Journal-of-Financial-Economics-Skills

JFE Skills

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Agent skill stack for manuscripts targeted at the Journal of Financial Economics (JFE) — published by Elsevier and one of the "top-3" finance journals, known for rigorous, methodologically demanding empirical corporate finance and asset pricing.

This repository is opinionated. It is not a generic finance-writing toolbox. It is a JFE-specific stack covering topic fit, literature positioning, credible identification, the nuts-and-bolts empirical design JFE is famous for, an exhaustive robustness battery, exhibit craft, the journal-hosted Internet Appendix, house writing style, submission, referee strategy, and R&R rebuttals.

JFE volatile specifics — current editors, the exact submission fee, the impact factor, and the precise data-availability and anonymity rules — change over time. This pack describes durable norms and tells you to verify the specifics on the journal's official page.

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Why a Separate JFE Skill Stack?

JFE imposes constraints that differ materially from JF and RFS, even though all three are top-3 finance journals:

Constraint	Journal of Financial Economics	Implication
Discipline	Empirical corporate finance & asset pricing (plus supporting theory)	Pure theory with thin empirics is a harder sell
Methodological bar	Nuts-and-bolts rigor; technical, line-by-line scrutiny	Sloppy measurement or estimation is fatal
Identification	Natural experiments, IV, staggered DID, RDD; explicit endogeneity	"OLS + controls" rarely carries the headline
Robustness	Exhaustive; every alternative explanation ruled out	A fragile result is a classic rejection
Inference (asset pricing)	Correct/clustered SEs, out-of-sample, multiple-testing discipline	A factor ignoring multiple testing is a red flag
Internet Appendix	Journal-hosted; deep — proofs and robustness live there	A thin appendix signals thin robustness
Length / depth	Typically longer and more robustness-heavy than JF	Expect a full, demanding structure
Review process	Multiple demanding rounds; thorough referees	The response letter is judged almost as closely as the paper

Generic "scientific writing" or "finance writing" skill packs do not address these constraints.

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Quick Start

Option A — Claude Code Plugin (recommended)

/plugin marketplace add https://github.com/brycewang-stanford/jfe-skills
/plugin install jfe-skills
/reload-plugins

Option B — Manual Copy

git clone https://github.com/brycewang-stanford/jfe-skills.git
cd jfe-skills

mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && cp -R skills/jfe-* ~/.claude/skills/
# or
mkdir -p ~/.codex/skills && cp -R skills/jfe-* ~/.codex/skills/

First Prompt

Use jfe-workflow to tell me which skill I should use next for my JFE manuscript.

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Default Workflow

jfe-topic-selection
        ▼
jfe-literature-positioning
        ▼
jfe-identification
        ▼
jfe-empirical-design
        ▼
jfe-robustness
        ▼
jfe-tables-figures
        ▼
jfe-internet-appendix
        ▼
jfe-writing-style       (polish)
        ▼
jfe-submission
        ▼
jfe-referee-strategy
        ▼
jfe-rebuttal

jfe-workflow is the router — it tells you which skill to use next based on where you are.

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Skills

Skill	Purpose
jfe-workflow	Router — decides which sub-skill to invoke next
jfe-topic-selection	Contribution and economic-question fit test
jfe-literature-positioning	Positioning against the top-3 finance frontier
jfe-identification	Credible causal design (natural experiments, IV, staggered DID, RDD)
jfe-empirical-design	Factor construction, Fama–MacBeth/GMM, clustered SEs, multiple testing
jfe-robustness	The exhaustive robustness battery JFE is known for
jfe-tables-figures	Readable, self-contained exhibits in house style
jfe-internet-appendix	Journal-hosted appendix: proofs, robustness, supplementary tests
jfe-writing-style	Precise, evidence-forward prose; no overclaiming
jfe-submission	Pre-submission preflight + manuscript template
jfe-referee-strategy	Anticipate and pre-empt referee objections
jfe-rebuttal	R&R response-letter structure for demanding rounds

Resources

• skills/jfe-submission/templates/manuscript_template.md — JFE-style manuscript skeleton (abstract, variable-definition table, exhibit and reference conventions)
• skills/jfe-submission/templates/checklist.md — 8-section pre-submission self-check
• resources/external_tools.md — finance data sources (CRSP / Compustat / TAQ / IBES / Dealscan via WRDS) + Stata / R / Python packages

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Differences vs. JF and RFS Skills

Dimension	Journal of Financial Economics	Journal of Finance (JF)	Review of Financial Studies (RFS)
Emphasis	Methodological rigor + robustness	A clean, idea-forward result	Theory + methodology depth
Typical length	Longer, robustness-heavy	Often tighter	Variable
Internet Appendix	Deep, expected	Used	Used
Best fit	Exhaustively-stress-tested empirics	A single decisive finding	Method/theory contributions

Confirm each journal's current scope on its official page before choosing a target.

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What This Repo Does Not Do

• It does not write a submittable manuscript for you
• It does not simulate a specific editor's preferences
• It does not store JFE's rejection rate, impact factor, or current fee — verify those on the official page
• It does not judge whether your contribution is genuinely novel — that is your call

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Related

• awesome-journal-skills — Index of journal-specific skill packs
• Journal of Finance Skills — JF
• Review of Financial Studies Skills — RFS

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License

MIT