DismalMe

That is ridiculously impressive. Economist work all their lives to get a single publication in QJE or JPE or JEP. Actually, I thought you could only get JEP articles were by invitation-only! She should just skip grad school. ;)

(I didnt apply to MIT) What is the main rationale behind "let's wait for NSF" ? Is it that it signals high calibre or it is basically the free money. But then if you told them hey, I promise to pay my way for two years (is NSF two years?) and you are decent cadidate, then you are in?

Do you think it is really important to live close to campus/department first-year? I have heard it is since group studying is very prevalent and living walking distance makes getting home at 2am after a long study session less painful. And then there are social reasons too I guess.

I think the freshwater people are pretty religious about their school. I work at a Fed. The economist I work (and a couple others) for is a Phd from Minnesota. There are also a whole bunch from Penn and Rochester. Our seminars, conferences and visiting scholars are dominated by the likes of Sargent, Rios-Rull, Wright, Kehoe(s), McGrattan, Kocherlakota, Manuelli, Shimer and the list goes on. Basically, it seems like the Penn/Minnesota/Rochester/NYU/UCLA people interact in the same circes. In fact, when I chose to go to Brown, I think many economist here did not look at it very favorably like I was defecting to the enemies camp! Hehe..

hehe, nope do more dismal-ness for now. Perhaps starting this fall..when the *fun* really starts... congrats on Stanford!

I thought I would start a thread for people who have decided 100% where they will be next Fall. It could be helpful and fun to get to know future classmates. Can't help to start forming study groups too soon, heh. I will be at Brown next fall.

I got my reject in the mail yesterday. Before that, I had called the grad sec and she said all decisions had been made and mailed out.

I have decided to accept Brown's offer. I visited them last Friday and it reinforced my interest in their program. (For those on waitlists etc: I have turned down most of my other offers as well) Please post if you're going to Brown too!

Freethinker, You're still waiting for 7 schools? That's a lot! All the best!

Yeah, Minnesota is an excellent option, their training is fabulous, but I may be interested in testing the empirical waters and then Minnesota wouldnt be so good. Plus, there are some personal issues too. StarvingEcon-- do elaborate about your macro philosophy issues with Brown!

Thanks for the input so far. Funding situation is same for both. See if it was like Harvard/MIT/Princeton/Chicago/Berkely/Stanford versus Brown I wouldnt be thinking about it all. I realize that I would have to really try to be top at Brown to do well whereas at Penn even being middle-of-the-pack will find you a decent job.

I am choosing very close to choosing Brown over Penn for Econ Phd. I realize that Penn is the overall stronger program but Brown is so good about macro growth and development (the fields I would really like to pursue). The economist in Fed department I work for are quite disappointed in me but that I think is natural because they mostly belong to the Minnesota/Rochester/Penn school of macro. Secondly, I do think Brown's program is on the rise. Additionally, I also favor Brown for personal reasons. Any thoughts on this issue? :hmm:

congrats to all. Got accepted as well (no funding)

I dug up an Economist from Feb. where they show an index of visa restrictions. It's kinda interesting. Americans can travel to 125 countries without a visa. Japan: 125 EU (average): 125 Hong Kong: 115 Mexico: 100 Malaysia~123 Turkey: 50 India: 25 (my passport) China This is just a sampling.. Even with a US greencard it is a pain to go to the consulate/embassy and then shell out $50-$100 for a visa which doesnt last very long. Even though it is a formality, it is annoying and costly.

Although, it can be a pain in the neck to have to get visas to travel in most countries in the world (I don't know what a Chinese passport benefits are but mine are not that extensive).