Computer Programming Skills for Economics PhD/Research

**econbs** · 01-06-2007, 06:05 PM

I am a freshman in college, but I am already thinking about an econ phd. I have read that for modelling there are some computer programming skills required, such as MATLAB. Are there any uses for programming other than modelling as a graduate student in economics? In what specific fields? Should I start studying MATLAB or Latex? What other languages should I pick up? Thanks in advance.

**bscout** · 01-06-2007, 06:41 PM

LaTeX is useful for formatting mathematical manuscripts not for other purposes.

**daageep** · 01-06-2007, 06:44 PM

i think LaTeX is useful to type up notes, lecture notes (when you're a TA), and your dissertation. i'm not saying this is a requirement, but LaTeX produces beautiful documents that contain math symbols etc.

As for programming, I *think* some object-oriented programming languages like C++ would be sufficient. I know C++, and STATA, SAS, R, S-PLUS (programs I assume are primarily used) are a breeze to learn.

**Golden Rule** · 01-06-2007, 06:53 PM

I would recommend taking some sort of programming course that teaches you the fundamentals -- don't be so concerned about learning one particular language or statistical package. You'll have to learn to use different packages again and again throughout your life. If you ever work as a research assistant (and I would recommend this as the best way to develop programming skills), you'll probably be stuck using whatever your boss or the previous RAs have been using.

**shootermcgavin7** · 01-06-2007, 07:11 PM

If you learn OOP through C++ first, pretty much anything you need after that will be very easy to learn.

**user_name** · 01-06-2007, 07:32 PM

Originally Posted by shootermcgavin7

If you learn OOP through C++ first, pretty much anything you need after that will be very easy to learn.

That's true.

**dafrk3in** · 01-06-2007, 08:52 PM

I used Matlab for a few of my macro assignments

**Jhai** · 01-07-2007, 02:43 AM

My Stats professor required us to type up all our homework, so I learned LaTeX - which is very easy to pick up if you've studied any programming at all. LaTeX is awesome for typing up math work. A friend of mine takes her computer to math classes to type notes into LaTeX, but I'm not quite at that speed yet.

I would recommend you take some relatively easy computer class in C++ or Java that fits in your schedule. Once you've learned one language, you can pick up most others relatively easily.