This month, I embarked on a project to explore why it is there are more and more researchers and scientists in the world, publishing more and more findings, yet productivity growth in the economy is not accelerating.
In a sense, while more resources are devoted to research, the productivity of research is declining. One reason for this development could be that we simply produce too much research. Academics today have much less freedom than 50 years ago.
In an effort to hold academics accountable for their work, universities and other research institutions now measure the number of papers a researcher publishes and the quality of these papers. Quality is usually measured by the impact factor of the peer-reviewed journal the paper is published in.
Joachim Klement is investment strategist at Liberum Capital and author of Klement on Investing blog
This article first appeared in ETF Insider, ETF Stream's monthly ETF magazine for professional investors in Europe. To read the full article, click here.
