<p>I'm interested in studying economic policy/business/finance, and of course Uchicago is known as the alma mater of Milton Friedman, who i am actually a big fan of. How is Uchicago's economic program in general, as compared to, for example, the ivies? Is it focused a lot on the kind of economics he advocated? </p>
<p>The two main schools im comparing Uchicago to are Cornell and Upenn.</p>
<p>I have yet to take an economics class here, so what I can present to you is anecdotal. My economics major friends say that they feel they are getting a very academic/theoretical education when it comes to economics, and that they don't feel the professors' points of view enter into the curriculum. </p>
<p>More information:
<a href="http://collegecatalog.uchicago.edu/pdf_09/ECON.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://collegecatalog.uchicago.edu/pdf_09/ECON.pdf</a>
University</a> of Chicago: Department of Economics</p>
<p>Because Cornell has AEM and Penn has Wharton, and because students in the Arts and Sciences schools at Cornell and Penn can cross-register, you have more options for finance/business courses at the undergraduate level at C or P and more students directly interested in business. Chicago offers business courses to undergraduates at the graduate level through the Graduate School of Business, which I don't believe count towards the economics major.</p>
<p>Chicago has an undergraduate major in public policy. Cornell has a whole school dedicated to Industrial and Labor Relations. Penn has Annenberg. All are worth further research on your part.</p>
<p>The schools as a whole are different. Chicago is a quieter school with more of a nerdy and socially awkward twist. Small Greek scene, 5,000 undergraduate students, 10,000 grad students. Penn and Cornell have larger Greek scenes and a larger undergraduate student body. Penn has center city Philadelphia walking distance from campus, and Cornell has its own college town in Ithaca. (I don't think Cornell feels like the middle of nowhere, it feels like a small citywith hordes of 18-22 year olds surrounded by farms and mountains).</p>
<p>Cornell is breathtaking (in my biased opinion). Penn, outside of Locust Walk, is kind of unexciting, and the campus setup is somewhat similar to Chicago. I think I'd find Chicago's campus and setup uninspiring if I just visited the school and walked around, but Hyde Park and the campus has really grown on me over the past few years.</p>
<p>I'm a fourth year econ major here. Unalove is right, uchicago's econ program is definitely very theoretical. I've heard that it gives you a great base for econ grad school (although since I am not applying/attending myself, I do not know if this is true). The bad news is that you don't really have a lot of finance training coming out. You still get great job offers in the financial sector though, it's more just that you'd have to go through some basic training with your firms before you start. You also can take finance courses as electives to get a basis in finance as well. </p>
<p>Before you come here as an econ major, make sure you like math. A lot. As far as Friedman economics, you definitely are taught some although there has been a shift recently to more of a Lucas (another U of C professor) model. I would say, although I might be wrong, that most of my teachers here focus a lot on rational expectations although monetarists models and viewpoints do come up.</p>
<p>I was wondering, does anyone know whether the U. Chicago economics is empirical? Is the economics inductive meaning do they generalize from data and experiences as opposed to more deductive principles?</p>
<p>Well, Chicago's economics faculty includes probably the world's most-popular empiricist: Steven "Freakonomics" Levitt. It also includes Nobelist Jim Heckman, whose work is mainly empirical (or, more accurately, theory about empirical work). But I don't think anyone would subscribe to the statement "University of Chicago economics is empirical".</p>
<p>For undergraduates UChicago is heavy on math but light on data. This is true pretty much everywhere decent for college as far as I can tell. The reason is most people do not take econometrics until the end of their third or well into their fourth year, leaving little time to employ the knowledge. In contrast, in graduate school econometrics is a core course from day one, so by the end of the first semester you are supposed to be able to do a good amount of data driven work.</p>
<p>As for the Wall Street value of the UChicago economics BA, it is solid to the extent that the street is hiring in general (this year, not so much). </p>
<p>Indeed, there are very few elite schools that teach rigorous finance theory at the UG level. The exceptions would be Wharton and Sloan in the plain vanilla, I-banking sense, but also Columbia's IEOR program and Princeton's finance certificate program on the rather quantish side.</p>
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Indeed, there are very few elite schools that teach rigorous finance theory at the UG level. The exceptions would be Wharton and Sloan in the plain vanilla, I-banking sense, but also Columbia's IEOR program and Princeton's finance certificate program on the rather quantish side.
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<p>The Kellogg undergrad certificate is another one.</p>
<p>DH was Wharton UG in the early 80s and it was very heavily quant for those who wanted it...</p>
<p>There is still plenty of math and stat to go around given its links to the larger Penn community, but there is not the same kind of demands on or offerings for students that one gets at places like Princeton or Columbia. </p>
<p>LSE also deserves mention for its stellar economics-finance-quant methods nexus at the UG level. CMU seems to have a lot going on to, but its not really on the radar for a lot of students applying to Ivies.</p>