College admissions is growing ever more competitive, and students are looking for any edge to set themselves apart from their peers. A newly popular avenue is pursuing research; we’ve discussed this before, along with how high school students can go about doing research the right way. As we’ve noted several times, publication is the ultimate goal of this research, a sign that what you’ve done is valid in the eyes of the broader academic community.
In this article, we’re going to explore one field of research in more depth: Economics (and also business, which is like economics, except when it isn’t). We’re going to cover some of the peculiarities of publishing in the field of economics, and then go over some professional economics journals that will accept submissions from high school students. We’re also going to cover best practices for publishing economics research. Let’s get started!
How Economics Publication Works
Publication has similarities between disciplines, but each has its own quirks as well. Each academic field is distinct, with its own quirks and traditions. This is because despite all being academia, fields tend to be remarkably self contained, and unconcerned with what’s happening in other fields.
Economics specifically often has very long publication timelines, far more so than many other fields. This is of course journal or conference specific, but in general it takes much longer to publish in economics. Indeed, even tenured professors tend to only publish one article per year or so.
The research done by economists tends to analyze large sets of data; like all other social sciences, this data relates to human behavior and decision making. Economists try to divine why humans act the way they do, especially in regards to market behaviors.
Literature reviews are also frequently done in economics, where a researcher goes over a significant number of papers on a single topic and synthesizes the results. These were especially popular during the pandemic however, creating a glut of literature reviews, and leaving fewer papers to synthesize. While you can still perform a literature review for your economics research, you must take care to make sure the same topic was not covered before.
Economics Publication Options
Now we’re going to go through a number of journals which specialize in publishing papers in both Economics and Business. These are professional journals, but will accept papers from high school students if the work is of high enough quality.
Open Journal of Business and Management
This is an international journal devoted to the science of business and management. While not aimed at high school students, they do accept submissions from them, and are one of the few locales to publish high school research on business and management. They accept both reviews and original research. Articles may be on any field or subfield within business.
All submitted articles must conform to their publication guidelines. All works cited must be referenced in the APA style. Articles which do not adhere to their publication guidelines will be rejected without review of scientific merit.
Articles which meet their guidelines will be reviewed by an editor, who will then send it to reviewers. Their review process is single-blind. The editor makes a publication decision based on the comments of the reviewers. Non-reviewed articles are returned within 10 days. Peer reviewed articles may be accepted immediately for publication, or may have revisions required. The peer review process takes four weeks.
There is a $299 submission fee, and articles are accepted on a rolling basis. They accept approximately 15% of submitted articles from high school students. Generally, accepted papers appear online within 3 weeks, and are published in hard copy at a later date.
American Journal of Industrial and Business Management
This is, in spite of the name, an international journal dedicated to publishing research on business management, industrial engineering, information management, and related topics. This journal is not aimed at high school students, but accepts papers from all authors so long as they meet its publication criteria. A full list of topics accepted by the journal may be found here.
AJIBM accepts research papers for publication. Reviews are published, but may only be submitted by invitation. All manuscripts must be submitted online, and must conform to their publication guidelines for formatting. AJIBM uses the APA style for citations. Manuscripts which do not follow their style guidelines will be returned to authors without review of their scientific merit.
Articles which meet their guidelines are then reviewed by an editor, who sends them to reviewers. All reviews are single-blind. The editor prepares a response letter to the author in response to the review comments. All decisions are made within four weeks. A paper may be accepted, rejected, or returned with comments for resubmission after revisions. Open access authors retain copyrights of their papers, all papers are published under the Creative Commons Attribution License.
There is a processing charge for submitted papers of $499. As the journal does not charge for access to published papers, this goes to funding the operations of the journal and ensuring continued access to published materials.
International Journal of Social Science and Economic Research
As the name suggests, this is an international journal dedicated to publishing research from all areas of the social sciences. While they are not specifically catered to submissions from high school students, they will accept them, so long as they are up to their scientific standards. IJSSER publishes monthly, and submissions are always open.
All papers must be in English. They publish original research, case studies, review articles, and technical notes. All submissions are subject to double-blind review. All submitted papers must conform to their stylistic guidelines. All papers are reviewed by an editor first to ensure adherence to these guidelines; those that do are then submitted for peer review.
IJSSER accepts slightly over 50% of all submissions for publication. As IJSSER is an open access journal, they do not charge for access to the papers they publish. They charge publication fees to authors to recoup the costs of running the site and paying editors. The fee to publish is $80 if you are from a high income economy, else it is $70. This covers a submission of up to 30 pages, above 30 pages there is an additional charge of $5 per page.
Final Thoughts
Of course, you can also publish your research in journals meant for high school students, many of which will accept papers on economics. Our list here is meant to demonstrate that there are publication options beyond those just meant for students, and to encourage high schoolers doing advanced research to put it out there where it may be seen and reviewed by professionals in the field. The point of research is to contribute to the sum total of human knowledge, and we believe high school students are capable of doing so.
Of course, doing original research is hard, as is writing a proper research paper discussing it. This is not a skill often taught in high schools, leaving students uncertain how to even begin. Our research mentors equip students with the skills and guidance they need to carry out and publish original research, and to showcase this in their college applications. Schedule a free consultation today to learn how we can help you with your own research goals.
