JME House Style (jme-writing-style)

When to trigger

• The abstract is over 100 words or begins with "This paper" / "We"
• References are numbered or use abbreviated journal titles
• You are unsure of the manuscript formatting JME requires at submission
• Final polish before the Editorial Manager preflight

Implementing JME style (verified specifics)

• Abstract: no more than 100 words, and it must not start with "This paper" or "We." Open with the finding or the question instead.
• References: author-date style ("Smith (1992) reported that..."; "(e.g., Smith et al., 1969)"). Journal titles are spelled out in full — never abbreviated. The reference list appears after appendices but before tables and figures.
• Formatting: manuscripts double-spaced, 12-point type, 1-inch margins, with line numbers on both submissions and final manuscripts.
• Notes: use footnotes, numbered consecutively with superscript Arabic numerals — not endnotes.
• Keywords / classification: up to five keywords and at least one JEL (Journal of Economic Literature) classification code are required.
• Tables and figures: numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals.
• Length: accepted papers must not exceed 40 pages of text/references/footnotes, with no more than 10 tables and figures combined (online supplements exempt) — write to that target.
• AI declaration: include a declaration of any use of generative AI in manuscript preparation, per Elsevier policy.

Writing for a macro audience

JME readers are macroeconomists and central bankers. The intro should state the question, the identified shock or mechanism, the headline result, and the policy lesson quickly. Define the shock units (e.g., a 100-bp policy surprise) early. Keep the prose disciplined: the 40-page cap rewards a tight argument, with derivations and extra robustness in the online supplement.

Before/after micro-rewrites in the JME register

• Abstract opener. Before: "We show that monetary policy shocks have heterogeneous effects across firms." After: "Contractionary monetary policy surprises depress investment roughly twice as strongly at financially constrained firms, dampening aggregate transmission when credit spreads are wide." The rewrite leads with the finding (legal under the no-"We" rule), quantifies it, and lands the aggregate policy margin inside one sentence.
• Method-inventory sentence. Before: "We estimate a VAR and also run local projections as a robustness check." After: "High-frequency policy surprises identify the shock; the VAR and local projections deliver the same peak impulse response, so the mechanism — not the estimator — carries the result." Referees read the second version as an identification claim, not a to-do list.
• DSGE contribution sentence. Before: "Our model extends the standard framework with financial frictions." After: "Adding an intermediary balance-sheet constraint lets the model match the observed spread response to a 100-bp surprise and reverses the welfare ranking of the two policy rules." Name the friction, the matched moment, and the counterfactual it overturns.
• Hedge pruning. Delete "it could be argued that," "somewhat," and "interestingly"; each costs words against the 40-page cap without adding an estimate, a moment, or a mechanism.

Checklist

• Abstract ≤ 100 words and does not begin with "This paper" or "We"
• References author-date; journal titles spelled out in full
• Reference list after appendices, before tables/figures
• Double-spaced, 12-point, 1-inch margins, line numbers on
• Footnotes (superscript Arabic), not endnotes
• Up to five keywords and ≥ one JEL code
• Generative-AI use declared if applicable

Style execution pass for Journal of Monetary Economics

Treat this skill as an executable review pass, not a prose hint. First lock the main macro object, the identifying variation, and the policy-relevant counterfactual; then judge whether the current manuscript answers the venue's real reader: macro and monetary economists who expect the shock, mechanism, and policy margin to be visible early.

• Do the pass: Rewrite the first two pages so each paragraph starts from the venue-level claim, not from chronology or method inventory; preserve exact source-map limits and move technical overflow to appendix or supplement.
• Return a ledger: give claim / evidence / risk / manuscript location rows, so the next agent can edit rather than rediscover the issue.
• Sibling guard: compare against JIE for open-economy trade/finance emphasis, RED for dynamic macro theory, AEJ Macro for broader field positioning; if a sibling owns the contribution, recommend re-routing before polishing format.
• Stop condition: do not give submission-ready advice until the pack's resources/official-source-map.md has been checked for volatile rules and the manuscript has one concrete fix for the largest venue-specific risk.

Output format

【Abstract】word count + first word (≤100, not "This paper"/"We")? Y/N
【References】author-date, full journal titles? Y/N
【Formatting】double-spaced 12pt, line numbers, footnotes? Y/N
【Keywords/JEL】≤5 keywords + ≥1 JEL code? Y/N
【AI declaration】present if used? Y/N
【Next step】jme-replication-and-data-policy