I am not saying IE is not engineering, and never did. I AM saying that FE is focused on finance, not economics, and the economics knowledge required is relatively small - GT’s EFS concentraton only requires 1-2 economics courses that I could find, and the grad programs don’t seem to require finance at all. Northwestern’s programs don’t seem to require actual economics coursework at all.
For someone to use an economics degree to get into that field appears to be overkill in a minorly-supporting area, it seems like it would make a lot more sense to either go straight engineering (and IE would be the most logical choice) or go finance with extra math.
Are there non-FE fields that DO combine heavy economics with engineering?
^At Northwestern, there are two Kellogg certificate programs that go well with any engineering major, one in managerial analytic and one in financial economics.
@IWannaHelp, why do you say they go well, and to what careers does the degree/certificate lead? And how does this show the engineering/economics combo? The Financial Economics option appears to require 3 finance courses and 1 finance/accounting course, I’m not really sure why they even put economics in the title!
^Couple intermediate economics courses are covered in the pre-reqs, which are extensive and quantitatively intense. Also these core courses are graduate level courses and they get even deeper into the quantitative aspect than when they are presented to MBA students, who may not have the quantitative background as these undergrads in this program. I was told by one student that they had to do some math proof/analysis on Markowitz Protfolio Theory.
Financial economics, as the name suggests, is where the two fields kinda merge. After all, Markowitz is an economist.
I now see that the certificate requires Econ 310 (recommended for freshmen and sophomore) and Econ 381 1&2 (recommended for sophomores on up), but I don’t see how that really changes anything. I do not dispute that the certificate requires knowledge of economics, nor that they are quantitative, even heavily so. My point is that requiring a few courses in an area does not mean that said program can be well described by study in that area, especially when the coursework seems to clearly more heavily favor finance. Electrical engineering requires some physics courses, that does not make a physicist an electrical engineer nor vice versa. Requiring a few economics courses does not make a financial engineer an economist nor does it provide an argument for someone to take a degree in economics to enter the field.
The OP was discussing a double major with engineering and economics, and the closest anyone is coming to an appropriate field for that are programs and jobs that finance-focused but that require engineering methodologies and/or some economics coursework. I had originally said “I am curious as to what positions you think that are out there that combine engineering and economics” and apparently that was confusing to many. Let me restate:
Are there any significant professional fields for which the best preparation would be roughly-equal study in engineering and economics? Fields not dominated by mathematics or finance or some other related field, but by engineering (any field, yes including IE) and economics? If there are no fields for which it would be the best preparation, are there any fields where you would get to apply knowledge of both engineering and economics on a regular and frequent basis?
There’s really no such thing as “economics/engineering dual major”. First, one needs to define what engineering she/he is referring to. Then, let’s say, we are talking about electrical engineering. It’s hard to imagine how photons would move differently with scarcity or free will of humans. Or maybe economics drives the search for a more inexpensive or readily available but still robust material. But the physics/chemistry of the material or material science behind don’t change due to economics. Maybe at some high level I don’t know of, they do but certainly not at the undergrad level.
A distant second would be “financial engineering” especially when one is confusing economics with finance (plenty of people out there though the two fields can merge or overlap at higher level). But financial engineering is a multidisciplinary field, which means it requires more than undergraduate degree to get any meaningful depth. That’s why most engineering schools don’t offer it. A few schools just move the yardstick lower to give it a fancy name to an undergrad degree when it’s really nothing more than Industrial Engineering with a couple finance courses added to it.
I mentioned Northwestern because it has various programs that give the maximum tools available at the undergraduate level when it comes to something relates to mathematical finance or mathematical economics. It has top industrial engineering and economics departments. It has aforementioned MMSS program and Kellogg certificate programs, which are known for their rigor. The quarter system makes it relatively easy to combine any or even all of them.
@cosmicfish We’ve pointed out several programs (and professions) that require a combination of engineering, economics and finance, which is what the OP is looking for.
The OP is looking for programs similar to Stanford’s Management Science & Engineering and Penn’s The Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology, and tossed out a dual degree in Engineering/Economics as a possibility. It’s already been explained why that’s not really an option, and they have been given several other options to think about.
Your instance that there is no profession that requires an equal study in engineering and economics is beside the point. If you feel elements of economics can not be combined with engineering, that’s your opinion, and not one shared by the schools we’ve listed above.
Perhaps we are talking in circles here, but let me try again.
I do not dispute that double majors are available in a great many schools, enough so that their absence at a school is more noteworthy than their presence. What I dispute is that there is a significant job market for which these programs are the best preparation.
I do not dispute that many schools offer integrated degrees that combine engineering and business (economics or something else) into a single major. What I dispute is that the job market for graduates from these programs is significantly different than the job market for the graduates of those schools in non-integrated programs. For example, I doubt that there are a significant number of jobs for which a Stanford grad could expect their MS&E degree would provide a significant advantage over other Stanford grads with degrees in other business areas.
I also would like to note that there is not always (perhaps even not often) a correlation between an academic program and an associated market. Many programs are designed to attract students to the university or college, without necessarily even considering whether or not the programs are filling an actual need post-college.
I have seen IE proposed and FE proposed, did I miss anything else? I freely acknowledge that both of those fields include some study of economics, but it appears to me that to the extent you could consider them as combinations of Engineering Field A with Business Field B, the latter would not be economics. It would be finance, or accounting, or management. You could broadly call any field that dealt with money to be or include a study of economics, but I think it is disingenuous to do so when comparing to actual degree fields for which other titles are more accurate.
And of course graduates from these programs are finding jobs, and no doubt some feel that they are getting their money’s worth out of them. I know some graduates from these programs, several from Lehigh in particular, and their career prospects do not appear to have been aided by their program choices. Their efforts at school seem to have steered them into a niche where they are competing with graduates from traditional business programs for certain business jobs (at others they are at a disadvantage) and are largely unable to compete with graduates from traditional engineering programs foe technical jobs.
The Lehigh info suggests the 4 year IBE degree is an accredited business degree, not an engineering degree (FAQ’s). To also get an engineering degree, the 5 year dual degree program seems to be necessary.
When I wrote dual degree, I meant meaningful integration of two fields, not some kind of double majors. All those programs, including those at Lehigh, are really nothing more than a double-major, depsite what Lehigh claims (if you look at the course selection and curriculum carefully). Don’t believe in the marketing colleges throw at you.
@nw2this DD’s friends who have done it really enjoy it and have done well in the job market.
Here is link to that fellowship I mentioned. My DD had no interest which bummed me because she could have see “Hamilton”. Shaw contacted my DD directly because they had gotten her name thru GT’s WIE program. http://deshawdiscoveryfellowship.com
My take on this is that engineering and economics are two quite different career paths. There may be some positions where the two intersect and that may be your direction of choice. However, it would seem to me that choosing one and getting as much education in that area would provide more job opportunities.
I was an engineering manager (now retired) for a large aerospace company. My group did heavy analytical work and so I shied away (to say the least) from dual majors. I wanted the best prepared engineer I could find.
So, the bottom line is that your college preparation will provide opportunities and will also close (or partially close) some doors. Choose carefully.