Full-text search across 15,000+ papers from top economics journals and NBER working papers
This tool provides full-text search and trend analysis for academic papers in economics. Search across papers from the American Economic Review, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Journal of Political Economy, Review of Economic Studies, Econometrica, Journal of Finance, Review of Financial Studies, Journal of Financial Economics, and over 30,000 NBER working papers.
Track how empirical methods, theoretical approaches, and research topics have evolved over time in economics research.
Search not just titles and abstracts, but the full text of papers. Find every mention of a method, theory, or concept.
Visualize how research topics and methods have changed over time. See adoption curves for empirical methods.
Sub-20ms query performance with PostgreSQL full-text search. Boolean operators, phrase search, and wildcards supported.
Filter papers by JEL classification codes to narrow your search to specific subfields of economics.
The search tool is particularly useful for understanding how empirical methods spread through economics. Here are two illustrative examples:
The Abowd-Kramarz-Margolis (AKM) model for estimating worker and firm fixed effects has become increasingly popular in labor economics since the 2000s. This chart shows the steady adoption of AKM methods:
Try searching for AKM or "worker fixed effects" to explore these papers.
While probit models were once ubiquitous for binary outcomes in the early 2000s, their usage in NBER working papers has declined steadily since peaking around 2006-2007. This reflects the field's shift toward more flexible methods and improved computational tools:
Search for probit to explore these papers, or compare with "machine learning" or logit.
The tool includes both published papers and NBER working papers, allowing you to compare trends across published research and the working paper pipeline. For example, searching for "difference-in-differences":
Notice how methods often appear in working papers before published papers.
Understanding how empirical methods spread through economics is crucial for researchers. As noted in Athey & Imbens (2025), the diffusion of causal inference methods has fundamentally changed how economists approach empirical questions.
This tool helps researchers track these methodological shifts, identify emerging techniques, and understand the evolution of economic thought beyond just citations.
The search system uses PostgreSQL's full-text search capabilities with several advanced features:
regress:* matches regression, regressive, etc.)Current Coverage: The database currently includes papers from 2010-2024 for most journals, with NBER working papers from 2000-2024.
Work in Progress: This is an ongoing project. Plans include:
The data collection pipeline is open source and available on GitHub. Contributions and suggestions are welcome!
Questions, suggestions, or want to contribute? Contact me:
This tool is provided as-is for research purposes. Paper coverage and text extraction quality may vary.