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Chicago Booth V Michigan


publicecon

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These programs seem pretty orthogonal so I'm not sure if this dilemma comes up often. I'm interested in public finance and tax policy and wondering if people had thoughts on which program would be a better fit. Note that I'd rather end up at a straight econ department rather than a business school.
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These programs seem pretty orthogonal so I'm not sure if this dilemma comes up often. I'm interested in public finance and tax policy and wondering if people had thoughts on which program would be a better fit. Note that I'd rather end up at a straight econ department rather than a business school.

 

Why are you asking us this question then?

 

Jeez, I am in a bad mood today...

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Yea sorry not to be clear but I meant placement-wise. I know Chicago booth candidates do sometimes end up at straight econ programs but I think they tend to go towards finance. I think this year somebody went to a policy school. So it's hard to know since the program is so young and unique. There just isn't much information on booth out there.
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These programs seem pretty orthogonal so I'm not sure if this dilemma comes up often. I'm interested in public finance and tax policy and wondering if people had thoughts on which program would be a better fit. Note that I'd rather end up at a straight econ department rather than a business school.

Michigan :) The PF group here is phenomenal. The PF placements are strong. There are at least two PF seminars a week, and often other relevant seminars or speakers. There are lots of students with similar interests, which makes collaboration, brainstorming, and feedback easier. You'd be coming to a well-established program to work in its strongest field.

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Michigan seems to place extremely well in government and policy-oriented positions. That may simply be a function of its strength in public finance. Michigan is stronger in public finance than Booth, but Booth might still be better if you want an academic placement. If I'm wrong, please correct me.
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Michigan seems to place extremely well in government and policy-oriented positions. That may simply be a function of its strength in public finance. Michigan is stronger in public finance than Booth, but Booth might still be better if you want an academic placement. If I'm wrong, please correct me.

Michigan also places well in academic positions. In the past 5 years, off the top of my head: Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Berkeley, U-Toronto, Williams, Chicago-Harris School, Carnegie Mellon, Rochester, Cornell (policy analysis and management), UC-Boulder, and many others.

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I think that Booth clearly dominates in placements. Michigan is a good place but at Booth in the past years you have students who have gone to Harvard, Penn, Stanford, Northwestern, Minnesota, Michigan, Cornell, and UBC. Keep in mind that the Michigan placements are only the top guys in classes of around 20. Booth accepts only about 2 students each year in the Econ program. Of those that go the academic route, about 50% get academic placements in the top 20. The guys who go into the private sector make megabucks with firms like GS, Barclays, KPMG, etc. To me the decision is a no brainer in favor of Booth, I view Booth as a top 10 maybe top 5 program. Booth is a very elite program which places the median student very well.
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so here are the placements of econ students since 2004

 

2010

Cornell, ILR (labor school)

 

2009

Associate Director, Chicago Partners (x2)

Postdoctoral Fellow, RAND-University of Pittsburgh Health Institute

Economist, Federal Trade Commission

Assistant Professor of Finance, Stern School of Business, New York University

 

2008

Associate Director, Becker Center, Booth School of Business, University of Chicago

Assistant Professor of Finance, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University

 

2007

Economist , National Economic Accounts/Research Group, Bureau of Economic Analysis

 

2006

Principal, Chicago Partners

Assistant Professor of Finance, Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota

Assistant Professor of Finance, Tippie School of Management, University of Iowa

Postdoctoral Fellow, American Enterprise Institute

Model developer, Barclaycard International

Assistant Professor of Finance and Managerial Economics, School of Management, University of Texas at Dallas

 

2005

Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, University of California, Santa Cruz

Post-Doctoral Fellow in Finance, Harvard Business School, Harvard University

Senior Lecturer, Graduate School of Business, Loyola University, Chicago

Senior Consultant, NERA Economic Consulting, Boston, MA

 

2004

Assistant Professor of Economics, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

Partner – S3 Asset Funding, President – Risk Economics Limited

Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, University of Washington

Assistant Professor, Business Economics, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan

Edited by publicecon
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Yes, those placements at Booth look great. I think the average placement there is much better than the average at Michigan (asquare mentions the very best ones there, not the typical ones!), but it is more likely to be in a business school. If you really wish to do pure econ at a pure econ program, you might want to talk to the folks at Booth about that. Of course, business school profs make far more money than econ ones (and usually have nicer job conditions as well), so maybe you will change your mind! ;)
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I think that Booth clearly dominates in placements. Michigan is a good place but at Booth in the past years you have students who have gone to Harvard, Penn, Stanford, Northwestern, Minnesota, Michigan, Cornell, and UBC. Keep in mind that the Michigan placements are only the top guys in classes of around 20. Booth accepts only about 2 students each year in the Econ program. Of those that go the academic route, about 50% get academic placements in the top 20. The guys who go into the private sector make megabucks with firms like GS, Barclays, KPMG, etc. To me the decision is a no brainer in favor of Booth, I view Booth as a top 10 maybe top 5 program. Booth is a very elite program which places the median student very well.

If the OP wanted to study finance, or wanted to teach at a business school, then I would agree that Booth would be the right choice. But the OP wants to study PF and tax policy.

 

Booth lists placements for 39 graduates of the economics program. By my count, 20 got academic placements, 16 went into industry or government, and 3 got postdocs. One of the academic placements was a lecturer position. Fourteen were in business schools and five were in economics departments. The median placement among those who stayed in academia was something like the business school at Iowa. Booth has some incredible placements, but I don't think the decision is as cut-and-dry as you imply, given the OP's choice of fields and preference for being in an economics department rather than a business school.

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Those are econ placements, the finance program is separate and has even better placements. The median was definitely not Iowa, that is easily in the lower quintile. Here's a rough list of top placements, the median placement is about top 20 Harvard, Booth, Northwestern (x2), Penn, Minnesota, Michigan, Stanford, Cornell, UBC.

 

Michigan also has high attrition rates, right? Booth has very low attrition rates. I don't see why someone would want to be in an econ dept rather than a bschool. Basically the same job, just more money at the bschool.

 

I agree that Michigan is great in public finance, but the OP might change what he wants to do. I think if he goes to Booth he is way more likely to have access to better faculty, will have more security, get a better placements, and make more money than if he goes to Michigan. Ann Arbor is a really nice place to live though, and the dept is still quite good. These are both good options but I think that Booth clearly dominates.

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Those are econ placements, the finance program is separate and has even better placements. The median was definitely not Iowa, that is easily in the lower quintile. Here's a rough list of top placements, the median placement is about top 20 Harvard, Booth, Northwestern (x2), Penn, Minnesota, Michigan, Stanford, Cornell, UBC.

 

Michigan also has high attrition rates, right? Booth has very low attrition rates. I don't see why someone would want to be in an econ dept rather than a bschool. Basically the same job, just more money at the bschool.

 

I agree that Michigan is great in public finance, but the OP might change what he wants to do. I think if he goes to Booth he is way more likely to have access to better faculty, will have more security, get a better placements, and make more money than if he goes to Michigan. Ann Arbor is a really nice place to live though, and the dept is still quite good. These are both good options but I think that Booth clearly dominates.

 

First of all, Michigan has some of the lowest attrition rates of any top 15 dept. Secondly, if the OP didn't have a serious interest in PF, then the choice probably wouldn't be up for question. We should probably address the question on its own merits (i.e. taking into account what the OP says he/she's interested in) rather than just assuming she'll change her mind and should just go to the place with the best brand name placements.

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Those are econ placements, the finance program is separate and has even better placements. The median was definitely not Iowa, that is easily in the lower quintile. Here's a rough list of top placements, the median placement is about top 20 Harvard, Booth, Northwestern (x2), Penn, Minnesota, Michigan, Stanford, Cornell, UBC.

 

Michigan also has high attrition rates, right? Booth has very low attrition rates. I don't see why someone would want to be in an econ dept rather than a bschool. Basically the same job, just more money at the bschool.

 

I agree that Michigan is great in public finance, but the OP might change what he wants to do. I think if he goes to Booth he is way more likely to have access to better faculty, will have more security, get a better placements, and make more money than if he goes to Michigan. Ann Arbor is a really nice place to live though, and the dept is still quite good. These are both good options but I think that Booth clearly dominates.

The academic placements for the econ track are: Stanford GSB, Northwestern, Northwestern, Chicago-Booth, NYU, Wharton, U-Mich Ross, Minnesota, Iowa, Texas-Dallas, SUNY, UBC, Tulane, UC-Santa Cruz, U of Washington, BYU, Montana State, a school in NZ and a school in Norway. Of those 20 placements, what do you think is the median? I agree that the top 8 placements are very strong. There's a pretty rapid drop off after that, though.

 

You may not agree with wanting to be in an econ department rather than business school, but that's the OP's stated preference. I happen to agree with him. It's not the same job. You are teaching different material to a different group of students, surrounded by a different group of colleagues. A business school doesn't have regular PF seminars. Etc.

 

If the OP was interested in finance, I would agree that Booth was a better option. However, I don't see why you are more sure of the OP's preferences than he is ;) If he wants to study public finance, the PF faculty at Michigan are better. You're also not correct that Michigan has high attrition rates.

 

I think we're going to have to agree to disagree on this. I don't think our arguing is of much use to the OP, and we're clearly looking at this from very different perspectives. I'm comparing the two schools for someone who wants to study tax policy and PF, and wants to teach in a department of economics, since that's the information the OP gave us. Either way, the OP has two great options and I wish him good luck wherever he winds up.

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The placement list is missing Harvard (http://www.chicagobooth.edu/phd/phdgradsjobs.pdf) and Cornell (this year.) UBC and Washington are pretty good, I think so are the median placements. According to this (http://lsa.umich.edu/UMICH/econ/Home/Grad%20Study/PhD/Incoming%20&%20Current%20Students/survival07.pdf) Michigan has fairly high attrition rates by my standards, or at least they did. Maybe things have changed, you would know better than me.
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According to this (http://lsa.umich.edu/UMICH/econ/Home/Grad%20Study/PhD/Incoming%20&%20Current%20Students/survival07.pdf) Michigan has fairly high attrition rates by my standards, or at least they did. Maybe things have changed, you would know better than me.

I'm pretty sure the survival guide doesn't have any information at all about attrition. It has prelim pass rates -- under the "old" system where people had up to 4 attempts to take each exam. The pass rate on a single exam is not the (non)-attrition rate and never has been. Since I've been here, fewer than 10 percent of students have failed their final (2nd) attempt at the prelims.

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