Topic · Economic theories and models
Most cited papers in Economic theories and models
What are the most cited papers in Economic theories and models?
The most cited paper in Economic theories and models is "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure" (Michael C. Jensen, William H. Meckling, 1976), with 72,158 citations. Next come "An Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change." (21,667) and "Bounds testing approaches to the analysis of level relationships" (20,229).
Showing 50 of 98 papers. Every paper with more than 2,529 citations is listed.
| # | Paper | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure Michael C. Jensen, William H. Meckling · Journal of Financial Economics | Oct 1976 | 72,158 |
| 2 | An Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change. Brian J. Loasby, Richard R. Nelson, Sidney G. Winter · The Economic Journal | Sep 1983 | 21,667 |
| 3 | Bounds testing approaches to the analysis of level relationships M. Hashem Pesaran, Yongcheol Shin, Richard J. Smith · Journal of Applied Econometrics | May 2001 | 20,229 |
| 4 | CAPITAL ASSET PRICES: A THEORY OF MARKET EQUILIBRIUM UNDER CONDITIONS OF RISK* William F. Sharpe · The Journal of Finance | Sep 1964 | 17,476 |
| 5 | Job Market Signaling Michael J. Spence · The Quarterly Journal of Economics | Aug 1973 | 16,197 |
| 6 | A BEHAVIORAL MODEL OF RATIONAL CHOICE Herbert A. Simon · The Quarterly Journal of Economics | Feb 1955 | 15,700 |
| 7 | MAXIMUM LIKELIHOOD ESTIMATION AND INFERENCE ON COINTEGRATION — WITH APPLICATIONS TO THE DEMAND FOR MONEY Søren Johansen, Katarina Jusélius · Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics | May 1990 | 14,204 |
| 8 | Dynamic Programming Richard Bellman · Science | Jul 1966 | 13,038 |
| 9 | Bank Runs, Deposit Insurance, and Liquidity Douglas W. Diamond, Philip H. Dybvig · Journal of Political Economy | Jun 1983 | 9,677 |
| 10 | The Costs and Benefits of Ownership: A Theory of Vertical and Lateral Integration Sanford J. Grossman, Oliver Hart · Journal of Political Economy | Aug 1986 | 9,650 |
| 11 | Financial Intermediation and Delegated Monitoring Douglas W. Diamond · The Review of Economic Studies | Jul 1984 | 8,655 |
| 12 | Asset Stock Accumulation and Sustainability of Competitive Advantage Ingemar Dierickx, Karel O. Cool · Management Science | Dec 1989 | 8,432 |
| 13 | Strategic assets and organizational rent Raphael H Amit, Paul J. H. Schoemaker · Strategic Management Journal | 1993 | 8,412 |
| 14 | A Model of Growth Through Creative Destruction Philippe Aghion, Peter W. Howitt · Econometrica | Mar 1992 | 7,561 |
| 15 | Staggered prices in a utility-maximizing framework Guillermo A. Calvo · Journal of Monetary Economics | Sep 1983 | 7,505 |
| 16 | A Simple Model of Herd Behavior Abhijit G. Banerjee · The Quarterly Journal of Economics | Aug 1992 | 6,671 |
| 17 | The Economic Implications of Learning by Doing K. J. Arrow · Palgrave Macmillan UK eBooks | 1971 | 6,653 |
| 18 | The New Institutional Economics: Taking Stock, Looking Ahead Oliver E. Williamson · Journal of Economic Literature | Sep 2000 | 6,444 |
| 19 | An equilibrium characterization of the term structure Oldrich Alfons Vasicek · Journal of Financial Economics | Nov 1977 | 6,305 |
| 20 | Golden Eggs and Hyperbolic Discounting David Laibson · The Quarterly Journal of Economics | May 1997 | 6,232 |
| 21 | Optimum consumption and portfolio rules in a continuous-time model Robert C. Merton · Journal of Economic Theory | Dec 1971 | 6,223 |
| 22 | Nominal Rigidities and the Dynamic Effects of a Shock to Monetary Policy Lawrence J. Christiano, Martin Eichenbaum, Charles L. Evans · Journal of Political Economy | Feb 2005 | 6,048 |
| 23 | Impure Altruism and Donations to Public Goods: A Theory of Warm-Glow Giving James Andreoni · The Economic Journal | Jun 1990 | 5,951 |
| 24 | The equity premium: A puzzle Rajnish Mehra, Edward C. Prescott · Journal of Monetary Economics | Mar 1985 | 5,789 |
| 25 | Matching As An Econometric Evaluation Estimator: Evidence from Evaluating a Job Training Programme James J. Heckman, Hidehiko Ichimura, Petra Todd · The Review of Economic Studies | Oct 1997 | 5,599 |
| 26 | Strategic Factor Markets: Expectations, Luck, and Business Strategy Jay Bryan Barney · Management Science | Oct 1986 | 5,592 |
| 27 | Property Rights and the Nature of the Firm Oliver Hart, John Hardman Moore · Journal of Political Economy | Dec 1990 | 5,552 |
| 28 | Unobservable Selection and Coefficient Stability: Theory and Evidence Emily F. Oster · Journal of Business and Economic Statistics | 10 Sep 2016 | 5,390 |
| 29 | On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets Sanford J. Grossman, Joseph E. Stiglitz · RePEc: Research Papers in Economics | Dec 1980 | 5,329 |
| 30 | Institutions Douglass C. North · The Journal of Economic Perspectives | Feb 1991 | 5,212 |
| 31 | Equilibrium in Competitive Insurance Markets: An Essay on the Economics of Imperfect Information Michael Rothschild, Joseph E. Stiglitz · The Quarterly Journal of Economics | Nov 1976 | 5,097 |
| 32 | The Science of Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Perspective Richard H. Clarida, Jordi Gaĺı, Mark L. Gertler · Journal of Economic Literature | Dec 1999 | 5,036 |
| 33 | The Next Generation of the Penn World Table Robert C. Feenstra, Robert Inklaar, Marcel P. Timmer · American Economic Review | Oct 2015 | 4,862 |
| 34 | Credit Cycles Nobuhiro Kiyotaki, John Hardman Moore · Journal of Political Economy | Apr 1997 | 4,840 |
| 35 | Expectations and the neutrality of money Robert E. Lucas · Journal of Economic Theory | Apr 1972 | 4,816 |
| 36 | Shocks and Frictions in US Business Cycles: A Bayesian DSGE Approach Frank R. Smets, Rafael Wouters · American Economic Review | May 2007 | 4,754 |
| 37 | Information Distortion in a Supply Chain: The Bullwhip Effect Hau L. Lee, Vineet Padmanabhan, Seungjin Whang · Management Science | Apr 1997 | 4,750 |
| 38 | Rank-Order Tournaments as Optimum Labor Contracts Edward P. Lazear, Sherwin Rosen · Journal of Political Economy | Oct 1981 | 4,697 |
| 39 | The Economic Costs of Conflict: A Case Study of the Basque Country Alberto Abadie, Javier Gardeazábal · American Economic Review | Feb 2003 | 4,639 |
| 40 | The Economic Importance of Financial Literacy: Theory and Evidence Annamaria Lusardi, Olivia S. Mitchell · Journal of Economic Literature | Mar 2014 | 4,610 |
| 41 | Agency Costs, Net Worth, And Business Fluctuations Ben Bernanke, Gertler, Mark, Ben Bernanke et al. · AgEcon Search (University of Minnesota, USA) | 1988 | 4,441 |
| 42 | Numerical Recipes in C: The Art of Scientific Computing. Chris R. Birchenhall, William H. Press, Saul A. Teukolsky et al. · The Economic Journal | May 1994 | 4,391 |
| 43 | Convergence Robert J. Barro · Journal of Political Economy | Apr 1992 | 4,189 |
| 44 | Financial Intermediation, Loanable Funds, and The Real Sector Bengt R. Holmstrom, J. Tirole · The Quarterly Journal of Economics | Aug 1997 | 4,060 |
| 45 | Implications of rational inattention Christopher A. Sims · Journal of Monetary Economics | Apr 2003 | 3,997 |
| 46 | The Theory of Capital Structure Milton Harris, Artur Raviv · The Journal of Finance | Mar 1991 | 3,963 |
| 47 | Increasing returns, monopolistic competition, and international trade Paúl Krugman · Journal of International Economics | Nov 1979 | 3,954 |
| 48 | Liquidity Preference as Behavior Towards Risk James G. Tobin · The Review of Economic Studies | Feb 1958 | 3,946 |
| 49 | Governing the commons — the evolution of institutions for collective action Erich Weede · European Journal of Political Economy | May 1992 | 3,926 |
| 50 | The role of human capital in economic development evidence from aggregate cross-country data Jess Benhabib, Mark M. Spiegel · Journal of Monetary Economics | Oct 1994 | 3,852 |
Citations are OpenAlex's own counts, from its 2026-09-23 snapshot, so the ranking can differ from Google Scholar or Web of Science. A paper is listed for a field when OpenAlex files it under one of the field's topics; retracted papers and papers whose citation count cannot be traced to citing works are left out, and a preprint and the article it became are shown once. Release dates are OpenAlex's: where a source gave only a month or a year, that is what is shown. How the lists are chosen.