Think Tanks: Hot Economists
and Hot Topics

Adam S. Posen¹, Institute for International Economics
Submission to The International Economy
First Version August 1, 2002
Updated/Corrected October 25, 2002

Independent public policy research institutions, aka "Think Tanks," are major contributors to the policy debate in the US and worldwide. Drawing on a small but well-defined community of scholars with the combination of academic training and practical policy interests—and usually some policymaking experience—these institutions influence legislative and executive decisions, educate the public about policy issues, and bring together disparate interest groups in substantive discussion. They also receive a significant share of foundation, corporate, and NGO funding of policy relevant research, as well as providing advice, and sometimes high-level appointees, to the US government and the major international organizations.

Small wonder then that the relative influence of particular think tanks and of individual scholars within the community elicits a great deal of interest, even for those not involved in the game themselves. An article in the September/October 2000 issue of this magazine, evaluating the press visibility of specifically economic policy think tanks and their scholars over 1997-1999, attracted a great deal of attention². In it, the top three tanks in press citations on economics were found to be Brookings, the Institute for International Economics [IIE], and the American Enterprise Institute [AEI], and the top three individual economists were Fred Bergsten of IIE, and Robert Litan and Nicholas Lardy of Brookings.

Large parts of the think tank community were pleased if not surprised by the study and its results. Beyond the obvious satisfactions for those of us affiliated with the top ranked institutions, there was a useful benchmarking aspect for a profession whose ability to track effectiveness often seems limited. While press visibility is only one measure of a think tank's or individual economist's influence, it is an important one, given the well-known feedback loops between visibility and access to policymakers, credibility of research, public awareness of proposals, and breadth of support for those proposals.

It also is a reasonably objective measure of influence. Reporters for the major mainstream press have an interest in presenting authoritative and representative views on the important policy issues of the day - they will quote those people who are most useful to them on these criteria. To whatever degree particular think tank scholars are covered more because of their ability to clearly convey their analyses, that probably correlates with similar added impact on Capitol Hill and in meetings with decision-makers. Moreover, thanks to electronically searchable databases, the extent of press coverage of individuals can be verified without bias.

For these reasons, we undertook to extend Nicolas Ruble's earlier survey, both in time and over institutions considered. In this article, we report the results of a study of the number of press citations by think tank and by scholar for 16 research institutions in the major news publications over a five-year period, July 1, 1997 through June 30, 2002³. The basic principle for inclusion was that the scholar in question had to be listed by one of the considered think tanks as a senior-level (non-visiting, but not necessarily resident) researcher with primary areas of work in economics.

There were several questions that only this longer study, which spans changing agendas and presidential administrations, could answer, in addition to giving those included updates on "How'm I doin'?"

• First, is the demand for think tank commentary driven by the relative priority of differing news stories? So, for example, would the number of citations given to economists working on international issues decline as the Asian Crisis receded and Monicagate and the 2000 Presidential election came to the fore? (Short answer, yes, but in 2001-2002 global issues came back)
• Second, to what degree does the partisan environment in Washington affect who is quoted? Are more conservative think tanks and economists given greater coverage under a Republican presidency? (Short answer, yes, but not hugely so)
• Third, are there consistent personalities and qualities to think tanks? Or do the rankings and impact of them reflect changing fashions? (Short answer, no, those on top tend to stay on top, and their staffs tend to be stable, reinforcing the rankings)
• Fourth, are there patterns in which publications favor which think tanks? For example, do domestically based and oriented US publications pay less attention to global economic issues than some international publications? (Short answer, yes, indeed, global coverage is greater in global papers)
• Finally, how do the most cited economists compare to their peers, both to other think tank economists and to well-known academics, in terms of their visibility? (Short answer, the best-known think tank economists tend to gather at the same think tanks, and to garner citations comparable to all but a pair of academic superstars—guess who?)

And bottom line, which scholars are doing well in the press? Over the last five years, the top three think-tanks by press citations are the same as in 1997-1999: Brookings first, IIE second, and AEI third in total cites, and IIE first, AEI second, and Brookings third if ranked by citations per economist, though AEI has closed the gap on total cites in recent years. The rest of the economics think tanks have a long way to go before catching up with the big three. The most cited individual think tank economists were pretty stable over the five year period as well: Fred Bergsten first, Robert Litan second, with James Glassman and Robert Reischauer (after taking over the Urban Institute), tying for third (Nicholas Lardy, who was in third from 1997-1999, moved to fifth place overall).

1. Think Tank by Think Tank

The Competitors [see Table 1] are sixteen think tanks well-known in Washington and worldwide⁴. Some are multi-issue, like Hoover or CSIS, while some focus solely on economic issues, like ESI, but all are ranked here solely on the basis of their economics scholars' citations, to compare like with like. The political spectrum runs from libertarian right like Cato to labor-backed left like EPI. And some have a dedicated domestic focus, like the Urban Institute, while others are dedicated to international issues, like CFR.

As can be seen in Table 2, Brookings, IIE, and AEI are ranked 1-2-3 in total cites, with Brookings having nearly twice as many cites (1252) in total over the five years as either IIE (781) or AEI (662). Cato is in fourth place with 334, and Hoover is right behind with 313 total cites, both below the top three by a noticeable margin, but also a comfortable amount ahead of the remaining think tanks. EPI, Heritage, Urban, and CBPP are clustered together in the same range (182-269 cites over five years), with the remaining seven far behind. For think tanks whose primary focus is other than economics (CFR, CSIS), their low overall ranking should not be a surprise.

In terms of partisanship, there seems to be quite a bit of even-handedness by the press, with the most middle of the road/academic think tanks most cited, and an even split between left and right think tanks in the next tier of visibility. This was consistent over the period, with Brookings number 1 in total cites all five years, IIE in second in 4 out of 5 years, and AEI in third in 4 out of 5 years. The most noticeable improvements in visibility were for the Urban Institute after Reischauer took over, and recently by PPI.

Of course, think tanks vary greatly in size of staff. Hoover (with 51 economists) and Brookings (37) are far larger than any of the other institutions considered, while ESI (6) and PPI (9) are practically boutique-size tanks. While total impact of a think tank's staff should be related to number, impact per scholar is also of interest. Thus, in Table 2 we calculate citations per economist as a measure of average visibility, and perhaps quality as judged by the press. The overall rankings change little on this measure, with the same top seven think tanks, but IIE comes out on top by a wide margin (13.0 cites per economist per year), with Brookings (6.8) and AEI (7.0) in second place. Both AEI and Cato have been steadily increasing their citations per economist in recent years.

Turning to impact on the press rather than relative to each other, Figure 1 shows the shares of total cites from all 11 publications considered given to economists from each think tank. Brookings is again on top, with 25.8% share, followed by IIE (16.1%) and AEI (13.6%). Cato is in fourth, with 6.9%, followed by Hoover with 6.4% and EPI with 5.5 %.

Different publications, however, have different tastes. Grouping the press into two categories, Domestic (BW, NYT, USA, WP, WSJ) and International (AWSJ, Economist, FT, IHT, WSJE), one finds a significant divergence⁵. Table 3 gives the breakdown by category and publication. Brookings dominates in the domestic publications, with 28.8% of total cites, and is particularly relied upon by Business Week and USA Today relative to other think tanks. AEI (12.2%) and IIE (11.7%) are close to each other both in share and (perhaps more surprisingly) in distribution across the five domestic press outlets. As might be expected Cato and Hoover play disproportionately well in the Wall Street Journal, while EPI gets far more coverage in the New York Times than in any other outlet. In interestingly bipartisan fashion, the Washington Post gives a great deal of coverage to both Heritage and to CBPP economists as compared to the other major news outlets.

Three major differences are apparent in the international press' coverage. First, Brookings and IIE switch places, with IIE grabbing a 26.7% share versus Brookings' 18.2% (AEI remains in third with 17.9%). Second, as these numbers make clear, there is a concentration at the top, with the share of the first three think tanks rising by 10% versus their piece of the pie in the domestic market. Presumably in the world press there is an emphasis on brand names, and displacement of some of the exposure of the less well-known US think tanks by Asian, European or other local institutions. Third, EPI loses a great deal of ground in the international market (3.0% vs. 6.6% domestic press share), in line with its more domestically focused mission.

In terms of individual publications, IIE scholars get far and away the most mention in the Asian WSJ, even in comparison to Cato and Hoover. Brookings scholars are rarely cited in the International Herald Tribune, despite their huge share of Post and Times citations in the domestic market. The Economist clearly favors Brookings and IIE on both a total and per economist basis, but it is also the publication in which CFR's few economists have the most impact.

2. Individual Economist Talking Heads

Of course, it is individual scholars who are both the sources of these citations and the constituent components of these think tanks⁶. If press citations are at least a partial indicator of influence on public policy, then the most cited in the press are the policy gurus to be reckoned with Admittedly, it is also more fun to consider rankings of individuals than of institutions, particularly among the (ahem) modest members of the think tank community.

Table 4 gives the overall ranking by number of press citations of the top 30 economists at the sixteen think tanks considered. C. Fred Bergsten of IIE comes in first overall (with 310 cites), and having ranked number one in three of the five years. Robert Litan of Brookings (267) is second, ranking first in the two years Bergsten did not, but also dropping to fourth place in the most recent year, perhaps as regulatory issues receded under the Bush administration. In third place, James Glassman of AEI with 229 cites is tied with Robert Reischauer, now President of the Urban Institute, formerly of Brookings, who had ranked #2 or #3 in each of the past four years.

No other think tank economist accumulated over 200 press cites in the last five years, and in fact only five others topped 100 total. Two AEI scholars, Kevin Hassett (#7, 116) and John Makin (#9, 105), have shown the steadiest climbs up the rankings, showing up in the #4 through #6 slots in both of the last two years. Combined with the return of James Glassman (#3, 229) to the top 5, the second Bush era seems to have been coincident with a rise in AEI's visibility. Brookings has three scholars in the top 10 and nine in the top 30 from its staff of 37, and IIE has two in the top 10 and five in the top 30 from its staff of 12.

Clearly, the salience of scholars' topics of research to the current policy agenda (and press interests) has significant effects on their visibility in the press, once one goes below the top three. Glassman of AEI shot up to the number 2 position in 2001-2002 after investors' concerns about financial markets became paramount—it must be noted, however, that unlike the other 29 scholars on this list, Glassman has had a weekly column in the Post for most of this five-year period, and Post citations account for just under 50% of his total coverage. Nicholas Lardy of Brookings (#5, 149) has clearly had his visibility vary in line with the prominence of China in popular consciousness, just as Morris Goldstein of IIE (#6, 118) has seen his rank move up and down with the prominence of emerging market and IMF issues, though both have stayed in the top 30 throughout. On the domestic side, Jared Bernstein of EPI (#7, 116) has tended to gain rank in election years, reflecting his labor-issue focus. Robert Crandall of Brookings (#23, 52) and Nicholas Eberstadt of AEI (#24, 49) are examples of individuals who had single banner years when their particular issues (transportation and Korea, respectively) became hot.

During the 1997-1999 period, when the Asian Financial Crisis was the dominant economic policy story, such international specialists as Bergsten, Lardy, Goldstein, and Prestowitz had on average nearly twice as many total cites as during 2000-2002, when the US domestic politics and policy were prominent. The effect does not seem to be symmetric, however, with most domestic specialists, including Reischauer, Bernstein, Bartlett, and Rivlin, remaining relatively steady across the two periods or increasing a little in coverage. Of course, individual factors also were at play, as can be seen in the rise of particular scholars, the reduced citation of those approaching retirement, or the fate of those with one issue of declining salience. Nonetheless, the message seems to be that economics coverage expands to encompass international events when they draw attention from policymakers, rather than domestic and international scholars fighting for a fixed pool of total economics coverage.

Considering the citation proclivities of particular publications (Table 5), parallel to the categorization for think tanks in the previous section, supports the picture that partisanship plays a very limited role in press visibility. The WSJ and its two sister publications are rather inclusive in their citations, spreading them around the think tanks, although giving particular voice to Bruce Bartlett of NCPA in comparison to other publications. Similarly, the Times, while clearly favoring Bernstein of EPI compared to other publications, did reach out to a number of scholars from all think tanks, including Heritage and Cato. Leaving aside the set-asides for Glassman, the Post also drew its citations relatively even handedly across the political spectrum of think tanks. Clearly, however, economists at the more academically oriented think tanks (AEI, Brookings, IIE, excepting Hoover) drew the bulk of the citations from all the publications⁷.

Unlike perceived partisanship, domestic versus international focus of research counts for a lot in determining where one is cited. Among the top ranked scholars, Litan has the most domestic press citations (216), with Reischauer (202) in second and Bergsten (153) in third. In the international press, however, the situation changes significantly, with Bergsten (152) way ahead, James Glassman moving into second place (91), and China expert Lardy (74) moving into third place; meanwhile, in international publications, Litan (50) drops to fourth, and Reischauer (27) into the tenth position. More than half the total citations in the IHT go to AEI and IIE scholars, while Brookings and IIE corral more than half of the Economist's coverage (though Benn Steil's top individual total there of 10 cites gives CFR a presence in that one publication). The remaining international publications tend to spread coverage around like their domestic counterparts.

Several economists who are big in the domestic press go nearly unmentioned in the international press, including the tax scholar Henry Aaron of Brookings, the labor economist Jared Bernstein of EPI, and the budget expert Robert Greenstein of CBPP. Meanwhile, most of those economists focused on international issues are evenly covered in both the international and the domestic press. It would seem that an emphasis on international research generally leads to more variable visibility, but also to exposure in a wider range of publications.

Given the focus on individual scholars, it is reasonable to ask whether any think tanks consist of one-man-bands, that is, whether the visibility of a single economist in the press is on its own the source of most of his home institution's visibility. Table 6 addresses this question by removing the most cited economist at each think tank in our sample from the institutional totals. The most important point is that the ranking of think tanks is essentially unchanged for the top half of the rankings even after this removal, either on total cites or on cites per remaining economists.

For some of the smaller institutions, however, the percent of total cites accruing to the remaining economists can be quite small, as low as 16.4% for ESI (without Prestowitz), or 36.4% for NCPA (without Bartlett). The flattest institutions by this criterion are Hoover (81.8% without Robert Barro) and Cato (85.3% without Michael Tanner). Perhaps conservatives are egalitarians after all. In any event, among the top eight think tanks, only one (EPI) gets more than 40% of its citations from a single individual.

Finally, it must be acknowledged that think tank economists do not have a monopoly on press citations about public policy issues. Several well-known academic economists, often but not always with high-level policymaking experience, are also very visible in the major press. The most prominent of them are comparable in exposure to the most widely cited think tank economists. Taking Bergsten (310) and Litan (267) as the benchmark for five-year citation totals among think tank economists, the other most familiar names are in the same ballpark: Alan Blinder has 265 cites over 1997-2002 in the 11 publications considered, Martin Feldstein has 241, and Laura Tyson has 219. Former press favorites Michael Boskin (54) and Lester Thurow (98) have lost some visibility, though they still would rank as comparable to the top-30 think tank economists.

Unsurprisingly, the two standouts are Jeffrey Sachs with 375 cites, and Paul Krugman with an incredible 701 cites over the period. Even taking out the appearances of Krugman's New York Times column since January 2000 (and direct responses to them in the Times), he accumulated 332 cites in the last five years—and presumably the existence of his column cuts both ways somewhat, by guaranteeing him a certain number of appearances but discouraging his quotation elsewhere.

It remains to be seen whether any of the major economists who recently made departures from senior government positions (Stanley Fischer, Joseph Stiglitz, Larry Summers), or of those likely at some point to return to a life of policy scholarship from the current administration (Glenn Hubbard, Larry Lindsey, John Taylor) will attain those levels of press coverage. Of course, it depends on the particular jobs they have chosen and how they pursue them. It is safe to say, however, that the most prominent think tank and academic economists share the same rarefied circles of coverage, and the rest of the think tank top-30 get far more press coverage than their remaining academic brethren.

Tables and Figures >>

Notes

1. Adam Posen is senior fellow at the Institute for International Economics. This project was made possible by the research work of Samantha Davis, Debayani Kar, Helen Hillebrand, and, especially, the IIE Librarian, Zeinab Mansour.

2. "Think Tanks: Who's Hot and Who's Not," Nicolas S. Ruble, The International Economy, September/October 2000, pp. 10-16.

3. The major news publications searched for this study are the Asian Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Economist, Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, International Herald Tribune, New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, Wall Street Journal Europe and Washington Post. Both Lexis/Nexis and Dow Jones Interactive databases were used.

4. Two well-known institutions contributing to policy analysis are omitted because they do not fit into the definition of think tanks as independent research institutions with permanent staff. The Rand Corporation is largely funded by government contract work, and, as a result, its scholars do not tend to make themselves as available to press. The National Bureau for Economic Research is a clearinghouse for hundreds of academics, with only a handful in residence at any time; far more often than not, NBER economists are identified by their primary, home university, designation when cited in the press.

5. Foreign Affairs, being sui generis and only appearing six times a year, is left out of these calculations.

6. An interesting question is whether think tanks are more than the sum of their individual parts in two senses: first, whether the reputation effect of a think tank overall might lead to an economist getting greater or fewer press cites than she would on her own merits; and, second, whether a community of reasonably comparable quality scholars within an institution might alter the visibility of its members, through increased or decreased opportunities either to refer press contacts to each other or to quality control each others' work.

7. Business Week is the one publication to show obvious favoritism to scholars at one think tank in particular with no other think tanks' scholars cited half as often. Over 36% (87 out 237) of the think tank economist citations in Business Week in the last five years were to Brookings scholars.