Network analysis of econometric society fellows

Abstract

Being elected as an Econometric Society Fellow is one of the greatest honors for an economist. In this paper, we see whether the Fellows are well-connected. We collected the Fellows' publication records and the institutions where they work to analyze their co-author and co-worker networks. Although there are more than 80 years between the foundation of the Society and the last elected Fellows, the vast majority of the Fellows are connected either directly or indirectly. The average distance between the connected Fellows is 2.4 in the co-worker network and 4.4 in the co-author network. We also find that the percentage of connected Fellows has increased through time. Therefore, the percentage of Fellows who have not co-authored a paper with another Fellow or have not worked in the same institution with another Fellow is decreasing over time.