Mechanisms for distribution of academic research and financing in scientific collectives

Abstract

Authors consider the mechanisms for the distribution of income and academic research withinresearch teams with a fixed total amount of funding and payments proportional to the publication activity of scientists. This situation is typical for the grant research projects and fundamental science organizations that use incentive bonuses for the effectiveness of scientific activities. It is shown that if team members act selfishly, maximizing their net income (minus the cost of writing scientific papers), their equilibrium net incomes are many times lower, and the total number of papers written by them is many times higher than in the case of a “cartel collusion”, when the team as a whole writes a certain minimum required number of articles. Mutually beneficial (in comparison with competitive equilibrium) distribution of the amount of work and payments between the participants of the “scientific cartel” can vary widely. It is alsoshown that the competitive mechanism leads to the “washing out” of research teams scientists with high opportunity costs of writing scientific papers, to an increased risk of unethical behavior of some scientists and, probably, to a decrease in the quality of papers to the detriment of their quantity.