians
usually account for this transformation.
20 See, for instance, the fourth Exhibit of the 1957
18 Bell to Brigham, October 15, 1940 and October 18, AEA handbook entitled The Profession of Economists:
1940; Brigham to Bell, October 21, 1940; Brigham to Mills, Educational Requirements and Career Opportunities.
October 31, 1940; box 89. “Description of the Profession of On economists’ involvement with the government, see
ECONOMISTS. O-39.14,” box 60. Bernstein (2001) and Fourcade (2009).
of their educational and governmental They were also sensitive to AEA members’
duties, although these played out differently soul searching and need for a better grasp
in psychology, sociology, and anthropol- of the transformation of their discipline.
ogy (Backhouse and Fontaine 2009, 2010). One response to the latter was a two-volume
A consequence was that social sciences Survey of Contemporary Economics (Ellis
classifications were flourishing worldwide. 1948; Haley 1952), whose purpose was to
The Library of Congress had developed provide “the qualified layman, the beginning
an economics section in its classification, graduate student, and the public servant”
the Institut National de la Statistique et with an account of economists’ “main ideas—
des Études Économiques de Paris had both analytical devices and their practical
recently issued a Plan de Classification applications to public policy—which have
Décimale, and UNESCO was sponsoring an evolved during the last ten or fifteen years”
International Bibliography of Economics.21 (Ellis 1948, p. v). In this intellectual context,
While the Cambridge and Oxford libraries the classification was considered another
were developing systems of their own, vari- vehicle to showcase the growing unity of the
ations of the AER classification were used discipline.
by the Netherlands School of Economics, In the fall of 1955, Bell circulated a memo
the Australian National Research Council, proposing to revise the AEA classification.
Johns Hopkins University, and the College He did not anticipate that it would pro-
of the City of New York. Librarians from voke a prolonged and heated epistemologi-
many institutions, such as the Library of cal debate. Eager to provide a scheme that
Congress and the British National Institute would adequately encapsulate the iden-
of Economic and Social Research were urg- tity of the profession, the economists who
ing the association to provide a new classifi- were consulted argued for months over the
cation scheme that could serve as a reference respective status of theoretical and applied
point for all the institutions dealing with eco- work, how and where to classify new model-
nomic literature (AEA 1957). ing and measurement approaches, and which
applied subject matters should be grouped
2.2 A Revision Captured by Internal
together or given independence. In par-
Epistemological Debates
ticular, the debates pitched former interim
AEA officials were fully aware of the and current AER editors Fritz Machlup and
“international ferment of interest” in classi- Bernard Haley against one another. Both had
fication (Bell’s words). They understood that done applied work: Machlup had special-
the classification promulgated by the AEA ized in international monetary economics,
would shape the discipline’s public image foreign exchanges, and industrial organi-
at a time when economists’ distinctive sci- zation—especially patents and innovation;
entific credentials were still challenged.22 Haley had written on value and distribu-
tion, price controls, and cartels. They were
21 The Library of Congress Classification includes a thus interested in theories, but also in facts
class H titled “social sciences,” which collapses statistics,
economics, and sociology.
22 In his 1953 AEA report on Graduate Education in lower than that of other learned professions” (quoted in
Economics, Howard Bowen characteristically lamented Coats 1985, p. 1716). Thomas Carroll, an official from the
the fact that “the economists of the United States are a Ford Foundation, who had become the largest patron for
small heterogeneous group without strong professional social sciences in these years, was making plans to open a
consciousness or powerful professional organization. “behavioral science program” in which economists would
They face public attitudes that are often indifferent and participate in interdisciplinary work alongside other social
sometimes hostile. Their status as viewed by the public is scientists (Pooley and Solovey 2010).
and institutions. Both were lauded for their theoretical,” he wrote to Haley.24 Likewise,
broad knowledge of economists’ practices “abstract” and “applied” theory could also be
and both had experience outside academia. disentangled from each other, he explained:
Machlup had pursued a business career in
cardboard manufacture during the 1920s, Of course, applied theory is also abstract to a
certain extent. There can be only a difference
while Haley had worked for the Office of in degree between abstract and applied theory.
Price Administration and the Department of One can perhaps say that a theory should be
State during the war. 23 called applied if it uses variable assumptions
Their main disagreement was over the concerning political institutions. For example,
possibility and desirability of establish- the pure quantity theory of money might be
called abstract. A monetary theory which dis-
ing a separate top-level “theory” category. cusses various kinds of banking institutions,
Machlup believed there should be one. His different kinds of reserve requirements, dif-
arguments reflected a mix of pragmatism— ferent types of money substitutions, should
he wanted a classification with enough “class be called applied theory . . . I have little dif-
segregation”—and principle, resulting from ficulty putting Keynes’ General Theory into
my group [Abstract Economic Theory] and
his longstanding interest in methodological Keynes’ Treatise on Money into group [Money
debates. Trained under Ludwig Von Mises in and Banking].
Vienna, at the time of the revision Machlup
was engaged in a controversy with Terence Haley did not believe such a strict separa-
Hutchison over finding a middle way between tion between theoretical and empirical work,
what he called Hutchison’s “ultraempiri- or even between abstract and applied theory,
cism” and Von Mises’s “extreme a priorism” was possible. “Is there any theory that is not
(Machlup 1955; see also Caldwell 1982). His abstract? And, for that matter, is there any
solution was to differentiate between “funda- economic theory worth its salt that is not
mental (heuristic) hypotheses, which are not applied,” he teased Machlup. He wanted
independently testable, and specific (factual) each category to cover a specific subject mat-
assumptions, which are supposed to corre- ter, theoretical and empirical. Even the top
spond to observed facts or conditions; or . . . category was designed to encompass price
between hypotheses on different levels of theory, but also statistical demand analysis, as
generality and, hence, of different degrees of well as “both theoretical and empirical stud-
testability” (Machlup 1955, pp. 8–9). No such ies of, e.g., the consumption function, eco-
thing as “theoretically meaningful numbers” nomic growth models of the Harrod–Domar
existed, so that theoretical and empirical variety, [. . .] national income accounting con-
work were altogether distinct. “I have not yet cepts and methods.”25 Moreover, he feared
seen a single numerical parameter or coef-
ficient in economics that could be derived 24 This idea was predicated upon a comparison with
from a theoretical system. As I see it, the physics, which, unlike economics, involved “theoreti-
numbers in economics are historical facts not cally meaningful numbers.” And even in this case, he
had explained the previous year, “physical concepts are
free creations of the human mind, and are not, however
it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world”
(Machlup 1955, p. 27).
25 In response, Machlup denied any intention to isolate
23 See Chipman (2008) for biographical material on empirical work from the rest of economics: “Where I want
Machlup. On Haley, see the “Memorial Resolution” to separate abstract, non-numerical studies from quanti-
drafted by Tibor Scitovsky, Moses Abramovitz, and tative and numerical ones is only in analyses of the gen-
Edward Shaw: http://historicalsociety.stanford.edu/ eral system of economic theory. I believe there is a valid
pdfmem/HaleyB.pdf. Haley had edited the second AEA distinction between the comprehensive theoretical system
Survey of Contemporary Economics mentioned earlier. and various applied subjects on which the general theory
that Machlup’s proposal would create arbi- c ategory was more eclectic. It covered the
trary separation, while he believed that the 1948 category National Accounting, but
classification should bring unity. The estab- also the various data produced through
lishment of a theory category would suggest econometrics, activity analysis, or input–
that “. . . class 1 is theory, the rest are applied. output analysis.26 Discussions on the tech-
But obviously, such a distinction cuts across niques themselves were to be filed under a
subject-matter fields. How about monetary Research Techniques, Economic Data cat-
theory, international trade theory, business egory. Haley and Bell’s proposals exhibited
cycle theory? Do they all go into class 1? similar groupings, but the title Bell had envi-
In my opinion,” he continued, “the answer sioned—Economic Methodology—drew fire
is to adhere strictly to a classification in from Machlup. Economic methodology was
terms of subject-matter fields.” Accordingly, a “philosophical activity,” and it made no
in his successive drafts, Haley consistently sense to juxtapose the methodological writ-
eschewed any “theory” headings, which he ings of Carl Menger, Schmoller, J.N. Keynes,
replaced with either General Economics, or Veblen, Schumpeter, Robbins . . . with arti-
with a combination of subject matters, such cles on Chi-squared tests, he retorted.27 The
as Price Systems; National Income Analysis. category was meant to cover mathematical
As far as measurement and data were con- economics, but many economists advised
cerned, Machlup was, not surprisingly, push- that the latter be removed altogether from
ing for the separate category reproduced the classification. Haley called it a “method
below: of analysis of exposition” rather than a “kind”
of economics, Werner Hildebrand agreed
Social Accounting, Measurements, and that it was a “means of communication and
Numerical Hypotheses
analysis.”
a) Concepts of National Income and Wealth
b) Estimates of National Income and Wealth,
Bell, Haley, Machlup, and their col-
Investment, Consumption leagues also argued over how to cope with
c) Measurement of Economic Activity (census emerging, expanding, and dying subject
data, expenditure surveys, etc.) comprising, matters. That room should be made for the
for instance, Kuznets’s work burgeoning fields of growth theory (to be
d) Input–Output Matrices, Activity Analysis
e) Numerical Hypotheses (consumptions
classified under Income and Employment
and investment functions etc.), including Theory) and economic development (to go
Koopmans’ quantitative models along with Economic History in an inde-
pendent category) commanded wide agree-
Haley supported the set up of a Statistics, ment. On the other hand, the former Public
Methods of Measurement group, but in Utilities, Transportation, Communications,
addition to having a good deal of empirical and Industry Study groups were integrated
work classified alongside theory, the
26 A few months before, he had contemplated putting
Social Accounting together with other macroeconomic
is brought to bear. A quantitative study of the labor mar- subject matters in the first group. He also wanted activity
ket surely belongs to labor economics . . . a quantitative analysis to be included in the first category under Price and
study, however, of aggregate consumption or aggregate Allocation Theory.
investment cannot be assigned to any applied field but 27 Both methodology and history of economic thought
should not be merged with abstract theory either. It is for were moved, in successive drafts, from one category to
such quantitative studies and numerical hypotheses that another depending on the aim of each researcher. While
I wanted a special group together with national income the latter eventually found home alongside price theory
analysis and other social accounting” (Machlup to Haley, and income theory, “methodology” was eventually dropped
February 3, 1956, box 102). from the final classification.
into Industrial Organization. Where to and business and industry economists could
locate economic geography was more con- identify themselves with one or more of
troversial. Machlup and others persistently them. This was the reason why the former
argued it should be removed from its former introductory General Economics category,
Land Economics; Agricultural Economics; originally deleted by Haley and Bell, was
Economic Geography; Housing category eventually reinstated. Many consultants,
and broken up between Area Studies and including IMF economist Richard Gooda,
International Economics, where compara- suggested that the tentative classification was
tive analysis belonged. Likewise, Haley had too rigorous and too research oriented, and
initially planned to move consumption eco- that General Economics would be a useful
nomics from the last category—Population, group within which to classify the activities
Welfare, and Living Standards—to the of college teachers, the production of text-
top category, alongside income analysis. books, etc. . . .
This move was warranted by the shift from The Theory category was closer in spirit
institutional to theoretical analysis the field to the vision of Haley than Machlup’s, allow-
underwent in the previous decade. Machlup ing the classification of empirical work and
wanted part of consumption studies to be activity analysis alongside theoretical mod-
filed under micro rather than macro, as they els. Although Bell’s original plans to name
were related to the pure theory of consumer the category Micro and Macroeconomic
choice, and pointed out that institutional Theory received wide support throughout
studies of consumer habits, what he called the revision process, he eventually decided
Home Economics, was well alive and in against it, won over by Machlup’s somewhat
expansion.28 contorted argument that there was no the-
ory other than micro and macro, therefore
2.3 The Resulting Compromise
the wording was redundant. For his part,
The final structure and wording of the Haley had conceded that many economists
final classification (see table 1) reflected an identified themselves with the “theory” label
epistemological compromise between alter- he had tried to avoid, and he agreed to have
native visions of theory, empirical work, it reinstated. Haley also won the consolida-
measurement, tools, and the field dynamics tion of national accounting into a category
of the discipline. The compromise was also that eventually mixed methodological dis-
between forward and backward looking, and cussions, measurements, and data outputs.
between the requirements that it should The AEA’s heterogeneous membership—
serve both for publications and personnel. which included a sizeable cohort of statisti-
Categories and their titles therefore needed cians—underpinned the decision to name
to be framed in such a way that AEA mem- the category Economic Statistics. Columbia
bers, researchers, teachers, civil servants, economist Ragnar Nurske explained that
“some members recognize themselves as
specialized in a method and may apply it
28 From Box 102, folder “classification committee 1956”: to, say, labor in one paper, transportation
“Memorandum” from Bell, October 17, 1955; Comments in another, and agriculture in a third. Their
by Machlup, undated; “Proposed Revision of Classification
of Subject-Matters or Fields of Specialization,” by Haley, base of operations remains group 3 as it
undated, Haley to Machlup, December 7, 1955; Draft revi- now stands.” The same logic also prevailed
sion, fourth draft by Bell, and third draft by Haley, undated in the naming of Business Administration,
(probably January 1956); Machlup to Haley, January 17,
1956; Haley to Machlup, January 27, 1956; Machlup to which Haley had tried to rename Economics
Haley, February 3, 1956. of the Firm. Echoing business economists’
Table 1.
Comparison between the Classification Schemes Used in 1949 and 1956
AEA CLASSIFICATION 1949 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956

(selected categories only) (selected categories only)
1. ECONOMIC THEORY; GENERAL ECONOMICS 1. GENERAL ECONOMICS (teachers of general

a) Theory courses and all nonspecialists)
b) History of Theory
c) Mathematical Economics 2. PRICE THEORY; INCOME THEORY; HISTORY
OF THOUGHT
a) Price and Allocation Theory (including general
welfare economics, activity analysis, capital theory,
value and distribution theory)
b) Income and Employment Theory (including
dynamic growth theory)
c) History of Economic Thought
2. ECONOMIC HISTORY; NATIONAL ECONOMIES 3. ECONOMIC HISTORY; ECONOMIC

a) Economic History DEVELOPMENT; NATIONAL ECONOMICS
b) National Economies a) Economic History
b) Economic Development
c) Area Studies (regional and national economics)
3. STATISTICAL METHODS 4. ECONOMIC STATISTICS

a) Statistical Methods a) Statistical Methods
b) Econometrics b) Econometrics
c) Economic Measurement c) Social Accounting (including distribution of income
by size)
d) Input–Output Analysis
(Continued )
isgivings, Machlup remarked that such a

m embodied in the classification. While the clas-
title was too restrictive; its meaning seemed sification committee attempted to anticipate
exclusively derived from Marshall, Robinson, the future evolution of the discipline, the cat-
and Hicks.29 egories still owed much to past changes. The
That both economic geography and con- case of consumption also shows how import-
sumption economics remained in their ant classification choices were perceived to
previous categories in spite of heated debates be for a given approach. A couple of years
highlights the resistance to change classifi- after the revision ended, George Katona, the
ers encountered and the path-dependency Michigan architect of economic psychology,
wrote to Haley that the classification of his
29 From box 102, folder “classification committee
new book on consumption behavior under
1956”: Gooda to Haley, October 13, 1955; Nurske to Population; Welfare Programs; Standards
Haley, October 29, 1955. Hildebrand to Haley, October of Living was very problematic. “The pre-
13, 1955; Comments by Machlup, undated; Haley to Bell, vailing system of classification relegates the
October 5, 1955; Haley to Bell, January 13, 1956; Machlup
to Bell January 31, 1956; letter from Machlup, February 1, consumer to a minor place in the econ-
1956; Machlup to Bell, March 12, 1956. omy,” he explained, and maintains a vision
Table 1.
Comparison between the Classification Schemes Used in 1949 and 1956 (Continued )
AEA CLASSIFICATION 1949 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956

(selected categories only) (selected categories only)
4. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS; PLANNING AND 5. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS; PLANNING AND

REFORM; COOPERATION REFORM; COOPERATION
5. NATIONAL INCOME AND SOCIAL

ACCOUNTING
6. BUSINESS FLUCTUATIONS 6. BUSINESS FLUCTUATIONS
7. MONEY AND BANKING; SHORT TERM 7. MONEY, CREDIT, AND BANKING

CREDIT. CONSUMER FINANCE
8. BUSINESS FINANCE; INVESTMENTS AND

SECURITY MARKETS. INSURANCE
9. PUBLIC FINANCE 8. PUBLIC FINANCE; FISCAL POLICY
10. INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS 9. INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS
11. BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION 10. BUSINESS FINANCE; INVESTMENT AND

SECURITY MARKETS
11. BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION; MARKETING

AND ACCOUNTING
12. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION AND 12. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION; GOVERNMENT

MARKETS; PUBLIC REGULATION OF AND BUSINESS; INDUSTRY STUDIES
BUSINESS
13. PUBLIC UTILITIES; TRANSPORTATION;

COMMUNICATIONS
14. INDUSTRY STUDIES
15. LAND ECONOMICS; AGRICULTURAL 13. LAND ECONOMICS; AGRICULTURAL

ECONOMICS; ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY ECONOMICS; ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY;
HOUSING
16. LABOR 14. LABOR ECONOMICS
17. POPULATION; SOCIAL WELFARE AND 15. POPULATION; WELFARE PROGRAMS;

LIVING STANDARDS STANDARDS OF LIVING
a) Population; Migration and Vital Statistics a) Population; Migration
b) Relief, Public Welfare, Pensions, Social Security b) Welfare Programs and Social Security (public)
(including all public programs) c) Consumer Economics; Level and Standards of
c) Industrial benefit Programs Living
d) Consumption Economics
16. RELATED DISCIPLINES
of consumers as “uninfluential transmitters dual aspiration to record the ongoing uni-

of trends.” He interpreted the inappropri- fication of the discipline and to accommo-
ate categorization of empirical studies of date its diversity, and to allow economists’
consumers’ motives, attitudes and expecta- self-identification with the revised catego-
tions as a consequence of the low status of ries. The various other internal and exter-
empirical research in relation to theory. He nal demands the AEA faced in those years
also emphasized that the AER editors had received scant attention. The idea that the
the ability to make such research more vis- discipline was stabilizing around a “core”
ible through altering the structure and titles comprising microeconomics and macroeco-
of the classification categories as they had nomics was present in the debates, but there
just done through the addition of “Related was as yet no consensus on the point. This
Empirical Studies” to the title of the top evolution was documented by Yale national
Price Theory category. accounting specialist Richard Ruggles, who,
Machlup was nevertheless to see his plans a decade later, explained that the function
for a category exclusively devoted to the- of graduate training was “to provide a com-
oretical work implemented elsewhere. In mon core of basic economic theory,” (quoted
1956, the AEA decided to compile an index in Backhouse 2008).31 Ruggles was to be in
of past publications, a task entrusted to Yale charge of the next revision in 1967. It might
industrial economist John Miller and librar- have been expected that this revision would
ian Dorothy Livingston, head of the Yale have enacted the core/applied fields, but by
catalogue department. Their inspiration this time the pendulum had swung back and
was the newly revised AEA classification the revision was largely determined by exter-
for literature and personnel, but they found nal factors: a request from the NSF, budget
the reduced number of categories unsuited strains and the challenge of computerization.
to the handling of articles on a cumulative
basis. In 1958 they settled on a “telescopic”
3. Rationalizing Classification
three-digit classification with twenty sepa-
(1962–1969)
rate categories, including Economic Theory,
Economic Systems, History of Economic
3.1 Expansion, Budget Constraints, and the
Thought, Economic History and Social
Need for Rationalization
Accounting, and more than 700 subdivisions.
Under Machlup’s pressure, the index scheme By the mid-1960s, the AEA’s concerns
exhibited the kind of broad theory category about economists’ public image and job
he was advocating, with development, busi- opportunities had abated slightly. John
ness fluctuations, money and banking the- Fitzgerald Kennedy was heavily relying on
ories referenced alongside microeconomic the expertise of Walter Heller’s Council
and macroeconomic work.30 of Economic Advisors. The council’s flag-
The 1956 revision was therefore remark- ship proposal, supporting economic activity
able in that it was captured by AEA classi- through tax cuts, was implemented in 1964.
fiers’ epistemological disagreements, their
31 At that time, his wife Nancy Ruggles was working
30 “Report on Cost Estimates for a Proposed Index of on the edition of a survey of the discipline under the aus-
Economic Journals” by Dorothy Livingston, October 1956; pices of the National Academy of Sciences and the SSRC.
Box 96, folder “Classification Committee.” “Classification,” Published in 1970 as Economics, it was introduced by the
January 6, 1958, Box 96, folder “Cumulative Index.” idea that economics embodied a core/applied fields struc-
Katona to Haley, September 23, 1960, Box 102, folder ture, which determined the outline of the book (Ruggles
“classification committee.” 1970, pp. 4–5).
Number of articles in “economics” discipline in JSTOR

10,000
9,000
8,000
7,000
Number of articles
6,000
5,000
4,000
3,000
2,000
1,000
0
1940 1944 1948 1952 1956 1960 1964 1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1988 1992 1996 2000 2004 2008
Year of publication
Figure 4. Number of Articles Listed under “Economics” Discipline in the JSTOR Database, by Year
Graduate programs and specialized profes- 13.5 percent for the government, and 35 per-
sional societies within economics were being cent in industry and business (Tolles 1965).
established, the economic PhD was widely AEA editors estimated that the literature
recognized as the signifier of economic of economics had grown by 300 percent in
expertise, and the transition from military the previous twenty-five years. Evidence for
to civilian patronage was under way, with an this is found in the dramatic increase in the
NSF Division of Social Science eventually number of economic articles JSTOR data-
created in 1960. Although new subject mat- base in the mid-1960s (see figure 4).
ters and techniques were constantly being This expansion was causing problems for
introduced, the broad structure of econom- the AER. Even though its page count had
ics stabilized with the spread of general increased by 50 percent over twenty years to
equilibrium modeling, the so-called neoclas- 1,965, and the number of papers published
sical synthesis, and econometric techniques. had risen from forty-seven to sixty-two, this
What nurtured AEA officials’ belief that fell behind the growing number of submis-
they needed to rationalize their classification sions. From around 230 in 1955, submissions
practices rather was a sense of impending rose to some 420 in 1966, before peaking at
crisis in the AEA publishing business. 637 in 1968. There was a growing sense that
Economic personnel and literature were many good papers were being rejected, but
both proliferating. The AEA membership the space, time, and money necessary to
increased from 10,000 in 1959 to 17,000 in increase the proportion published were not
1968 and remained heterogeneous. A 1964 there, despite the recruitment of an assistant
survey indicated that 45 percent of AEA editor in 1963. Between 1954 and 1969 the
members worked in educational institutions, number of AER referees increased from 36
to 220. There was a corresponding increase computerization, such as chemistry, biol-

in the number of periodical abstracts, book ogy, and medicine, were able to cope with
reviews, and review articles, and the task the mounting bibliographical load. By the
of classifying the swelling tide of publica- mid-1960s, many reports detailed the pio-
tions was very labor-intensive (Margo 2011, neering development of a computerized
pp. 21–3). Additionally, economists com- retrieval system, MEDLARS, by the US
plained that it was increasingly difficult to National Library of Medicine (NLM). The
keep abreast with the flow of information original failure of its Index Mechanization
necessary to undertake research.32 The AEA Project in 1960 had highlighted that such
classification was now under scrutiny as an a project should start with the design of
information system, rather than as a device the retrieval system before the publica-
to instill consistency or to publicize eco- tion system was conceived. Indeed, the
nomics. Coverage deficiencies were pointed implementation of the MEDLARS project
out in existing classifications, so that Yale had required a prior update of the NLM’s
classifiers decided to raise substantially classification system, the Medical Subject
the number of journals indexed.33 Another Headings (MeSH; see Dee 2007).34 In 1966,
response to the crisis was the creation of the IBM awarded a three-year grant to the
Journal of Economic Abstracts in 1964, but ACLS to computerize the new Répertoire
the lack of budgetary and human resources International de la Littérature Musicale
created managerial tension between Arthur and establish a bibliographical data process-
Smithies, its editor, and the newly appointed ing center in the humanities, the definition
editor of the AER, John Gurley, whose staff of which was extended to include econom-
was in charge of drafting the abstracts. ics. Those early efforts, however successful,
Managing the swelling tide of publica- were tedious and time consuming. Although
tions was not a problem specific to econom- information retrieval, programming, and
ics; AEA editors’ complaints were finding hardware had been improved considerably
an echo in the humanities and other social under the leadership of the Department of
sciences. The editors of the American Defense during the previous decades, apply-
Political Science Review and of the Writings ing those techniques to the specific needs of
of American History had recently decided such a wide range of scholarly disciplines was
to discontinue their own bibliographical extremely complex and costly.35
sections on account of the impossibility of In addition to these pressures, public
providing adequate coverage of their disci- agencies were still concerned with hav-
plines’ publications. Only those disciplines ing an inventory of the growing number
whose professional societies had turned to of scientists in the country. The purpose
of the Register of Scientific and Technical
Personnel, maintained since 1954 by the
32 In 1969, Mark Perlman estimated that “there are
published each year between 1,300 and 1,500 books of
some significance to the discipline [and] more than 250 34 The structure of the MeSH and JEL classifications
journals carrying . . . more than 5,000 major articles” are close to each other. MeSH descriptors are arranged
(quoted in Margo 2011). in a twelve-level hierarchical structure, and are used for
33 A survey of 32 Yale faculty members had shown that indexing the articles of most biomedical journals.
only 37 percent of their publications fell within the scope 35 Box 104, folder Journal of Economic Abstracts:
of the current Index, since 10 percemt of their output Smithies to Gurley, February 21, 1964; Gurley to Smithies,
was books, 32 percent chapters in collective volumes, and March 11, 1964. “Preliminary Report to the A.E.A.
20 percent in non-indexed journals (see Ruggles’s 1967 Committee on Classification . . . ,” by Richard Ruggles,
report and Econometric Society’s 1969 report, referenced March 1, 1967. Box 922 folder “NSF Revision of 1968
in note 41). Specialty List,” and Box 965 folder “classification.”
NSF, had evolved alongside US i nternational NSF system sufficiently useful that it adopted
relations. Originally aimed at identifying spe- a variant of the “Economic Specialty List” in
cialized personnel in case of national emer- its new handbook published in 1966.
gency, it had turned into a major source of
statistical data on scientific and engineering 3.2 A Revision Constrained by External
personnel for studies related to the devel- Demands
opment of national science policy and for
public, e ducational, and private recruitment. The AEA was thus confronted with the
Relevant data were extracted from ques- dual challenge of improving the quality of
tionnaires sent directly by scientific associa- its information system to manage the lit-
tions and professional organizations to their erature, while lowering the cost of its bib-
members in numerous fields. Among other liographic activities. The way other sciences
queries, respondents were asked to select had solved such problems clearly pointed
four specialties from a list. It was only in to the solutions AEA editors should emu-
1964 that the AEA agreed to join the census. late. They needed to avoid unnecessary
The questionnaire sent to economists in the duplication in costly classification pro-
summer of 1964 was likely designed under cesses (articles were classified by a team of
the supervision of Cornell Professor Arnold trained specialists rather than by authors
Tolles (Williamson 1964, p. 644). Aimed at themselves) which called for a unification
facilitating respondents’ self-classification, of the AER, the index, and the handbook
the economic “specialty list” it included classification systems. Reducing the costs
was an updated version of the 1956 AEA of this labor-intensive process and enhanc-
scheme (see table 2). The top-level theory ing the coverage and quality of the classi-
group opened with a new category, General fication would come from rationalizing and
Equilibrium, which had become a signifi- then computerizing procedures, and the
cant and high-prestige area of analysis. It MEDLARS case had made it clear that a
was followed by Economic Fluctuations, successful information retrieval project
Economic Forecasting, Metho dology, and required a preliminary adaptation of the
Microeconomic Theory. That macroeco- classification system (Leftwich 1968).
nomics was still missing from this list indi- At the beginning of 1967, Ruggles became
cated that the scholarship it spanned was director of the Yale index and, eager to ratio-
not as clearly defined as in microeconom- nalize the classification, he wrote a careful
ics. Economic History and Development analysis of the various purposes of existing
had been granted separate categories, as classifications, accompanied by a quantitative
had Agricultural Economics and Land assessment of their performance. The AER
Economics, while Money and Public Finance classification, whose purpose was to “han-
had been collapsed.36 The AEA found the dle the current flow of information” without
leaving categories empty or concentrating
36 Four hundred forty thousand questionnaires were articles too much was not accomplishing
mailed by scientific associations, with 62 percent responses, such a balance. Statistical evidence indicated
among whom 12,143 had identified themselves as econo- that, while History and Development, Price
mists given the specialties they had chosen in a list of more
than 1,172 subject matters. In its first part, he detailed the and Allocation Theory, and International
NSF’s peculiar definition of “economists” as professionals
working in educational institutions, the federal govern-
ment, industry, and business, mainly with at least a BA in Census had counted 22,500 economists based on another
economics and actively associated with a relevant profes- definition (Dec 65 R, 11; Box 922, Folder “Arnold Tolles
sional society. By comparison, in 1959 the Bureau of the Corresp plus Ad Com (NSF)”).
Table 2.
AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1967 NSF CLASSIFICATION 1965

(Selected categories detailed only) (Selected categories detailed only) (Selected categories detailed )
1. GENERAL ECONOMICS 000 GENERAL ECONOMIC GENERAL ECONOMIC THEORY
(teachers of general courses and THEORY; HISTORY; General Equilibrium
all nonspecialists) SYSTEMS Economic fluctuations
.... Economic forecasting
2. PRICE THEORY; INCOME 020 General economic theory Methodology
THEORY; HISTORY OF 021 General Equilibrium Microeconomic Theory
THOUGHT Theory Other
a) Price and Allocation Theory 022 Microeconomic Theory
(including general welfare 023 Macroeconomic Theory
economics, activity analysis, 024 Welfare Theory
capital theory, value and ....
distribution theory) ECONOMIC HISTORY; HISTORY
b) Income and Employment OF THOUGHT
Theory (including dynamic
growth theory)
c) History of Economic Thought
3. ECONOMIC HISTORY; 100 ECONOMIC GROWTH; ECONOMIC SYSTEMS;

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT; DEVELOPMENT; DEVELOPMENT AND
NATIONAL ECONOMICS PLANNING; PLANNING
a) Economic History FLUCTUATIONS
b) Economic Development
c) Area Studies (regional and
national economics)
5. ECONOMIC STATISTICS 200 QUANTITATIVE ECONOMIC STATISTICS

a) Statistical Methods ECONOMIC METHODS Econometrics
b) Econometrics AND DATA Input-output and programming
c) Social Accounting (including methods
distribution of income by size) Social accounting
d) Input-Output Analysis Statistical methods
6. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS;
PLANNING AND REFORM;
COOPERATION
(Continued )
Economics each collected 350 to 450 entries a rticles or fewer in 1964–65, and 113 of them
in 1965, Economic Systems was used for were empty. Conversely, fifty subcategories
barely 50 articles. Similarly, although the contained twenty-five articles or more, and far
700 index subclassifications were legitimized too many articles were concentrated within
by the need to handle articles on a cumula- the single class Economic Theory. As for the
tive basis, 50 percent of them contained five handbook–NSF biographic classification, it
Table 2.
Comparison between the Classification Schemes Used in 1956 and 1967 (Continued )
AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1967 NSF CLASSIFICATION 1965

(Selected categories detailed only) (Selected categories detailed only) (Selected categories detailed )
7. BUSINESS FLUCTUATIONS 300 DOMESTIC MONETARY MONETARY AND FISCAL
AND FISCAL THEORY AND THEORY AND INSTITUTIONS
8. MONEY, CREDIT, AND INSTITUTIONS
BANKING
9. PUBLIC FINANCE; FISCAL

POLICY
10. INTERNATIONAL 400 INTERNATIONAL INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS

ECONOMICS ECONOMICS
11. BUSINESS FINANCE; 500 ADMINISTRATION; BUSINESS FINANCE AND

INVESTMENT AND BUSINESS FINANCE; ADMINISTRATION;
SECURITY MARKETS MARKETING; MARKETING AND
ACCOUNTING ACCOUNTING
12. BUSINESS
ADMINISTRATION;
MARKETING AND
ACCOUNTING
13. INDUSTRIAL 600 INDUSTRIAL INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION;

ORGANIZATION; ORGANIZATION; GOVERNMENT AND
GOVERNMENT AND TECHNOLOGICAL BUSINESS; INDUSTRY STUDIES
BUSINESS; INDUSTRY CHANGE; INDUSTRY
STUDIES STUDIES AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS
14. LAND ECONOMICS; 700 AGRICULTURE; NATURAL LAND ECONOMICS

AGRICULTURAL RESOURCES
ECONOMICS; ECONOMIC
GEOGRAPHY; HOUSING
15. LABOR ECONOMICS 800 MANPOWER; LABOR; LABOR ECONOMICS

POPULATION
16. POPULATION; WELFARE 900 WELFARE PROGRAMS; POPULATION; WELFARE

PROGRAMS; STANDARDS OF CONSUMER ECONOMICS; PROGRAMS; STANDARDS OF
LIVING URBAN AND REGIONAL LIVING
a) Population; Migration ECONOMICS
b) Welfare Programs and Social STATISTICS
Security (public)
c) Consumer Economics; Level MATHEMATICS OF
and Standards of Living RESOURCES USE
Activity Analysis
RELATED DISCIPLINES Actuarial mathematics
Biometrics; biostatistics
....
was considered quite balanced, with the larg- cut short the scope for discussions and dis-
est groups and subgroups—Microeconomics agreements. When Bell, Ruggles, and their
and Agricultural Economics—each con- colleagues realized that an intermediate
taining 7.5 percent of economists, and level of titles between the major categories
Economic Development and International and the detailed specialties of the revised
Trade, 4.5 percent each. Ruggles concluded NSF scheme could be added to provide the
that it was possible to create a three- or unified classification they longed for, they
four-level system to accommodate all three focused on making the architecture fit for
uses in a single scheme.37 This organization mechanization and computerization.
was seen as a way to tame complexity, lower
3.3 The Challenge of Classifying an
the cost, and improve the quality of data
Expanding Discipline
collection, storage, and processing, with no
need for double-checking and less proof- The committee’s decision to settle on max-
reading. Ruggles also wondered whether imum of ten categories, each itemized in no
asking authors to classify their own writing more than ten subcategories, and so forth,
would yield better data at a lower cost.38 made the problem of grouping crucial (see
In the summer of 1967, secretary John table 2). It prompted Williamson to propose
Williamson, aided by a classification com- the enlarged NSF Theory category repro-
mittee composed of Gurley, Smithies, and duced below, one that, again, concentrated
Ruggles and chaired by Leftwich, began much of the debates:
gathering suggestions to respond to the
issues Ruggles had raised. Although they General Economic Theory
General Equilibrium
were not pivotal to the decision to under- Microeconomics
take a revision, debates over the top cate- Macroeconomics
gory and whether theoretical and empirical Economics Fluctuations
work should be separated surfaced again. Economic Forecasting
It was only by chance that these debates Methodology
History of Economic Thought
did not take over the revision, as had hap- Others
pened a decade before. In August, the NSF
reported complaints from AEA members Ruggles found the word “theory” a par-
that the Specialty List did not adequately ticularly unsuitable general heading for a
reflect their interests, and requested an category that was supposed to encompass
updated version by early September. This Economic Fluctuations and Forecasting,
unanticipated demand induced the com- since these two specialties essentially com-
mittee to start out from a recently updated prised empirical work conducted by practi-
classification explicitly tailored for econo- tioners. He wanted to rename the category
mists’ s elf-identification, and the short notice General Economics and, echoing Haley’s
earlier misgivings, he underlined that “many
people work in both theory and empirical
37 Broad categories (ten to twenty) would serve as a research, and separating the two is often not
frame to handle the current flow of articles, subclassifi- possible. Even for economic literature, it may
cations (forty to sixty) would help classify personnel, and
third and fourth levels (150 to 200 entries) would later be in the future be more reasonable to abolish
added for cumulative indexing. theory as a major category.” The change was
38 Ruggles’ advice was based on a similar request made
not implemented. Instead, Leftwich moved
by the Econometric Society to its members in 1957. Ninety
percent of them had duly provided extensive bibliograph- Economic Fluctuations to Monetary and
ical information on their work for the previous ten years. Fiscal Theory: “actual economic fluctuations
and their control is one of the very import- of categories resulted in broader fields
ant reasons for worrying about monetary comprising diverse specialties, and saw the
and fiscal institutions—isn’t it?” he pointed development of a large and fluid applied
out. In the end it was consolidated with microeconomics field. A surprising effect of
Economic Growth and Development, along- these mergers was the disappearance of a
side Forecasting. Baumol would have rather separate Public Finance category at a time
seen the latter under a new category titled the field was booming—it was merged with
Applied Economics, along with Operational monetary economics.
Research.39 Leftwich’s recommendation to The NSF’s request for a quick update of its
add General Welfare Economics—“it really classification for economists therefore acted
has to do with [. . .] optimizing behavior”— as a catalyst for a new revision, but econo-
commanded wide agreement, as did the first mists pursued their own agenda: improving
appearance of a Macroeconomics title in the the quality of the information retrieval sys-
AEA classification. This set of subjects, clos- tem they used to navigate the booming lit-
est to the then stabilizing “core,” ended up erature, lowering the costs of maintaining
as a subpart of a wider top category that also it, and moving toward computerization. In
covered history of economics, economic his- that respect, the resulting three-digit hier-
tory, and economic systems. What was to be archical decimal classification scheme was
filed under the new Quantitative Economic successful. Plans for the development of a
Methods and Data category, which some unified “System for Information Processing
had attempted to rename Mathematical for Professional Societies” that would create
Economics, was also unclear. A new Cost– an inventory of all members, then their work,
Benefit Analysis subclass was added, but began in 1969 when the Econometric Society
later removed, for Ruggles believed that it and the American Statistical Association
was a technique used in a variety of fields computerized members’ responses to the
such as economic development, education, annual questionnaire, and pushed the AEA
and health economics. to do the same. The computerization of liter-
Reducing the number of categories to ature indexing continued, so that in 1983, an
ten also made it impossible to accede to Economic Literature Index (ELI) whereby
the request, made by many economists, researchers could retrieve publications on
that Urban Economics, widely perceived as a given subject, was made available online
the hottest field in these years, should be through the DIALOG system. It was later
granted a separate category. It therefore turned into EconLit. Soon after its revision,
remained in alongside Welfare Programs the management of the classification system
and Consumer Economics in the last cate- was transferred to the Journal of Economic
gory that saw considerable expansion with Literature, created in 1969. Edited by
the addition of Education, Health, and Mark Perlman, the new journal was to pro-
Poverty specialties.40 Reducing the n umber vide the abstracts previously included in
the JEA, alongside book reviews, listings of
new books, review articles, and a quarterly
39 He also advised adding Mathematical Economics and
Activity Analysis and Mathematical Programming special-
ties to Economic Theory.
40 This last category also came to include Regional pertaining to natural resources and analyses of transpor-
Economics, designed to receive those works in economic tation systems moved to Industrial Organization. Labor
geography that had previously been classified under Land Economics was also revised to include mobility, migration,
Economics. Studies on forestry and fisheries were col- and, at Ruggles’ suggestion, major regulations such as the
lapsed into Agricultural Economics, with the research minimum wage.
subject index of articles to be aggregated in surveys of recent scholarly advances.

an annual “Index of Economic Literature.” Eliminating the JEL articles department was
However, neither the revision and comput- again considered, but eventually rejected at
erization of classification procedures nor the the time.43 Throughout, JEL editors resisted
creation of the new journal solved the bud- abandoning a system whereby articles were
getary and publishing crisis.41 allocated a code by a staff of trained classi-
fiers and switching to the kind of self-clas-
sification by authors used for the UNESCO
4. Mapping a Stabilized Discipline and an
indexing system.
Institutionalized Profession (1988–90)
Economists’ attitudes toward their classifi-
cation system was also changing. The devel-
4.1 The JEL Codes as an Intellectual and
opment of ELI/EconLit initiated a process
Institutional Map of Economics
whereby literature search was increasingly
During the 1970s and 1980s, the literature done through keywords and less through JEL
continued to expand, although less rapidly, code filtering, although the latter was still
with the result that budgetary pressures on dominant in the 1980s. As the discipline grew
AEA publications did not abate, threatening in size and scope, its unification around a core
its bibliographic activities. In the early 1970s, mentioned above was paired with a process
AEA secretary Rendigs Fels criticized the of fragmentation and specialization. From
JEL for being too expensive.42 In 1982, after the late 1960s to the 1980s, many specialized
new editor Moses Abramovitz threatened to journals were founded, including the Journal
resign, a shared JEL editorship was contem- of Economic Theory (1969), the Journal
plated, as was splitting the journal back into of Public Economics (1972), the Journal
a survey journal and an index. Neither of Urban Economics (1974), the Journal of
of these suggestions was implemented Development Economics (1974), the Journal
though, when the first issue of the Journal of Health Economics (1982). These new
of Economic Perspectives appeared in 1987 journals were usually attached to new field
with the aim of providing nontechnical societies and conferences. New approaches
were also gaining traction. The development
of experimental economics culminated in
41 Box 922 folder “NSF Revision of 1968 Specialty List.” the foundation of the Economic Science
Gurley to Smithies, March 4, 1966. Gordon to Gurley, Association in 1986 (Svorenčík 2015), the
November 4, 1966 and “Computer, Traditional Scholarship,
and the ACLS,” Report by Thomas Gordon, Box 104 same year as the Russell Sage Foundation’s
folder “Journal of Economic Abstracts.” “The develop- Behavioral Economic Roundtable was
ment of the Biographical-Bibliographical Indexing System formed (Heukelom 2014). Economists
for Economics,” January 1969, Box 940. “Proposal for the
Development of Capability for a communication Network increasingly relied on the JEL codes as a
for Economists,” Econometric Society, September 2, 1969, map to navigate the profession intellectually
box 940. “Application for a Development Grant by the
AEA to the Office of Science Information Services to the
NSF,” Box 939. Ruggles to Friedman, November 27, 1967,
and Ruggles to Williamson, November 3, 1967, folder 43 “The development of the Biographical-
“Classification,” Box 965. Bibliographical Indexing System for Economics,” January
42 In response, Perlman explained that part of the costs 1969, Box 940. From box 939: Perlman to Fels, October
related to classification had been graciously supported by 14, 1970; Perlman to Fels, February 12, 1971; “Application
the many editors’ wives in office during the 1950s and for a Development Grant by the AEA to the Office of
1960s: Nancy Ruggles and Mrs. Gurley were in charge of Science Information Services to the NSF.” From Box 934:
the AER book section, and Truus Koopmans was responsi- Fels to Rees, September 21, 1982; “Report of the Ad-Hoc
ble for much of the office work done for the Yale index (see Committee on Publications,” by Fels, October 1, 1982.
JEL 9(3), p. 956). Pencavel to Board of Editors, February 6, 1987, Box 955.
and institutionally: to place their work within with pedagogical tools, and prevent them
the discipline and to publish and screen job from applying for most job openings. In a
offers, scroll conference programs, apply for recent witness seminar, Caltech’s Charles
grants, and choose referees. Getting a code, Plott explained why he did not want to see
and having it placed in the right category, experimental work classified separately:
became an increasingly important element
Well, I think that we were dealing with the
in establishing intellectual and institutional [empirical] foundations of economics [but]
space within the profession. economics does not have [such] a classifica-
It was no surprise, then, that John tion. If the experiment was a committee exper-
Pencavel, who replaced Abramovitz as JEL iment, I would have put it having to do with
editor in 1986, took AEA members’ grow- something with public choice. If it was a mar-
ket experiment, I would have had it in micro-
ing dissatisfaction with the classification very economics. I wouldn’t have separated it out as
seriously. Since the classification had been anything special. It is data about phenomena
placed in the JEL editor’s hands, it had been [and the empirical relationships the data pres-
curated on a more regular basis. Incremental ent]. But that is the way it was treated—just
changes had been decided upon and imple- education. 45
mented through exchanges between the JEL Pencavel thus understood that a radical
board of editors and the Pittsburgh office, overhaul was necessary. He was aware that
where the bibliographical department was economists expected the classification to
managed, first, by Naomi Perlman, then, reflect the current structure of the discipline,
from 1985 onward, by Drucilla Ekwurzel.44 and that, like Plott, Kagel, or Katona before
That same year, long-term consultant them, economists would fight for the codes
Asatoshi Maeshiro, of the University of they felt would give them a confortable posi-
Pittsburgh, was officially appointed “classi- tion within the discipline. He also wanted to
fication consultant,” a position he held until design a system that “facilitate[d] the search
his retirement in 2006. As an econometri- for information by economists and best sum-
cian, he took special care to update the quan- marizes the content of bibliographic mate-
titative techniques category. Yet, economists rial.” A result of these various motivations,
increasingly complained that the General he was eager to finally set up representa-
Economic Theory and Econometric Theory tive Microeconomics and Macroeconomics
categories were insufficiently detailed, and categories, and to record the growing inde-
that no entry existed to accommodate new pendence of several applied fields. He had
kinds of model, such as found in the flourish- probably not anticipated that his agenda
ing literature on game theory. Likewise, the would throw him, Ekwurzel, and Maeshiro
creation of an Experimental Economics code into two years of complex negotiations.
within the Quantitative Economic Methods
and Data category in 1985 made experi-
mental economists uneasy. They feared that “
45 I agree 100 percent that they should be classified by
the topic, by the subject matter of whether you are deal-
a separate category would relegate them to ing with, say, auctions or you are dealing with voting and
specialized journals, equate their methods this sort of thing, because it is a tool. It is not like econo-
metrics. It is very far from econometrics where there are
real high-powered techniques that are being developed all
the time,” Ohio’s professor John Kagel added. Elizabeth
44 Drucilla Ekwurzel was appointed Associate Editor. Hoffman, from Iowa State University, also explained that
She had been a long-term assistant editor for the JEL, first she was advised against advertising herself an experimental
in charge of proofreading, and after 1981 in charge of clas- economist when she was on the job market, at the turn of
sification matters. After 1985, she focused on the migration the 1980s. A full transcript of the witness seminar can be
from the DIALOG to the EconLit system. found in Svorenčík and Maas (2015).
4.2 Making Up the Core Supply and Growth; Fluctuations and

Policy) was considered outdated by many
Pencavel quickly settled on the gen- advisors. Relying on extensive advice from
eral structure of Microeconomics. His goal Alan Blinder and suggestions by James Tobin
was to accommodate research in “rapidly and John Taylor, he proposed the following
expanding areas . . . such as game theory and organization:
principal–agent models.” His initial draft
listed eight subgroups: Household Behavior, 1. General Aggregative Models (with
Production, The Market (a category covering entries for classical/Marxian/Sraffian,
different types of competition and pricing), Keynesian and co., monetarists, new
Interacting Firms, General Equilibrium and classical and forecasting models)
Disequilibrium, Economic Welfare (ranging
over externalities, social welfare functions, 2.
Production and Output Growth
rent seeking, and inequality), Uncertainty (including technological change and
and Information, and Intertemporal Choice. forecasting)
Game theory was dispatched into several of
these groups, with the precise location of a 3. Consumption and Saving
particular type of work depending on the
characteristics of the games. As the revision 4. Capital, Investment, Profit, and Rent
proceeded, it would eventually be reunited
as a single subgroup within Microeconomics, 5. Labor and the Macro Economy
then, as the Mathematical and Quantitative (including employment and wage
Methods category took shape, moved along- determination)
side programming and data collection,
where it still stands today. By the end of 6. Price and Business Fluctuations
1988, Distribution and Collective Decision
Making subgroups were also added (see 7. Money and the Macro Economy
below), and the titles and contents of several
three-digit entries were being discussed. 8. Government and the Macro Economy
In contrast, Macroeconomics underwent
endless rounds of rewriting.46 Pencavel 9. Macroeconomic Policy and General
initially intended to end the previous clas- Outlook
sification’s “uncomfortable division” of
macro between Macroeconomic Theory Macroeconomic Aspects of International
and Economic Growth • Development • Trade and Financial Economics were soon
Planning • Fluctuations. Yet, his initial plan added to the list of subgroups. Maeshiro
to break down Macroeconomics into four and Ekwurzel pointed out overlaps with
groups (Measurement of Macroeconomic other categories, in particular Money and
Variables; Aggregate Demand; Aggregate Finance, Labor Economics, Public Finance,
and International Economics, while Jerry
46 The difficulty in assembling a Macroeconomics cate-
Green objected that all economic arti-
gory is consistent with its late appearance in the classifica- cles would end up in Macroeconomics or
tion. However, Claveau and Gingras (2016), who analyze Microeconomics if the category were to stay
the changes in the structure of the discipline through so large. The problem, Pencavel explained,
bibliographic coupling, conclude that the resulting cluster
associated with macroeconomic and monetary phenomena was that “most macro courses touch on mate-
is the most stable over a period ranging from 1963 to 2010. rial that is taught in other courses (in micro,
trade, money, public finance, labor, and so E. Macroeconomics and Monetary

forth) so that, although there is a clearly Economics
defined core consisting of a system of equa- General Aggregative Models
Consumption, Saving, Production,
tions describing the essential features of an Employment, and Investment
aggregative economy, there is a wide penum- Prices, Business Fluctuations, and
bra of material neighboring on other fields Cycles
[. . .] concerns about drawing the lines between Money and Interest Rates
macro and other classifications reflect very Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and
the Supply of Money and Credit
much the nature of the subject.” The threat Macroeconomic Aspects of Public
that Macroeconomics might become too Finance, Macroeconomic Policy, and
large a category increased again when JEL General Outlook
board member Thomas Mayer, who oversaw
the revision of the Financial Economics cat- 4.3 Integrating Theoretical and Applied
egory, reported the widely shared opinion Work
that its architecture was “lumping . . . two
distinct classes of research—one that might The making of Microeconomics and
be called Monetary Economics, and the Macroeconomics categories caused the dis-
other, more narrowly, Finance.”47 Monetary appearance of the Theory category, whose
economics had always been classified in sep- existence and content had been debated
arate groups in previous classifications, and for half a century. Pencavel, Ekwurzel, and
now it was not quite clear where it belonged. Maeshiro intended to go even further in the
At that point, Macroeconomics encompassed integration of theoretical and applied work.
entries on Measurement and Data, Money They were adamant “not to place the theo-
and Interest, Money Demand, and Money retical and empirical research in separate
Supply, but Financial Economics was sup- categories, but to integrate them.” The jus-
posed to cover the literature on the nature tification for this approach, as Pencavel later
of money and monetary standards, the the- wrote, was that “good research in econom-
ory of interest rates and their term struc- ics is a blend of theory and empirical work
ture, portfolio models, and central banking, and our procedure asks the author to make
among others. Following Campbell’s remark a choice when it comes to categorizing his
that “monetary economics is now much work.” Yet, the debates surrounding their
more closely aligned with macro,” Pencavel project to abolish the theory heading illus-
eventually moved monetary research into trated that, in spite of the applied turn the
macro, consolidated consumption, produc- profession had undergone since the 1970s,
tion, employment, and investment into a many economists still identified themselves
single subgroup, and moved the interna- as theorists.
tional component of macroeconomics under
International Economics, thereby giving
Macroeconomics its final shape:48
Pencavel to M&E, October 2, 1988. Pencavel to Ekwurzel,
March 1988. Pencavel to M&E, February 10, 1988;
47 His advisors included Meir Kohn, Robert Shiller, Pencavel to Ekwurzel, March 1988; Pencavel to M&E,
James Poterba, John Campbell, Benjamin Friedman, October 2, 1988. Pencavel to M&E, July 21, 1988; M&E
Michael Jensen, John Long, René Stultz, and Michael to Pencavel, September 2, 1988; Pencavel to M&E,
Gibbons. September 14, 1988; Pencavel to M&E, April 19, 1990.
48 From Box 904, folders “Log 1987/1,” “Log 1987/2,” John Pencavel, email to author, July 31, 2014. See also
“Log 1988,” and “Log 1989”: Maeshiro and Ekwurzel Pencavel (2014). Drucilla Ekwurzel, emails to author,
(hereafter M&E) to Pencavel, October 12, 1987, folder. August 23, 2014 and September 7, 2014.
Breaking with the previous organiza- theoretical and empirical articles of consumer
tion, Maeshiro’s Quantitative Methods and producer behavior in separate categories
and Models, for instance, initially omitted within Microeconomics.
empirical work or data collection, leaving Pencavel, Maeshiro, and Ekwurzel gen-
this research to be classified under the sub- eralized this principle to most two-digit
ject with which it dealt. Maeshiro’s scheme categories, which by the end of 1989 were
was designed as a list flexible enough to formulated along the following lines:
accommodate rapidly changing econo- Consumption and Savings
metric techniques, with Single Equation 3-0
General including measurement and
Models, Multiple/Simultaneous Models, data on consumption expenditures
Econometric Modeling, Mathematical 3-1 Theory
Methods, Programming and Input–Output, 3-2 Empirical Analysis
3-3 Forecasting
Computer Pro grams, and Experimental
Economics entries.49 Richard Quandt agreed Sherwin Rosen and Richard Marston,
with the scheme, but wanted an additional the board members in charge of the revi-
subclass on statistical data. But once it was sion of Public Economics and International
done, Lee Hansen found it odd that material Economics, respectively, had also explic-
on data was placed alongside Econometrics itly advised that theory and empirical work
and Game Theory, and suggested the cre- be separated. Yet, as later pointed out by
ation of a distinct major category called Houthakker, such an organization principle
“Economic Data.” Maeshiro and Ekwurzel was running counter their initial integrative
retorted that “the methodology of data col- plan, so that by mid 1990s, the editors con-
lection was an integral part of quantitative templated “rethink[ing] for the last time our
methods,” but nevertheless changed the title extensive use of the ‘theory’ versus ‘empir-
of the subclass to Data Collection and Data ical analysis’ distinction” out of a concern
Estimation Methodology. that “we may well be overdoing it.” In a last
In July 1988, Pencavel further reported move, they merged all their theory/empirical
that many colleagues still favored an orga- subclasses.
nization whereby theoretical work would Yet another type of applied work required
belong to the core, while empirical work consolidation: policy analysis. Reflecting
would be classified in the field categories: on the newly added Macroeconomic Policy
subcategory, Maeshiro and Ekwurzel asked
People such as Blinder, Deaton, Houthakker, Pencavel whether this category was “for a
Riley, Sonnenschein, and Taylor support it
[the merger between theoretical and empiri-
theory of policy or policy actually taken.” “If
cal] while Davidson, Green, Kurz, and Pollak the former,” they said, “then it is better to
oppose it. I am sympathetic to Baumol’s place in [Production or Growth] or [Money]
statement: “I think the merging of the the- . . . If it is for actual policies, wouldn’t it be
oretical and empirical studies is desirable if better in its subject category? If we don’t
the reader will still be able to distinguish one
from another.” Deaton suggests a suffix code
want to separate theory and empirical anal-
that distinguishes applied articles. My sugges- ysis, why do we separate theory and policy?”
tion picks up on Pollak’s proposal of putting This time, integration was not fully achieved.
Several two- and three-digit categories—for
instance Monetary Policy, Central Banking,
49 In the 1969 JEL classification, a subclass on “econo-
and the Supply of Money and Credit (E5),
metric, statistical, and mathematical methods and models”
coexisted with another dealing with “economic and social Government Policy and Regulation (G38
statistical data and analysis.” in Financial Economics), or Government
Policy (H118 and H128 in Health Education and Macroeconomics at the top.52 On the
and Welfare)—were added, after overlaps other hand, the study of growth, which in the
with Public Economics had been cleared.50 1960s had been thought a separate field but,
since then, had become central to macroeco-
4.4 Managing Field Demographics
nomics, was subsumed into the Production
Because of the institutional visibility and subclass of Microeconomics, and was then
intellectual status a JEL code was perceived placed alongside Economic Development
to bestow upon a line of research, changing and Technological Change to form a new
the classification of fields was perhaps the category.53
most sensitive part of the revision. Many The original list of categories was subse-
economists believed that there was much quently amended once, to accommodate
at stake in the decision to place a field in its a request by Harvard’s Steven Shavell (see
own top-level category and in where that cat- table 3). In December 1987, Shavell wrote
egory was placed (see table 3).51 Pencavel to point out that the Economics
In the first months of the revision, of Law and Crime subgroup in the Welfare
Economic History, Money and Finance, category was inappropriately constructed.
Welfare, Public Finance, Development Designed in 1983 to deal mainly with the
Economics, and Spatial Economics gained growing literature on the legal and economic
independence. The ordering reflected no aspects of antitrust and crime, it omitted
particular ranking, Pencavel insisted, except subjects of importance. Notably, it failed
the desire to place neighboring fields adjacent to include such subjects as property, tort,
to one another and to keep Microeconomics contract law, and litigation. He thus rec-
ommended that the words “and Crime” be
dropped from the category title. This request
induced the editors to rethink the status of
50 From Box 904: Quandt to Pencavel, June 28, 1998;
law and economics in the classification. They
Pencavel to AM&DE September 27, 1989; Pencavel
to AM&DE, July 21, 1988; Ekwurzel and Maeshiro to initially thought of placing the field under
Pencavel, October 31, 1989. From Box 905, folder “Log
90”: Pencavel to AM&DE, April 19, 1990.
51 The structure of each category was entrusted to a 52 In the course of the revision, he received several com-
small number of specialists. Most were members of the plaints that Economic History should be moved up with
JEL board of editors, including Blinder (Macroeconomics), the methods, and that the existing ordering reflected the
Rosen (Public Economics), Marston (International dominance of mathematics in economics. Pencavel refused
Economics), Mayer (Financial Economics), Abramovitz on the grounds that he would have had to add Economic
and Alex Field (Economic History), and Duncan Foley Development and Economic Systems, its neighboring dis-
(Economic Systems). Pencavel supervised the revision ciplines, which would have positioned Microeconomics
of the Labor and Demographic Economics section with and Macroeconomics midway through the classification.
Mark Killingsworth, the heterogeneous category spanning 53 This evolution also contrasts with the dynamics
Health, Education, and Welfare was overseen by Robert uncovered by Claveau and Gingras (2016) on bibliographic
Moffit, Roger Noll handled Industrial Organization, Glenn coupling. They document a high degree of connection
Nelson revised Development, Daniel Sumner reflected between clusters in the late 1980s, at a time of specialty
on Agriculture and Natural Resources, and Edwin Mills rearrangements, then a substantial decrease. Instead of
provided blueprints for the organization of Urban, Rural, an increase in the number of fields since the 1960s, they
and Regional Economics. John Siegfried modeled the report a cluster downsizing, from twenty to fewer than
first category, General Economics and Teaching, after the ten. The reason for this is that labor, health, education,
recommendations of the AEA Committee on Economic housing, and other topics usually found themselves in the
Education. Many other economists then commented on same bibliographic cluster—one they call “applied micro-
these preliminary drafts before Pencavel, Ekwurzel, and economics,” whose focus changes across time. The cog-
Maeshiro set about making them consistent. For instance, nitive proximity of many new JEL categories, measured
Pencavel consulted John Whitaker on the History of by shared bibliographic references, thus contrasts with
Economic Thought, and Richard Muth on Urban applied economists’ aspiration for independence, recorded
Economics. Email to author, July 31, 2014. in the JEL codes evolution.
Table 3.
1986 Classification 1991 Classification

0 General Economic Theory; History; Systems A General Economics and Teaching
1 Economic Growth; Development; Planning; B Methodology and History of Economic Thought

Fluctuations
C Mathematical and Quantitative Methods
2 Quantitative Economic Methods and Data
D Microeconomics
3 Domestic Monetary and Fiscal Theory and
Institutions E Macroeconomics and Monetary economics
4 International Economics F International Economics
5 Administration; Business Finance; Marketing; G Financial Economics

Accounting
H Public Economics
6 Industrial Organization; Technological Change;
Industry Studies I Health, Education, and Welfare
7 Agriculture; Natural Resources J Labor and Demographic Economics
8 Manpower; Labor; Population K Law and Economics
9 Welfare Programs; Consumer Economics; Urban and I Industrial Organizations

Regional Economics
M Business Administration and Business Economics;
Marketing; Accounting
N Economic History
O Economic Development, Technological Change,

and Growth
P Economic Systems
Q Agriculture and Natural Resource Economics
R Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics
Z Miscellaneous
Industrial Organization, next to Economics the legal process, rather than business and
of Regulation. After discussions with competitive issues. The subject was more
Stanford’s Mitchell Polinsky, Shavell opposed parallel in importance to urban economics,
such a scheme, pointing out that the subject they emphasized, and merited similar sta-
matter of law and economics increasingly tus in the classification scheme. The editors
focused on property law, contract law, and eventually decided to create a new Law and
Economics major category and asked Shavell parochial). He thus settled on Collective
to provide a structure for it. Decision Making, a wording that he took
This move induced other economists to from the title of a book edited by Clifford
claim an independent category for their Russell in 1979, and which he believed to
field. A Cultural Economics subclass was be “rare” and “neutral” enough so that the
created under Z: Miscellaneous at Scott many communities involved in the field
Farrow’s request, but Marianne Felton felt would accept it. Although carefully crafted,
that the dynamics of her specialty were com- this solution did not please everyone. Zane
parable to that of urban economics (classified Spindler, from Simon Frazer University,
in Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics) thought that Public Choice had been for-
and should consequently be given a major gotten and claimed that it deserved its own
entry. In the spring of 1989, Gordon Tullock heading just as much as Law and Economics
similarly wrote to complain that the editors’ did. It was also felt already that environmen-
tentative plans were “downgrading” Public tal economics should have been given more
Choice, in the sense that it was buried into space.54
a few scattered third-level classes. Indeed, Throughout this revision, the JEL edi-
the editors had drawn on Dennis Mueller’s tors faced the dual challenge of tracing the
Public Choice textbook to propose that boundaries of the core categories and decid-
three, three-digit entries be created inside ing which fields and approaches were large
Microeconomics to classify the new empir- and institutionalized enough to warrant
ical analysis of voting, rent seeking, etc. Noll separate categories and which had to share
underlined that public-choice subject mat- top-level codes. The revision was driven by
ters had little to do with traditional welfare the needs of economists but this did not
analysis, but nevertheless encapsulated the mean that the task was uncontroversial. It
work of about 5 percent of the profession. was, however, successful in that over the next
The relationship of this research to public twenty years, only incremental changes were
economics was unclear. Part of the analysis needed: no new major category was created,
of the political aspects of policy could cer- though the title (and content) of category Q
tainly fit into this category, he explained, was amended to include Environmental and
but then a similar section could as well be Ecological Economics. At the two-digit level,
created for every other subject matter, from a fifth entry titled International Relations
social security to defense programs. He thus and International Political Economy was
advised that Pencavel set up a new Positive created under International Economics.
Analysis of Collective Decision Making sec- Demand and Supply of Labor and Labor
tion within Microeconomics, to cover Social Standards: National and International were
Choice Theory, Theory of Teams, Economic created inside Labor Economics, belatedly
Models of Political Processes, Bureaucracy, recognizing the changes that had taken place
but also International Relations, and Positive
Analysis of Micro and Macro Policies (of the
Tabellini–Alesina type). He did not want to 54 AM to Pencavel, January 22, 1988; Pencavel to
call the new section Public Choice (“to avoid Shavell, February 1, 1988; Box 904. Shavell to Pencavel,
December 31, 1978; Shavell to Pencavel, March 14, 1988;
association with the political views of Gordon courtesy, Steven Shavell; Felton to Ekwurzel, October 6,
and Jim Buchanan”), Political Economy (too 1990; AM&DE to Pencavel, September 2, 1988; AM&DE
Marxist), or Political Economics (a term he to Pencavel, May 25, 1989; Pencavel, November 14,
1989, Box 904; Noll to Pencavel, June 4, 1989, courtesy,
believed had wide currency only at Stanford Roger Noll. Spindler to Maeshiro, June 11, 1991, Box 905.
and Caltech and might therefore sound Kolstad to Maeshiro, November 13, 1991.
in this field, and Personnel Economics was isregarded the classifications crafted for
d
added to the Business . . . category. Several that particular purpose. In the 1966 revi-
subclass titles were expanded to make room sion, it was the NSF’s requirements that
for new themes such as knowledge, transi- combined with the demands of computer-
tional economies, simulations, behavioral ization and cost reduction. In contrast, the
economics, and housing markets. These second and fourth revisions were driven by
additions were usually suggested by “increas- factors internal to the discipline, resulting in
ing usage of particular keywords by authors greater weight being attached to economists’
in EconLit” (Rousseau 2013). views about how their discipline should be
conceived. But here, too, there were differ-
ences. In the 1950s, economists were con-
5. Conclusions
cerned about the status of their discipline
It took eighty years, four major revisions, and its public image, whereas in the 1990s
and several additional incremental changes the issue was providing a map with which
for the American Economic Association to navigate a growing and rapidly changing
to arrive at the JEL codes we use today. discipline.
The process involved far more than simply The last revision achieved a remarkable
observing the literature of economics and level of stability. For more than twenty years,
dividing it into fairly obvious categories. The the scheme designed under the leadership of
notion of a core of micro and macro, central Pencavel had accommodated the emergence
to the current classification, is of recent ori- of new subfields and methods. Recently,
gin, and until this emerged, it was hard to however, a new general revision of the JEL
achieve a consensus. Classifying economics classification system has been discussed.55
stirred up methodological differences, such Given the role now played by the JEL codes,
as over the role of economic theory as well which is different from its role for much of
as different views of the status of different the twentieth century, the most likely rea-
applied fields. A major problem is that the sons to undertake a new revision would be
classification has been aimed at classify- the fragmentation of the discipline due to
ing both economists and their output, and the emergence of new methods, and the dis-
has been aimed not only at economists as appearance of the core, on which the stabil-
researchers, referees, publishers, job appli- ity of the past twenty years was based. The
cants and recruiters, and conference attend- lesson to be learned from past revisions is
ees, but also at governmental bodies, natural that if this happens, difficult m ethodological
scientists, funders, business recruiters, com- problems will have to be confronted and if
mercial publishers, librarians, and program- there is no consensus on these, it will be diffi-
mers. The codes have been the product of cult to create a system that lasts as well as the
many forces, external demands, and visions previous one. Account should also be taken
of the discipline. of external pressures that are likely to arise,
Each of the revisions had a different char- with the formalization of methods of research
acter, driven by a different combination of assessment and possibilities for bibliometric
internal and external forces. In the first and
third, external factors dominated but they
operated in different ways. In the 1938–44 55 Minutes of the Executive Committee, January 3,
revision, the overriding factor was the need 2013; Minutes of the meeting of the Executive Committee,
April 12, 2013; Minutes of the meeting of the Executive
to classify economists who might be drafted Committee, January 2, 2014: https://www.aeaweb.org/
into government service, and economists AboutAEA/meeting_minutes.php.
analysis opened up by computerized data- Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press.

bases of publications and researchers. Given Caldwell, Bruce J. 1982. Beyond Positivism:
Economic Methodology in the Twentieth Century.
that these are, to a significant extent, interna- London: Allen and Unwin.
tional, there might even be pressure to take Card, David, and Stefano DellaVigna. 2013. “Nine
into account the needs of economists outside Facts about Top Journals in Economics.” Journal of
Economic Literature 51 (1): 144–61.
the United States, something with which Chipman, John S. 2008. “Machlup, Fritz (1902–1983).”
previous authors of the AEA’s classification In The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, Sec-
systems did not have to contend. Whatever ond edition, edited by Steven N. Durlauf and Law-
rence E. Blume. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
the future holds, the discussions surround- Claveau, François, and Yves Gingras. 2016. “Macrody-
ing the JEL codes provide a window into the namics of Economics: A Bibliometric History.” His-
ongoing intellectual and institutional trans- tory of Political Economy 48 (4): 551–92.
Coats, A. W. 1969. “The American Economic Associa-
formation of economics. tion’s Publications: An Historical Perspective.” Jour-
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Journal of Economic Literature 2017, 55(2), 545–579

Classifying Economics: A History of the

1. Introduction JEL codes to categorize papers, assuming a

C lassifying economics might appear to be

rationalization. Multiple classifications did für Nationalökonomie und Statistik, one of

first free-standing biographical Handbook in the country. Princeton psychometrician

1. Economics 3.  Accounting; Statistics;

2. Economic History 4. Finance

Figure 1. Excerpt from Bell’s Draft Classification, January 1940

Source: See footnote 14.

1. General Works 9. Business Cycles

Figure 2. Excerpt from Homan’s Proposed Classification, August 1940

Source: See footnote 14.

Pattern of Classification of Fields of Economics

Figure 3. The AEA Classification, 1948

efficient allocation of resources (Backhouse c­ategories—Economic Theory, Economic

AEA CLASSIFICATION 1949 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956

1. ECONOMIC THEORY; GENERAL ECONOMICS 1. GENERAL ECONOMICS (teachers of general

2. ECONOMIC HISTORY; NATIONAL ECONOMIES 3. ECONOMIC HISTORY; ECONOMIC

3. STATISTICAL METHODS 4. ECONOMIC STATISTICS

­ isgivings, Machlup remarked that such a

AEA CLASSIFICATION 1949 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956

4. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS; PLANNING AND 5. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS; PLANNING AND

5. NATIONAL INCOME AND SOCIAL

6. BUSINESS FLUCTUATIONS 6. BUSINESS FLUCTUATIONS

7. MONEY AND BANKING; SHORT TERM 7. MONEY, CREDIT, AND BANKING

8. BUSINESS FINANCE; INVESTMENTS AND

9. PUBLIC FINANCE 8. PUBLIC FINANCE; FISCAL POLICY

10. INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS 9. INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS

11. BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION 10. BUSINESS FINANCE; INVESTMENT AND

11. BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION; MARKETING

12. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION AND 12. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION; GOVERNMENT

13. PUBLIC UTILITIES; TRANSPORTATION;

14. INDUSTRY STUDIES

15. LAND ECONOMICS; AGRICULTURAL 13. LAND ECONOMICS; AGRICULTURAL

16. LABOR 14. LABOR ECONOMICS

17. POPULATION; SOCIAL WELFARE AND 15. POPULATION; WELFARE PROGRAMS;

of consumers as “uninfluential transmitters dual aspiration to record the ongoing uni-

Number of articles in “economics” discipline in JSTOR

to 220. There was a corresponding increase c­omputerization, such as chemistry, biol-

AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1967 NSF CLASSIFICATION 1965

3. ECONOMIC HISTORY; 100 ECONOMIC GROWTH; ECONOMIC SYSTEMS;

5. ECONOMIC STATISTICS 200 QUANTITATIVE ECONOMIC STATISTICS

AEA CLASSIFICATION 1956 AEA CLASSIFICATION 1967 NSF CLASSIFICATION 1965

9. PUBLIC FINANCE; FISCAL

10. INTERNATIONAL 400 INTERNATIONAL INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS

11. BUSINESS FINANCE; 500 ADMINISTRATION; BUSINESS FINANCE AND

13. INDUSTRIAL 600 INDUSTRIAL INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION;

14. LAND ECONOMICS; 700 AGRICULTURE; NATURAL LAND ECONOMICS

15. LABOR ECONOMICS 800 MANPOWER; LABOR; LABOR ECONOMICS

16. POPULATION; WELFARE 900 WELFARE PROGRAMS; POPULATION; WELFARE

subject index of articles to be aggregated in surveys of recent scholarly advances.

4.2 Making Up the Core Supply and Growth; Fluctuations and

trade, money, public finance, labor, and so E. Macroeconomics and Monetary

1986 Classification 1991 Classification

1 Economic Growth; Development; Planning; B Methodology and History of Economic Thought

4 International Economics F International Economics

5 Administration; Business Finance; Marketing; G Financial Economics

7 Agriculture; Natural Resources J Labor and Demographic Economics

1. Economics 3. Accounting; Statistics;

efficient allocation of resources (Backhouse categories—Economic Theory, Economic

1. ECONOMIC THEORY; GENERAL ECONOMICS 1. GENERAL ECONOMICS (teachers of general

2. ECONOMIC HISTORY; NATIONAL ECONOMIES 3. ECONOMIC HISTORY; ECONOMIC

isgivings, Machlup remarked that such a

4. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS; PLANNING AND 5. ECONOMIC SYSTEMS; PLANNING AND

8. BUSINESS FINANCE; INVESTMENTS AND

11. BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION 10. BUSINESS FINANCE; INVESTMENT AND

11. BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION; MARKETING

12. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION AND 12. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION; GOVERNMENT

13. PUBLIC UTILITIES; TRANSPORTATION;

15. LAND ECONOMICS; AGRICULTURAL 13. LAND ECONOMICS; AGRICULTURAL

17. POPULATION; SOCIAL WELFARE AND 15. POPULATION; WELFARE PROGRAMS;

to 220. There was a corresponding increase computerization, such as chemistry, biol-

3. ECONOMIC HISTORY; 100 ECONOMIC GROWTH; ECONOMIC SYSTEMS;

5. ECONOMIC STATISTICS 200 QUANTITATIVE ECONOMIC STATISTICS

9. PUBLIC FINANCE; FISCAL

10. INTERNATIONAL 400 INTERNATIONAL INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS

11. BUSINESS FINANCE; 500 ADMINISTRATION; BUSINESS FINANCE AND

13. INDUSTRIAL 600 INDUSTRIAL INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION;

14. LAND ECONOMICS; 700 AGRICULTURE; NATURAL LAND ECONOMICS

15. LABOR ECONOMICS 800 MANPOWER; LABOR; LABOR ECONOMICS

16. POPULATION; WELFARE 900 WELFARE PROGRAMS; POPULATION; WELFARE

trade, money, public finance, labor, and so E. Macroeconomics and Monetary

1 Economic Growth; Development; Planning; B Methodology and History of Economic Thought

5 Administration; Business Finance; Marketing; G Financial Economics

9 Welfare Programs; Consumer Economics; Urban and I Industrial Organizations

O Economic Development, Technological Change,

analysis opened up by computerized data- Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press.

University Press. Cambridge, MA and London: MIT Press.