From aer-insights-skills
Positions an AER: Insights short-format manuscript against the closest published work in one or two tight paragraphs, staking the gap concisely without writing a full literature review.
How this skill is triggered — by the user, by Claude, or both
Slash command
/aer-insights-skills:aeri-literature-positioningThe summary Claude sees in its skill listing — used to decide when to auto-load this skill
- The contribution relative to the nearest paper is fuzzy or oversold
AER: Insights gives you no room for a survey. Positioning must be done in one or two paragraphs that do exactly one job: pin the single closest prior result and state precisely what your one insight adds, corrects, or overturns. Because the whole paper is one idea, the literature task is narrow — locate that idea on the frontier, not map the whole field. The word budget is shared with everything else (≤7,000 words minus exhibits), so every citation must earn its place.
aeri-topic-selection.| Gap type | One-line framing | Watch-out |
|---|---|---|
| New result on an open question | "It was unknown whether …; we show …" | be sure it is genuinely open, not just unaddressed-by-you |
| Overturning a believed result | "Prior work concluded X; with [better design/data] we find not-X" | engage the prior paper's design fairly |
| Sharpening / separating channels | "Prior work left A and B bundled together; we isolate ..." | show the separation is the contribution |
| Method that changes the answer | "Applying [method] to [setting] reverses the standard conclusion" | the payoff, not the method, is the contribution |
In a long paper the literature has its own section; in AER: Insights it should live inside the
introduction — typically the second and third sentences after the headline result
(aeri-writing-style). The reader meets the result, then immediately
learns what was believed before and what your one insight changes. A standalone "Related Literature"
section is a smell that the paper is too long or trying to be an AER paper.
Because AER: Insights is general-interest, the closest paper you confront should be one a broad
audience recognizes, not only the three specialists in your subfield. If the only papers you can position
against are field-internal, reconsider whether the venue is AER: Insights or an AEJ field journal
(aeri-topic-selection). Position against the most visible prior
claim your result touches; cite the field-internal antecedents in a footnote.
A fictional paper finds that revealing posted wages closes part of the gender application gap. A weak positioning cites "a large literature on gender gaps" and a dozen papers. A strong AER: Insights positioning is two sentences: "The application gap is widely attributed to preferences or confidence (closest paper: X); we show a simple information change moves it substantially, implying the gap is partly an information friction." One named antecedent, one delta clause, no survey.
【Closest prior work】<1–2 papers> — what they established / left open
【Delta clause】"We show ..., where prior work only ... / assumed ... / left ... unresolved"
【Novelty calibration】exact marginal contribution (no over/underclaim)
【Where the rest goes】footnotes / Supplemental Appendix
【Next step】aeri-identification (or aeri-theory-model for a theory paper)
npx claudepluginhub brycewang-stanford/awesome-journal-skills --plugin aer-insights-skillsPositions the marginal contribution of an AEJ: Applied manuscript precisely against prior applied-micro work. Use when a contribution is fuzzy, undersold, or risks reading as a replication.
Positions a REStud manuscript against the closest related work by confronting nearest papers and stating the marginal contribution precisely.
Sharpens the contribution-vs-frontier claim for EER manuscripts when the novelty gap is fuzzy, oversold, or under-cited. Helps name the closest papers and state a checkable marginal contribution.