Should a hyphen be used between "rational" and "expectations" in phrases like "rational expectations equilibrium" or "rational expectations condition" in an academic paper? The practice seems uncommon in economics so I am wondering whether an exception to the usual rule applies here.
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I don't think you should be using "rational expectations" adjectivally in the first place! It's a completely non-standard usage, which in any other context would normally be enclosed in "scare quotes". But any usage that would normally be set off with scare quotes definitely shouldn't be used in an academic paper. – FumbleFingers May 24 '21 at 11:16
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Science Direct seems to buck the trend, slavishly following the rule-of-thumb to hyphenate novel-ish compound modifiers but most institutions think the hyphen is better ditched here as the people using / encountering the strings will know how to read them. This is covered in general at Zou's question you later cite, and these particular examples, in the grey area, can easily be checked for a reasonable estimate of relative frequency of use. – Edwin Ashworth May 24 '21 at 11:37
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I can't upvote, but both of the preceding comments are helpful. – Attila the Fun May 24 '21 at 16:17
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In current usage, this is possibly an example of omitting a hyphen because the term ("rational expectations") is very familiar to the audience. See this answer. However, I do not know that hyphenated usage was ever common.
Attila the Fun
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