<p>Is a econ minor worth anything?</p>
<p>Your BME background would be awesome when actually getting hired-- by doing well in BME you've proven that you have amazing quantitative skills, which these firms absolutely love. (hey-- you're less time to train). I was talking to a family friend who works at Morgan Stanley who was a science/comp engineering guy himself and he said that he loooooves seeing applicants with a very strong math/science/engineering background.</p>
<p>Do NOT take 139 with Tauchen -- the curve was rough. My friends and I couldn't understand Yildrim, but a lot of people I know were pretty happy with both Yildrim and Connolly (who seemed like an easy grader).</p>
<p>I'm not sure how many Econ majors go onto law school, but I think quite a few do... not too sure. Ummm as for BS vs BA I guess if Econ is your second major, it's easier to do something like BA, but I'm not sure anymore with the new curriculum..</p>
<p>is there a reason why so few Duke people choose to get a PhD in Economics? Or is this universal among all schools?</p>
<p>I-banking/consulting = way more $$$. Getting a PhD is not that common anywhere, although some schools will obviously have more than others. There's a poster that ranks schools by the percentage of undergrads that go onto PhDs in certain subjects...I remember seeing a lot of LACs.</p>
<p>this is an awesome thread...</p>
<p>does anyone know why they are restructing the core econ courses again?</p>
<p>because there are sooo many econ majors.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Why would people with a Ph.D in Econ make less than i-bankers/consultants? I mean, it obviously takes much more time to get a Ph.D, so why isn't a student rewarded for it? </p></li>
<li><p>Do you only need 4 years of undergrad (B.A. or B.S.) to become an ibanker/consultant?</p></li>
<li><p>And one more thing: If a student enters Pratt, he WANTS to work in the engineering workforce. So why do engineers accept finance firms offer of employment if the reason they are going to school is to do engineering as a career. Wouldn't they have majored in Econ. if they were interested in working for IBM, etc. It just seems like an engineering student who decides to work in finance isn't following his/her dreams.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>UltimateFrisbee, to answer your 1st question:</p>
<p>Not everyone who studies Econ want to be an ibanker and such and make tons of money one day. Many econ majors go on to earn phD's simply because they love the subject. They are happy to put in the extra years at school studying economics, and could care less if they earn less than the ibankers. How much ibankers earn is determined by market supply and demand, not how many years they spent studying in school. There's a econ lesson for ya.</p>
<p>2.) Yes.</p>
<p>3.) Because they change their minds after a while in engineering. Generally if you want to move between Pratt and Trinity it has to be done in your first two years, after that you're mildly "stuck". So if you're a junior and you realize you don't want to do engineering, then you can start looking elsewhere.</p>
<p>Ok, Thanks. What is Duke's strongest strength in business? (I just remembered I think Duke doesn't offer an undergraduate degree in business, right?)</p>
<p>Unless you get a job there, Fuqua will be pretty irrelevant while you're an undergrad.</p>
<p>Duke offers the M&M Certificate for pre-business undergrads. See <a href="http://www.aas.duke.edu/trinity/prebusiness/liberal.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.aas.duke.edu/trinity/prebusiness/liberal.pdf</a></p>
<p>However, I've been told that the certificate is not as useful as people may think for ibanking and finance. I've also been told to think of the M&M as a way of preparing people who want to study ETHICS in business and become corporate lawyers and such. But then again, there's pre-law for that.</p>
<p>The certificate was designed to a) boost enrollment in sociology classes and b) make less heavily-recruited majors like english or history more marketable.</p>
<p>Of course it didn't take long for the future i-bankers in the econ department to latch onto yet another resume padder, so they make up a plurality of M&M students now.</p>
<p>Right, MMS can be also be a useful add-on to non-traditionally-business majors i.e. sociology.</p>
<p>Ultimate Frisbee- that's not necessarily true about everyone entering Pratt. Plenty of engineers like Pratt's curriculum but know from the get go that the chance of them actually becoming an engineer is slim. There's plenty of Pratt students who go onto med school and many of them have those career goals before they set foot on campus. Some realize they don't like it. Some take an economics course and love it. </p>
<p>I have a bunch of friends in Pratt who genuinely enjoy what they're studying and are glad they're not bothered with Trinity's liberal arts requirements... but many of whom have known from day 1 that they will not become practicing engineers. Yet they do know that the fact that they're Duke engineers (or FEMALE engineers) will teach them all the skills and give them quite an edge in going into finance or patent law or whatever they want. It's funny, only one of my friends in Pratt actually wants to be an engineer after graduation. </p>
<p>As for an econ PhD, I don't think it's really needed to succeed and have a high earning potential in finance, which is what most economics students across the country are trying to do. This will probably be a national trend, although there definitely are economics students who love the subject and want to do serious research/ultimately teach it and get a PhD (think UChicago's programs). But yeah, I haven't heard of too many i-bankers/financial services people with econ PhDs</p>
<p>What do i-bankers usually have? Just a bachelor's degree?</p>
<p>Hey now - some misperceptions coming out. Engineers don't go into iBanking or finance because they change their minds about engineering but are "stuck" in Pratt. Engineers come to Pratt a lot of times because they know that Duke's engineering degree has elements to it that provide a strong foundation for many things - including engineering, iBanking, med school, law school, etc. We have a large number of students who start and finish with Econ as a double major or as a minor, or who get the Markets and Management certificate.</p>
<p>I agree with bluestar7, but I would rephrase "the chance of them actually becoming an engineer is slim." That makes it sound like there's not much hope for someone who wants to be an engineer after graduating to become one. The rephrase is that many Pratt graduates choose to go into fields other than engineering, and are generally successful pursuing the field they do want. <a href="http://www.pratt.duke.edu/students/profiles.php%5B/url%5D">http://www.pratt.duke.edu/students/profiles.php</a> has some profiles of students to see what I mean.</p>
<p>how do Duke PhD-hopefuls do in grad school admissions? do they get into top economics schools?</p>
<p>I believe there were two or three this past year. The two I know of were admitted to Stanford (among others) and Princeton (among others).</p>
<p>A good friend of mine, who is a rising senior, enrolled in Pratt because everyone in high school told him he HAD to go into engineering because of his math abilities. He also decided to double major in econ because he thought he might want to go into business. It wasn't long before he realized that a few more classes and he could have a major in math as well. He was abroad in England for a semester, tents and is currently doing a $1000 a week internship with Merrill, after he turned down 2 other big firms. He still doesn't know if he wants to go into engineering or business but hopes the internship should help point the way. If HE doesn't feel pressure to make a firm decision now, we should be open minded.</p>