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ier-referee-strategy

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Use when anticipating referee objections before submitting an International Economic Review (IER) manuscript, or when reading the room of an IER review. Maps the likely objections by archetype and pre-empts them; it does not draft the response letter (see ier-rebuttal).

International-Economic-Review-Skills/skills/ier-referee-strategy/SKILL.md

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# Referee Strategy (ier-referee-strategy)

## When to trigger

- The paper is near submission and you want to find the objection that would sink it before a referee does
- You are deciding what to put in the paper vs. hold in reserve for the response
- A draft is strong but you suspect one undefended assumption or one fragile number is the soft spot
- You want to calibrate expectations for IER's review (a rigor-gated, theory-leaning process)

## How IER referees read

An IER referee is usually a rigor-minded economist who reads for **whether the contribution is correct, general, and tightly linked to its evidence**. Unlike a top-5 referee, they are not primarily asking "is this important enough"; they are asking "is this right, and does it teach a general lesson." The most common reasons an IER paper stalls are: an undefended load-bearing assumption, identification that is "calibration in disguise," a headline number that moves under a reasonable perturbation, or a proof that is not airtight. Pre-empt by archetype:

| Archetype | The objection that sinks it | Pre-empt by |
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