The problem is that universities and journals are ranked. Rankings are based, in part, on metrics related to publications and citations and that's the utility

The problem is that universities and journals are ranked. Rankings are based, in part, on metrics related to publications and citations and that's the utility function they try to optimize. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publish_or_perish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publish_or_perish