What economists do: (2) contributions in “normal science”

Chapter 4 focuses on what Kuhn called “normal science” and categorizes articles published in American Economic Review in 1990 and 2020. Three types of articles were found: those where the core was an analysis of relations in a mathematical model, those that presented an empirical study without any explicit “theoretical” model, and a third group that included both such a model and an empirical study. Over time, the first group has shrunk while the second group has grown. The “theoretical” studies typically have the following structure: they start with a problem in existing models in relation to some empirical observations. A new model is therefore needed to explain a phenomenon, and the new model is in some dimension more realistic than earlier models. In the conclusions, the researcher typically returns to the real-world situation. The conclusions are formulated in a number of different ways but are typically rather guarded. There are almost no claims that results from the study can be generalized.