werther

once having graduated from school i am not sure how one can obtain programs like SAS (so expensive), and learn it.. not even sure what a PROC SQL is, i reckon it's some kind of programming language? is it possible to self teach oneself these things? i love how i learned nothing actually useful in undergrad/masters :rolleyes:

sorry to bring up this dusty old topic, but a question related to the actual thread title: in order to get analyst/associate level jobs in economic consulting, are programming skills required? if so, which kind? i was hoping i'd learn programming after being hired, but if it is required to land a job, then i'd have to take up that task some time soon. i have a masters in economics from an ok school and took one IO course, which i found slightly bit more interesting than other electives i took so i want to get an entry level job in this area but there are very little econ consulting firms in my country.. i temporarily moved to europe after finishing my MA this summer but realized it is almost impossible to get a job here with a non-E.U. passport; is it just as difficult to get a job in the U.S. without being a U.S. citizen? thanks in advance

i get my MA next week :sleepy:

To the person who compared SFU funding to Toronto's "zero" funding: AT SFU, I am assuming they gave you something like 15+k for 3 semester worth of TAship. At Toronto, virtually everyone who wants a TAship gets one. If you get a full TA-ship at Toronto for 2 semesters, that's 10k right there! Also, you can apply for summer TAship if you want.

then i guess its just regular MAs who are discouraged from taking more than 1 PhD core. i just think it's an extremely risky move unles you're totally confident you can do well in all three. and if you do take all three you dont need to take any electives because PhD core courses run for the whole year and count as 3 credits.

even 2 is discouraged*

that's if you're not trying hard enough (in other words you don't want it enough). i believe it works. it kind of sucks but it's not impossible. and i'm hardly an optimist so.

thanks so much for that!! i don't think the RBC chapter in romer's book is any good

p.s. forgot to mention: seconded

Yeah, not true. How do you know that? You're not here. Nevertheless.. we do have some Queen's alumni here who think this department is not so friendly. I guess they are comparing to their alma mater. And yes, relatively speaking, it's not the most friendliest department. However, I don't think it's fair some of you people make the U of T program out to be a bad place to study. It is still considered 1st tier. It still sends students to to top U.S. schools. It really depends on you. I remember once when UWO's Ekonomiks said something like, "why spend x hrs on a really difficult problem set when you can leave that for your classmates" (those weren't his exact words, but he did say something along that line once). With that kind of mentality you might not like Toronto all that much, because who knows, you might not have that many people to collaborate with, probably because you never got around to knowing everyone in your program (we don't have very many socials and pub nights and things like that - I think other programs have these frequently).

Wise idea. I should have done this. Anyway, I hope you enjoy Toronto! It's a great city.

uh i think most doctoral stream MA's problem is that they can't continue with PhD at Toronto even if they wanted to.. i think worrying about being forced to pursue PhD at Toronto would be the least of your problem!!

Yes, exactly. And then came the regrets.. just kidding, I think every program has its advantages/disadvantages. It is true that Toronto MAs experience less student satisfaction because we don't get enough guidance/support, we're very much on our own. If you don't care for much interacting or getting help from other students, i.e. if you can do everything on your own, you will be fine here. Also, there are tons of seminars happening and a lot of people stopping by, last week Daron Acemoglu came p.s. i kind of regret not going to UBC, if i went there i'd have at least become better skiier

i have nothing against Western, and i have no reason to praise Queen's. i just think the OP is biased. he always touts Western as the best program, while (somewhat) patronizing other 1st tier programs, and i really don't know how he can be so certain about the superiority of Western without having been to all other first tier programs in canada. if you are a Yale material, you will get into Yale, doesn't matter whether you attend UWO or QUeens or wherever.

this is the lamest comment i ever heard in my life in any case queen's trumps western when it comes to reputation and sends people to top programs just as well so if i were to do this all over again i'd def. choose queen's unless, going to UWO somehow guarantees me a place in top ten US phd (by the way, one or two people getting into yale doesn't mean anything - that happens in any first tier canadian MA program)

i dont know why you still want to do MA - you should really just go for PhD. btw i doubt you can be "exempted" from core theory courses - either you take MA or take PhD sequence.

how accurate is your info? it's not always 16k for MAs - most of that $$ is in the form of TAship (approx.9k) and the rest are scholarship, which can vary from one applicant to another - from a couple thousand to many more. as for Toronto, although MA students get no funding, they get 10k from TAship (pretty much guaranteed, if you want it). so.. it would be more accurate to compare 10k UofT vs. 16k Queens (that is if Queens really offers 16k to all MA students - which I know isn't true)

likewise; i'm a single 22 yr old and if nothing works out ill just find myself a s/o, get married, hopefully someone with MBA or JD so i won't have to work so hard with my useless MA Econ degree

you have no formal math beyond cal 1 and managed a 4.0 M.A. GPA? wow. i took up to real analysis and my M.A. GPA is nowhere close to that. (but then.. i rarely used RA here). consequently, PhD looks nearly out of question for me. i'm slacking off like crazy, and i think i will try learning some programming over the summer before i force myself into private/public industry. (sigh)

I believe I said "realistic".. If you want to talk about exceptions, there is also a dude who got his PhD from Toronto who is now teaching at Harvard. But I don't think these examples are rather conducive to the current topic at hand

This sounds more realistic to me than other opinions floating around this thread. unless of course you're from top 4 Canadian PhD and your job market paper was exceptional (then you probably have a shot at teaching at that top 4 level)

If anyone is wondering, I got my Queen's admit e-mail around 1st or 2nd week of March. Before that, there was another person who got an admit like in February, but I think that was a special case. I had to get back to the department by the end of March, and after that Queen's made another round of admits. If anyone has applied to Toronto, they never sent me an email about my admit; I heard by regular mail which was unexpected. However, this year the new grad admin might do things differently. Also, don't bother checking their SGS website application status, that never gets updated. I don't know anything about Western because I didn't apply there. My UBC application was kind of messed up as well. I am not an international student but apparently that's how the school perceived me and later Maureen told me my application wasn't complete because I didn't send her TOEFL (or whatever it is, I don't even know). And then like several months later when I had already made my decision she told me everything was OK and whether I would accept their offer or not. This was like when I was taking a vacation in Europe.. I didn't end up in UBC.

Refer to this post: Econ dept. won't teach you SAS (usually, anyway).

stata/sas/matlab

is knowledge of MATLAB a must in industry? if one has MA in Econ and is looking for a job (in either public or private), and the said person has some knowledge in Stata and SAS (but no Matlab/Gauss/Fortran/whatever), do you think that Stata/SAS knowledge is sufficient enough to land a decent position (suppose the person is willing to take any economics related position, either micro or macro, suited for MA grad).