Economics vs. Marketing Soul Searching

[ShowBizKid]

I don't usually like "tell me what to do with my life" posts but some of you may be able to offer some insight.

I am an older student. Significantly older than most here. I could not easily relocate for grad school (at least without getting a divorce!). And there are no PhD econ programs near me. So I compromised. I applied and was accepted to a (mid ranked) marketing PhD program though I had the grades, test scores and other stuff to probably be accepted to a top 20 or so econ program.

I am interested in Behavioral Economics, Experimental Economics, Consumer Behavior type work. The marketing program will allow me to work in this area, and there are advisers with Econ PhDs and profs in the econ department (which only offers bachelors and masters degrees) doing work in areas I enjoy and could be part of my committee.

So -- for you econ folks and others who are in marketing or inter-disciplinary programs (decision science, etc.)

1. Can you really do "econ" work outside of an econ department? (I know Kahnemann won a Nobel prize without taking an econ course - but is it possible for us mortals to be taken seriously?)

2. How do you learn good economics if you aren't in an econ program? I feel like (with a BA and an MA in econ) there's so much I don't know. Not just more rigor in micro theory and stuff - but coursework in experimental and behavioral. Is this even taught in PhD programs? Or is it gained by working with advisers, readings, seminar courses, etc.? It seems like some of this can be self-taught, but I am concerned about doing this while doing my other coursework and research at the same time.

3. Is it wise, or even at all beneficial to publish in econ journals? Or am I restricted to business (marketing) journals. Do marketing departments, etc. frown on publishing in economics literature? Do you only get "credit" for publishing in business journals?

On the plus side, I didn't have to move, (or pay alimony), the program is thrilled to have me, I have a lot of latitude to do research in areas I want, it's fully funded, 4 years to a PhD, and their placement is pretty good.

On the flip side - I feel like I sold out on my passion, won't learn much more econ except on my own, and I am driving myself nuts wondering if this was a bad decision.

[evergreen]

1 & 2: Usually the quant marketing kids will take a few of the econ PhD courses in first year, such as Micro. I guess you won't be able to do that at your current institution, but you might've already seen the stuff in your MA.

3. If you can publish in top econ journals like AER, then I'm sure no business school would ever object. If you're hired for a marketing position, there will be some expectation that you publish your work in MS, JMR, and maybe even JM. You can still publish in economics journals, but there is an expectation that you'll do some publications in marketing journals in order to receive tenure as a marketing faculty member.

Then again take a look at this guy:
http://www.rotman.utoronto.ca/~agoldfarb/cv.pdf
he was able to get tenure (2008) at a T20, with just one marketing pub that wasn't even an "A" pub, but then again in his tenure package there was probably a lot of marketing working papers cause you can see in 2009 he pumped out a lot of good quality marketing pubs.

[ShowBizKid]

Hi Evergreen,

Thanks for the reply.

1 & 2: Your answer is exactly the thing bugging me. I can, in fact I am encouraged to take some econ courses like Micro Theory and Econometrics. But since the school only offers an MA, it's a repeat of what I had. For example they use Nicholson & Snyder. I did that. But I am sure the econ PhDs would say - "you need Mas-Colell" to really learn Micro theory.

But it's not micro theory (for example) where I feel wanting. It's a grad course in experimental, or auction theory, or some other specialized course outside the "core" skills. But how does an econ PhD learn say - behavioral game theory? Is there a course? Or do you just read Camerer, or Roth & Kagel on your own?


3. I am not sure I can publish in AER, but then many econ PhDs don't make AER - I do think I can publish for example in JEBO. So now do they object?

Thanks.

[Walras]

Hey at the school I did my undergrad and was taking grad courses at the grad students had some trouble because they could only offer the big fields every year (enviro, labor or trade, development or macro III). I think there are a lot of programs where students are interested in experimental or auction theory and there aren't enough students to get the field class offered. What students interested in behavior did was they petitioned a prof to let them do a directed reading course under him, and basically did what you'd normally do in a field course (read lots of famous papers, replicate results, write practice peer reviews for the papers, and do a paper at the end).

[Humanomics]

Can I ask: barring the auction and behavioral game theory, doesn't marketing mostly violate foundational assumptions like identical utility functions and preferences-as-inalterable-datum? Frankly, as an older student facing similar )but not married) constraints, I think your path is enviable considering your research interests.

[sombaner]

Behavioral Economics, Experimental Economics and Consumer Behavior are different sub areas in Marketing. The first two are much closer to quantitative marketing models than the last one. Of course some researchers borrow theories from CB to create models. For more on such models one can read the following article. The main difference between CB and Behavioral Econ models is that the theory part of research generally involves analytical models in Behavioral Econ type of models.

Ho, Teck H., Noah Lim and Colin F. Camerer (2006), "Modeling the Psychology of Consumers and Firms Using Behavioral Economics," Journal of Marketing Research, 43 (3), 307-331.

A good foundation in Micro Econ/ Econometrics is important for doing Behavioral Econ research even in Marketing. I am sure that faculty in the Econ and Marketing will help you learn Econ from a book at par with Mas Collel if you ask them.

Publishing in good Econ journals is regarded highly in Marketing (at least as much as I know), as long as the research is related to marketing. That should not be a problem.