PhD-level courses in economics vs. MSc in statistics

[miaataro]

I just had a brief conversation with a professor on my plans to apply to MSc/PhD programmes in economics abroad and he got me wondering the following thing.

In addition to finishing my MSc thesis in economics, my plan for the next academic year has been to take three courses and to write an MSc thesis in statistics in order to get my both MSc degrees ready before starting either the PhD programme in my home country or an MSc/Phd programme somewhere abroad.

Now, again in addition to finishing my MSc thesis in economics, my other option might be to forget (at least for now) finishing the MSc in statistics, and instead, to already take the core courses in micro, macro and econometrics that are offered in the PhD programme in my home country.

I'm also working as an assistant researcher during the next academic year so I don't really have time to do both the coursework+thesis in statistics and the PhD courses in economics. So, which one of these two options do you think would help me more to get into a good MSc/PhD programme abroad and/or to survive there after I've been (hopefully) accepted?