And if you look at, say, the macroeconomists who will tell you they downweight Jpube to IER because they can't publish there, I think you will find that their revealed preferences from hiring decisions and tenure votes tell a different story.
Well, either that or they're the kind of people who only vote for hiring and tenuring other macroeconomists, in which case it's useless to try to cater to their preferences, because they won't vote to hire you anyway.
I would probably go for top field journal rather than 2nd-tier general journals, on the margin. My reasoning is that if you have a paper in top field journal, it has a better chance of getting the attention in your field. I guess many people will read the top field journal(s) in their field, and the top 5, but probably won't read the 2nd-tier general journal as often.
The point was that field journals do not involve competition across fields, and that this problem is solved by the top four journals, not the IER. Every field has its own top field journal, and I don't see how to rank one top field over another. If you look at revealed preference in good departments, tenure goes to the people who have been most successful in publishing papers in the top general journals.
You seem to assume (perhaps from your exposure to EMJR) that everyone ridiculously insists journals outside their field are worthless. While there are certainly some of those people are out there, its many fewer than you might think. There is a huge cost to taking this attitude: it makes it hard to evaluate and hire the best colleagues.
And if you look at, say, the macroeconomists who will tell you they downweight Jpube to IER because they can't publish there, I think you will find that their revealed preferences from hiring decisions and tenure votes tell a different story.