I know Carleton is tops for STEM, and for producing future PHD’s in all sorts of fields. How good is the Economics for those who don’t wish to be in academia? Who are it’s peers among other LAC’s when it come to Economics? Would Macalester be significantly below it? Swarthmore/U of Chicago significantly above it? Or would they all be pretty similar?
By economics faculty publishing, Carleton places 28th out of 197 liberal arts colleges:
https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.uslacecon.html
Macalester places 15th; Swarthmore does not appear in the top 49.
The absolute strongest LACs in economics (by this standard) may be Williams, Wellesley, Claremont McKenna, Middlebury, Wesleyan, Barnard, Hamilton and Colgate, which appear among much larger schools, even in data that has not been normalized for department size:
Many economists don’t think putting papers in repec is that important given the other ways you can make your work available. Those repec rankings do provide info on which departments care about it and perhaps assign a staff member to help. Swarthmore has a fabulous faculty who happen to not care about putting their work on repec.
Few recent Carleton graduates landed top 5 PhD Econ programs and MBAs. Suggest that you check which PhD programs or MBAs other institutions send their graduates.
Regarding reply #2, Swarthmore does appear in a more comprehensively scholarly, but older, analysis of economics faculty publishing:
The study’s overall top ten:
- Williams
- Wellesley
- Colby
- Trinity
- Wesleyan
- Colgate
- Middlebury
- Hamilton
- Claremont McKenna
- Bowdoin
- Hobart & William Smith
- Union
When adjusted for department size:
- Hendrix
- Colby
- Trinity
- Hamilton
- Claremont McKenna
- Grinnell
- Wesleyan
- Middlebury
- *Swarthmore*
- Agnes Scott
(Hartley and Robinson. Economics Research at National Liberal Arts Colleges: School Rankings. 1995.)
Don’t use REPEC - many schools don’t post on there. Look at faculty CVs. Swarthmore econ department very strong among LACs, with great PhD placement over the years also.
Note that the IDEAS analysis posted in reply 1 seems to have been further refined. Most notably among the changes, Swarthmore now places thirteenth by faculty publishing in economics (https://ideas.repec.org/top/top.uslacecon.html).
My nephew studied economics at Carlton and had job offers from The Analysis Group and The Brattle Group.
I think Carlton does a good job placing economics majors. Ask for stats on where econ majors start their careers.
If you want to get a PhD in economics, then consider earning a bachelors degree in mathematics. No top econ program will accept an economics undergrad major, without a lot of mathematics. You can double major, but do not
take an economics major, if you want an economics PhD, very hard to get in without the math background. If you want a job at a bank or management consulting, then the economics major should be OK.
Look at the strength of the alumni network if you do not
want a PhD. Carlton does seem to have a strong alumni network in economics.
The January 2019 rankings show a total of 131 schools including both LACs & National Universities in one combined ranking.
Six (6) LACs made the top 131 ranking. The top ranked LAC was:
Williams College at #52.
Wellesley = #84
Middlebury = #96
Claremont McKenna = #100
Wesleyan = #114
Hamilton = #125
Carleton College did not make the list of top 131 economics programs.