Rational (successive) h-indices: An application to economics in the Republic of Ireland

We rank economics departments in the Republic of Ireland according to the number of publications, number of citations, and successive h-index of research-active staff. We increase the discriminatory power of the h 1-index by introducing three generalizations, each of which is a rational number. The first (h 1+) measures the excess over the actual h-index, while the other two (h 1*, h 1?) measures the distance to the next h-index. At the individual level, h*and h ? coincide while h + is undefined.