ivanspartakfan

If you are admitted to all of these places with funding, go to Northwestern no matter what your interests are. NWU is a top 5 program, while others are top 15; NWU has one of the best programs in the US in terms of advising and helping the students to make the transition from studying to research (it is an opinion of a professor at Stanford, so he is not biased towards NWU). The ranking of the remaining three programs very much depends on the field, but Northwestern is clearly the best choice given the options you have.

Hi, Congratulations on admissions to great places! Why don't you consider Stanford (yes, I know I'm biased towards Stanford, but still) or Northwestern seriously? They both have well-structured programs and great placements recently, they are amazingly strong at micro theory, and they are strong at macro as well. Stanford, for instance, has Bob Hall and John Taylor in theoretical macro, Nick Bloom and Pete Klenow in more applied macro, and Monika Piazzesi and Martin Schneider in finance. Last year a Stanford guy doing macro/finance stuff went to Chicago Booth, so Stanford has a very good macro group. An as for micro, Stanford is probably the best program in the world (with Al Roth, Paul Milgrom, Jon Levin, Ilya Segal, Doug Bernheim, and many others). I had pretty similar options last year (Stanford, Berkeley, Yale, Northwestern) last year, I chose Stanford, and I'm completely happy with my choice. By the way, are you going to attend the flyouts? Given the great options you have, the best advice I can give you is to attend them, talk to faculty and current students, and pick the place you like more. Atmosphere is very important: since you are going to spend 5 or 6 years doing a PhD, you'd better feel comfortable at the place you choose. Good luck!

Hi, Given your interests, Berkeley is better. It also had better placements recently than Princeton. However, interests might change (a year ago I had interests pretty similar to yours; now I'm going to do econometric theory as my primary field and IO or labor as my secondary one), so take into account that you might be interested in a very different field in a couple of years. But the most important thing is that both places are great, and you should pick the one you personally like more. You are going to spend 5 or 6 years at a PhD program, so you'd better feel comfortable at the place you choose. Go to the flyouts, talk to people, look at the campuses, and choose the place you feel more comfortable at. I was choosing mostly between Stanford and Berkeley last year, and I chose Stanford mostly because I liked the atmosphere here more. So congratulations on admissions to really great places, and good luck!

Hi, Congratulations on admission to these programs! I would like to say 3 things about choosing a program. First, do not get stuck with looking only at one field. When I was choosing a program last year, I thought I would be doing development, political, or public; now, in the end of my first year, I'm going to take econometric theory and IO as my primary fields in the second year. Second, given your options, I think Northwestern is the top choice in terms of the quality of the program: it has a very well-structured program (they try to make transition from studying to doing research easier and less painful), it has great placements, and lots of NWU students go to RES tours. I would say that NWU is a top 5 program right now. So I'd choose NWU over Berkeley and Columbia. However, there is a very important thing you should also take into account. Even though, in my opinion, NWU is slightly better than the other two programs, they all are close in terms of quality; the most important thing for you is to pick a program and a place that you like. You are going to spend 5 or 6 years there, so you'd better choose a place where you feel comfortable. So the bottom line is: all three are great, NWU is slightly better than the other two, but try to go to the flyouts, talk to people, feel the atmosphere of these places, and choose the one that you like more. At least, this is how I chose a university last year, and as of now, I'm absolutely happy with my choice. Good luck!

Saying that economists should predict crises is the same as saying that physicists should predict airplane crashes. Or, better yet, saying that mathematicians (say, probability theorists) should predict the outcome of a coin toss. Prediction has nothing to do with science, and economics in particular.

I think your profile is perfect. My profile definitely was not better, and I got very good offers. Even though there is some randomness (or noise) in the admission process, I would expect you to get several offers from Top-5 programs. Good luck!

Thank you all for answering! By the way, does anyone know what the placement of Berkeley PhD graduates in 2009 - 2010 and 2010 - 2011 was? There is no such info on their website... And, if there are some students from Berkeley here: guys, could you tell me, please, whether or not professors are easily reachable at Berkeley? Is it possible to talk to them almost at any time you want?

molamiu, thanks! No, I just randomly checked the website and found out that the decision was there.

Finally, I do have offers from Berkeley, Stanford, and Northwestern (though this one is weakly dominated, I guess), and a wait-list from Yale. This will be a very difficult choice... :)

Institution: Yale Program: PhD in Economics Decision: Wait-listed Funding: $34K per year if admitted Notification date: February, 23 Notified through: E-mail to check website Posted on GC: No Comments: Institution: Stanford GSB Program: PhD in Economics Decision: Rejected Funding: Notification date: February, 23 Notified through: E-mail to check website Posted on GC: No Comments: Institution: Berkeley Program: PhD in Economics Decision: Accepted Funding: ~$25K per year, maybe more Notification date: February, 27 Notified through: Phone call from Yuriy Gorodnichenko Posted on GC: No Comments: Institution: MIT Program: PhD in Economics Decision: Rejected Funding: Notification date: March, 1 Notified through: E-mail to check website Posted on GC: No Comments: Institution: Northwestern Program: PhD in Economics Decision: Accepted Funding: ? Notification date: March, 2 Notified through: No e-mail, checked the website Posted on GC: No Comments: Institution: Stanford Program: PhD in Economics Decision: Accepted Funding: $34K per year Notification date: March, 2 Notified through: No e-mail, checked the website Posted on GC: No Comments:

whatdoido, no, I just know that my university has a fairly good record of placing top students there, and that last year a student with very similar profile (ranking, GPA etc.) was admitted there. I've asked about these three programs not because I'm sure that I will be admitted everywhere, but because I want to understand beforehand how to rank these programs in my head :)

Yes, it is a problem (a pleasant one, I guess :)), because all three universities are almost equal in general, and each of them is stronger than others in some particular fields.

He is more a Macro guy, but still has some papers in Development, I guess.

Thanks once again for an answer! Yes, I actually have already read almost everything I could find about these three programs. As for development, it seems that Berkeley are also very strong: they have Roland, Miguel, Gorodnichenko, and Finan (I think it is comparable to Yale with Karlan, Qian, Rosenwein, and Udry), while Stanford is a bit weaker in this field.

blockRed, yes, Berkeley offer is fully funded for 5 years.