Quote:
Originally Posted by pookie bear
Lastly, I think that there is still a certain amount of discrimination by undergraduate brand name.
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There definitely could be discrimination when it comes to undergrad brand name. However, I'd also like to offer another explanation.
Lets say that person A went to a top ivy school, and lets say that person B went to a directional state school. Let's say that the adcom has given them an equal likelihood of succeeding in their program. However, lets also say that the adcoms are less certain about what they're getting with person B, given their undergrad. In other words, the expected value of success of the 2 applicants is equal, but the variance is different. If adcoms are risk averse (which seems plausible) they'll likely take the "surer thing." By the way, I do imagine that variance is probably inversely related to undergrad reputation when it comes to succeeding in a Econ PhD program (but maybe that's just my opinion).