| name | economics-literature-review |
| description | Finds and synthesizes recent economics literature for a research question, prioritizing top economics journals and strong working-paper venues, resolving paywalled links through IDEAS/RePEc or author webpages, and writing a markdown review. Use when the user asks for a literature search, literature review, related-work scan, paper shortlist, bibliography, or economics article review. |
Economics Literature Review
Trigger
Use when the task involves:
- finding recent economics papers for a research question
- building a top-10 reading list or related-work shortlist
- writing a markdown literature review or paper scan
- handling paywalled journal articles by locating open versions
Defaults
- Read the research question from
spec/intent.md, under ## Research Question, unless the user points to another file.
- Write the review to
docs/literature-review.md unless the user requests another path.
- Start with the last 5 years. Widen to roughly the last 10 years if the recent pool is too thin.
- Prioritize top economics journals first, then strong theory or field journals, then leading working-paper series if needed.
Workflow
- Read the research question and extract the core topic, model terms, equilibrium concept, and likely synonym phrases.
- Search recent economics literature with a journal-first pass, then widen to IDEAS/RePEc and major working-paper venues.
- Build a candidate set larger than 10 papers, then screen for fit, recency, economics relevance, and venue quality.
- For each shortlisted paper, verify the abstract and metadata, then capture citation, year, venue or status, and a usable access link.
- If the journal page is paywalled, look for a free version on IDEAS/RePEc, the authors' webpages, NBER, CEPR, SSRN, arXiv, or an institutional repository.
- Rank the 10 strongest matches, explain why each matters for the research question, and separate published papers from working papers.
- Write the markdown review and tell the user about any unresolved access issues or thin-coverage areas.
Guardrails
- Prefer economics papers over adjacent math or control papers unless the adjacent paper is clearly necessary for the economics question.
- Do not imply publication status when the paper is still a working paper or the status is unclear.
- If top-journal matches are sparse, say so directly and explain why lower-tier journals or working papers were included.
- Record access status explicitly: open version found, journal page paywalled but free version found, or no free version located.
- Do not include a paper you have not verified at least through abstract-level evidence.
Output
Return:
- the extracted research question
- the search scope and selection logic
- a ranked top-10 list with citation, venue or status, year, access link, and a short relevance note
- a short synthesis of common themes, open gaps, and next-search directions
- an access-issues section listing paywalled or unresolved papers
Additional Resources
- For venue priorities, access fallback order, and a markdown template, see reference.md.
