<p>Which Ivy League institutions have the best econ undergrad programs? Which ones are the worst? Is it possible that an Ivy League has a BAD econ undergrad program?</p>
<p>The best econ program is the one that accepts you.</p>
<p>Gryffon makes an excellent point. All the Ivies have great econ programs -- to rank them would be nonsensical. Being ADMITTED to ANY ivy league school is extremely difficult. Maybe focus on other features that would attract you to them. Also consider outside the Ivies as well.</p>
<p>(I majored in Econ from one of the Ivies, BTW)</p>
<p>Is getting into any of the Ivies all that difficult? In my grandiose way I thought my S would get into all of them; he didn't, but he got into all 5 except HYP. So, here I am thinking he got a bum deal, the college process is unfair, etc. But from your posts, I ought to be grateful and count ourselves lucky. Please educate me. He will go to Columbia next month.</p>
<p>The best Econ programs are Harvard first then Princeton</p>
<p>I would say Harvard!!</p>
<p>I know some areas of economics better than others, so my rankings might be a bit skewed. I don't know much about Dartmouth's or Cornell's departments. </p>
<p>For graduate departments, probably Harvard then Princeton seems correct. But, for undergraduate teaching, maybe Princeton then Harvard. Harvard has a lot of development economics. Jeff Sachs moved to Columbia and he does extremely interesting stuff.</p>
<p>my brother goes to princeton and he is majoring in econ. and last year he said that all of his professors were great and awesome!!</p>
<p>I do agree with the other people when they say whatever ivy you get into.. So i guess if you get into both princeton and harvard choose the school that best fits all of your needs & a school were you would be happy!!</p>
<p>Dartmouth is extremely strong in econ. But, quite frankly, econ, like biology, is a standard major at any top college, whether it be a private Uni, a public Uni, or a LAC. You really can't go wrong at any of them.</p>
<p>Not ivy: University of Chicago (if you hadn't already heard of their famous ECON department)</p>
<p>HAH. I was totally going to say Chicago and try to pass it off as an Ivy.</p>
<p>Seriously, Chicago has a whole school of thought in economics named after it. You can't say that about Harvard/Princeton.</p>
<p>"You can't say that about Harvard/Princeton."</p>
<p>-Maybe not, but you darn sure could say a whole lot more.....</p>
<p>kk knows what's up</p>
<p>Harvard doesn't really have a "econ program" per se. they have an econ major. it's the biggest major there.</p>
<p>Chicago and MIT have the best econ programs in the country. If your goal is a PhD in econ those two schools would probably be your best bets, but you can get almost as good of an education at most any top college. If you just want a high paying job on Wall Street, either go to Harvard or Wharton @ Penn to have recruiters from all top firms. At this point, just apply to schools you like and pray you get in.</p>
<p>Columbia has the most Nobel Prizes in Economics of all the Ivies. </p>
<p>Jeffrey Sachs
Joseph Stiglitz
Baghwati
etc.</p>
<p>I looked at a few rankings that have various ranking schemes -- faculty prestige, number of citations, etc. They are not uniform but here are a couple:</p>
<p><a href="http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2007/07/economics-depar.html%5B/url%5D">http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2007/07/economics-depar.html</a>
<a href="http://neweconomist.blogs.com/new_economist/2005/11/economic_resour_1.html%5B/url%5D">http://neweconomist.blogs.com/new_economist/2005/11/economic_resour_1.html</a></p>
<p>In general, Harvard is the number one ranked. Princeton is the second ranked Ivy, though MIT, Chicago, and sometimes UC Berkeley are between them. Penn is sometimes in the top 10. Columbia is typically not in the top 10 (despite Sachs, Baghwati, Stiglitz, Mundell, Phelps, Vickrey if he is still alive, etc.). Brown and Dartmouth never are.</p>
<p>In terms of academic reputation, Harvard probably ranks # 1 for Economics, followed closely by Princeton. Generally speaking however, Princeton has a reputation of being more focused on undergraduate education than Harvard.</p>
<p>U of Chicago is non-Ivy league but I believe its econ department is ranked pretty high.</p>
<p>I think U-Chicago is no. 1.</p>