This document summarizes the origin and evolution of the NBER Working Paper series from its beginning in 1972 to the present. It started as an outlet for NBER research and has grown tremendously over time. Some key points: - The first working paper was published in June 1973 and there were only 3 papers in the first month. - Growth accelerated after Martin Feldstein became NBER President in 1977, with over 200 papers published in 1981. - There are now over 20,000 working papers published and about 5.5 million downloads per year from around the world. - The most popular papers focus on topics like financial crises, economic growth, and corporate governance.

1. The Origin and Evolution of the
NBER Working Paper Series
James Poterba, MIT and NBER
July 2014

2. The Beginning
Bob Michael seeks an outlet for research from the NBER
Center for Economic Analysis of Human Behavior and
Social Institutions (December 1972)
The Vision: “What I have in mind is simply a new heavy
paper cover for manuscripts much like that used by many
departments of economics and university research
institutes …”
Key Design Feature: “… [working papers have] not
undergone the full critical review accorded the National
Bureau’s studies…”

3. The Prototype by H. Irving Forman

4. Working Paper #1

5. The Launch: June 1973
Paper #1: Finis Welch, “Education, Information, and
Efficiency”
Paper #2: Barry Chiswick, “Hospital Utilization: An Analysis
of SMSA Differences” (published in Explorations)
Paper #3: Swarnjit Arora, “Error Component Regression
Models and Their Applications” (published in Annals)
3 WPs in first month, took 26 months to reach #100
About 175 Papers before Martin Feldstein becomes NBER
President in April 1977

6. The Great Expansion: Post 1978
1978: 55 Papers
1981: 221 Papers
Milestones:
WP1000: October 1982
WP2000: August 1986
WP5000: January 1995 (22 Years Post-Launch)
WP10000: October 2003
WP20000: March 2014

7. NBER WPs Today
1110 papers in 2013
869 academic institution subscribers, 168 non-academic
subscribers
Approximately 25,000 recipients of “New This Week” email
“Users who downloaded this paper also downloaded…”
feature
Roughly 5.5 million downloads per year, of which 1.8
million are non-OECD users and 40% are for papers more
than three years old
About 75% of visitors find NBER papers from a Google
search

8. Percent of 1st
Year Downloads by Days Since Release
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
Day
0
1 2 3 Day
4
5 6 7 8 Day
9
10 11 12 13 Day
14

9. Cumulative % Year 1 Downloads by Days Since Release
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
Day
0
1 2 3 Day
4
5 6 7 8 Day
9
10 11 12 13 Day
14

10. Working Papers by Program, 1972-2014

11. Top Working Paper Authors, 1973-2014
Author Paper Count
Martin Feldstein 161
Joshua Aizenman 157
Richard Freeman 142
James Poterba 122
Andrei Shleifer 121
James Heckman 121
Michal Bordo 119
Assaf Razin 115
Ed Glaeser 115
Daron Acemoglu 114

12. Top Working Paper Authors, 2004-2014
Author Paper Count
Daron Acemoglu 81
Joshua Aizenman 68
James Heckman 61
John List 60
Ed Glaeser 58
John Whalley 58
Michael Bordo 53
Shang-Jin Wei 50
Andre Shleifer 44
Olivia Mitchell 44
Rene Stulz 44

13. Most Downloaded Papers, 2005-2014
Author WP
Number
Title
Taylor 14631 (2009) The Financial Crisis and the Policy
Response: An Empirical Analysis of What
Went Wrong
Reinhart & Rogoff 15639 (2010) Growth in a Time of Debt
Reinhart & Rogoff 13882 (2008) This Time is Different: A Panoramic view of
Eight Centuries of Financial Crises
Barro 5698 (1996) Determinants of Economic Growth
Reinhart & Rogoff 13761 (2008) Is the 2007 US Sub-Priime Financial Crisis
so Different?
Reinhart & Rogoff 14656 (2009) The Aftermath of Financial Crises
Shleifer & Vishny 5554 (1996) A Survey of Corporate Governance
Sachs & Warner 5398 (1995) Natural Resource Abundance & Economic
Growth
Rajan 11728 (2005) Has Financial Development Made the
World Riskier?
B. Hall, Jaffe, & 8498 (2001) The NBER Patent Citation Data File