Jar workflow

Journal of Accounting Research Workflow (jar-workflow)

Overview

This is the router. It does not replace any specialized skill; it tells you which jar- skill to use right now* for your JAR manuscript.

Default assumption: unless the user says otherwise, treat the target as the Journal of Accounting Research (JAR) — one of the "top three" accounting journals, founded in 1963, sponsored by the Chookaszian Accounting Research Center at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and published with Wiley-Blackwell (five issues a year). JAR publishes original research in all areas of accounting drawing on finance, economics, statistics, psychology, and sociology, using analytical, empirical-archival, experimental, and field-study methods. Its defining identity is rigorous empirical-archival capital-markets research in the Ball-Brown lineage. The non-negotiable bar: a clean identification strategy answering a question that matters for how accounting information is produced, disclosed, audited, or used in markets — credible causal inference and an economic story weigh as heavily as a sound regression.

Governance is by a panel of Senior Editors (Berger, Costello, Hail, Nikolaev, Sapra, van Lent, Wittenberg Moerman), not a single editor-in-chief; Editorial Manager Lisa M. Heiberger. Fees, the conference theme, and the masthead change — verify on the Chookaszian Center JAR pages. Three things make JAR distinctive: a tiered submission fee ($750/$500/$50), a mandatory data-and-code sharing policy, and the Ray Ball JAR Annual Conference with its June conference issue. Impact factor (~4.9, 2023) is approximate.

When to trigger

• "What should I do next?" with a half-built JAR manuscript
• You have an archival result but no clean identification or economic story
• A referee pushes on endogeneity, the channel, or "what do we learn about accounting?"
• You received a JAR decision letter (R&R or reject) and need to switch into response mode
• You are weighing the Registered Reports track or a Ray Ball Conference submission

Routing table

Current symptom	Next skill
Idea is vague; unsure it is a real accounting question or JAR-fit	jar-topic-selection
No economic mechanism; predictions are atheoretical correlations	jar-theory-development
Front end reads as gap-spotting; the accounting literature not engaged	jar-literature-positioning
Design/identification may not support the causal claim	jar-methods
Have data; unsure about clustering, endogeneity, measurement of constructs	jar-data-analysis
Results exist but "so what for accounting" is thin	jar-contribution-framing
Tables/figures cluttered, off house style, or not self-explanatory	jar-tables-figures
Prose buries the research design and the economic argument	jar-writing-style
Ready to submit; need the Research Exchange + fee + data/code preflight	jar-submission
Want to understand JAR review, fees, or the conference/RR tracks	jar-review-process
Received an R&R; need to plan revisions and draft the response	jar-rebuttal

Default order

1. jar-topic-selection — lock an accounting question with a credible setting and JAR fit
2. jar-theory-development — build the economic mechanism and sign the predictions
3. jar-literature-positioning — engage the accounting conversation; state the marginal contribution
4. jar-methods — choose the identification strategy and the sample/setting
5. jar-data-analysis — clustering, endogeneity, construct measurement, robustness
6. jar-contribution-framing — turn the estimate into a contribution to accounting knowledge
7. jar-tables-figures — finalize the main descriptive/results/identification exhibits
8. jar-writing-style — full-manuscript prose polish (design-forward, economically literate)
9. jar-submission — Research Exchange preflight (anonymization, fee, data-and-code package)
10. jar-review-process — set expectations for the editor-panel, multi-round process
11. jar-rebuttal — after an R&R, revise then draft the point-by-point response

jar-tables-figures and jar-writing-style are late-stage polish. Do not invoke them while identification or the economic story is still unsettled.

Decision shortcuts

• "Archival result, treatment looks endogenous" → jar-methods then jar-data-analysis
• "Two-way clustering vs. firm-only?" → jar-data-analysis
• "Referee says the channel is unidentified" → jar-theory-development then jar-methods
• "High-outcome-risk study with new data collection" → consider Registered Reports via jar-review-process
• "Targeting the Ray Ball Conference" → jar-review-process (deadline, eligibility) then the design skills
• "Submitting next week" → jar-submission (fee within a week; data/code package)
• "Got an R&R from the editor panel" → jar-review-process then jar-rebuttal

Difference vs. TAR / JAE / RAST / CAR stacks

• JAR: Chicago Booth (Chookaszian Center) / Wiley; empirical-archival capital-markets identity; requires data-and-code sharing; tiered fee; Ray Ball Conference; Registered Reports. Identification + economic story weighted heavily.
• The Accounting Review (TAR): American Accounting Association journal; broad scope; no equivalent mandatory replication-hosting infrastructure.
• Journal of Accounting & Economics (JAE): Elsevier; positive/economics-based, contracting and disclosure; encourages rather than requires code sharing.
• Review of Accounting Studies (RAST) / Contemporary Accounting Research (CAR): strong empirical outlets with their own scopes and norms.

If your paper is purely a methods/statistics contribution with no accounting question, or has no identification leverage, JAR is likely the wrong venue.

Stage ledger (maintain this in the conversation)

Keep an explicit, auditable ledger of where the JAR manuscript sits and what each gate still needs. JAR's identity — clean identification plus an economic story, enforced by a Senior Editor panel and a mandatory data-and-code package — makes the "identification settled?" and "code package runnable?" rows load-bearing:

JAR MANUSCRIPT STAGE LEDGER
===========================
Question / setting : ______            JAR-fit rung: analytical | archival | experimental | field
Identification     : shock/DID | IV | RD | structural | descriptive-only (FIX)
Economic channel   : named & signed? ______
Stage gates (✓ / ✗ / n/a):
  [ ] jar-topic-selection       accounting question that matters; credible setting
  [ ] jar-theory-development     mechanism built; predictions signed
  [ ] jar-literature-positioning conversation named; marginal contribution stated
  [ ] jar-methods                identification strategy defensible
  [ ] jar-data-analysis          clustering, endogeneity, construct measurement, robustness
  [ ] jar-contribution-framing   estimate → contribution to accounting knowledge
  [ ] jar-tables-figures         exhibits self-explanatory, house style
  [ ] jar-writing-style          design-forward, economically literate prose
  [ ] jar-submission             Research Exchange preflight; anonymized; fee tier chosen
  [ ] data-and-code package      runnable; matches tables; deposit-ready (POLICY: mandatory)
  [ ] jar-review-process         track chosen: regular | Registered Report | Ray Ball Conference
  [ ] jar-rebuttal               (R&R only) revise first, then point-by-point
Fee tier           : $750 | $500 | $50   (verify current schedule on Chookaszian JAR pages)
Current bottleneck : ______            Next skill: jar-______

Refresh the ledger after each sub-skill. A ✗ on identification or the data-and-code package blocks jar-submission regardless of how polished the prose is.

Anti-patterns

• Do not skip jar-theory-development and present a regression with no economic channel.
• Do not let jar-tables-figures beautify exhibits before identification is settled.
• Do not start jar-submission without the runnable data-and-code package the policy requires.
• Do not let jar-rebuttal draft a response before the manuscript is actually revised.