repave

Since it wasn't mentioned here, all my theory professors told me to not do RA-ship and all my applied profs told me to pursue it. If you're likely to do theory, an advice I often hear is to finish up as fast as possible and then start churning out the results

M.J. Osborne and Ariel Rubinstein's undergrad and grad texts are each available for free on their website. You can't do much better. The notation is very different from book to book though, so beware of that.

You should check these out: Summer Institute 2015 Methods Lectures (Guido Imbens and Susan Athey's one-day course in machine learning) http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hal/Papers/2013/ml.pdf (Hal Varian's remark on the emergence of "big data") https://web.stanford.edu/class/ee380/Abstracts/140129-slides-Machine-Learning-and-Econometrics.pdf (His slides)

Conley, John P., and Ali Sina Onder. 2014. "The Research Productivity of New PhDs in Economics: The Surprisingly High Non-success of the Successful." Journal of Economic Perspectives, 28(3): 205-16.

Hi sorry didn't see this. Yes. Math refresher, math review, math camp. If you find the material familiar, you probably are alright (should still go to math camp). If the material is completely unfamiliar, then probably auditing a linear algebra / basic real analysis class won't hurt (though the learning is in doing the work as always)

Have you tried going through Math Camp materials? I understand that Yale and U Penn post theirs online. Also: https://owenzidar.wordpress.com/2013/07/30/a-guide-to-survive-math-camp/

No need for any further question. You will get in everywhere.

Professors at top programs *very occasionally* have funding for external RAs. These programs are absurdly incredibly competitive. All else equal, an RA position with one of these profs is harder to get than a spot at their graduate school.

I heard $40k - $55k.

Effect on adcoms would be of second order. You should be more worried about the effect this has on the writers themselves.

I've heard "This student will likely not succeed in a PhD program" before

PROFILE: repave Type of Undergrad: top Canadian Undergrad GPA: 3.90 / 4.00 Type of Grad: - Grad GPA: - GRE: 168Q 166V 5.5AWA Math Courses: Analysis (single-variable A+ multi-variable A+), Algebra (A+ B+), Probability and Statistics (C A- A-), ODE (A-), Topology (A), Real Analysis (A), PhD Real Analysis (halfway done, A+) Econ Courses: lower level courses (As), Advanced Micro (A+), Advanced Macro (A+), Econometrics (A A+ A+), a number of undergrad field courses (As all round). PhD Micro I (halfway done, A+) Other Courses: nothing worth mentioning Letters of Recommendation: very very amazing people who think I’m ok (I hope) Research Experience: RA 1 year for a “cute but useless” project part time, RA 2 years for development research center, 1 year RA for prof Teaching Experience: virtually none Research Interests: political, health, urban SOP: nothing special Other: a number of computer programs Applying to: who knows

Also theorists don't hire that many RAs.

Honestly didn't expect applications to take up this much time.

For sure take it.