columbia

Didn't mean to step on your toes, chateauheart. I wasn't referring to you in my tirade. A lot of people on here do emphasize the importance of math to a genuine fault. The fact is, if you're not from a target undergraduate school, your chances at being admitted to a top 5 program, regardless of how much math you have, is minimal. Having perfect grades and perfect test scores would not change that. I have a first-hand account of this being the case. I suspect you probably go to Harvard or MIT, chateauheart, and I suspect you're probably from a non-target school. However, you are not necessarily accurate in your assessment of the level of meritocracy that goes into PhD admissions in economics. The truth is, the way departments select students from non-target schools are more random than objective. It works sort of like this: A particular top 5 department receives applications for the year. Certain members of the adcom will set aside applications of their RAs or their pet students. Then they will start setting aside those applicants whose recommenders have made phone calls. Not all phone calls are credible, so applicants would have to have a recommender or recommenders in the inner circle of those on the adcom. Then, there are a few seats reserved for international students. Usually, these seats will be filled up by graduates of Beijing, Tsinghua, Bocconi, your French écoles normales supérieures, or Oxbridge/LSE. In most years, one or two token admits from South America. Then it's the NSF people. Finally, when it's down to just a handful of seats left, those students from non-target universities get to fight it out in the only meritocratic part of the entire process—filtering based on grades, test scores, math courses, grad-level courses, publications, research experience etc. It is an illusion that top economics departments offer all applicants equal opportunity. THEY DO NOT. And your advice to the "typical" applicant from a non-target school is helpful, but not useful. OF COURSE you should maximize your chances by getting As in all your math classes, get a 170 on the GRE. It's actually a no-brainer advice and I wonder why some people get a kick out of stating the obvious. The point is, regardless of how marginally you increase your chances, your chances are still marginal. It's like saying you should stop eating processed meat altogether because it raises the risk of cancer by few percentage points. It's true, it's factual, but it still wouldn't matter. It's statistically significant, but not meaningful. The more helpful advice you should give to any top economics department aspirant from a low-ranked school is just to give up.

Don't retake it. Most of the people who are giving out advice on urch are likely to be people who (1) are not in any top departments (2) do not know the admissions process for doctoral programs in economics. There's a running joke already within the field about clueless wannabe advisors on urch who won't stop traumatizing young prospects by saying that you won't stand a chance without analysis. Please take the advice you get from this forum with a grain of salt. A lot of people responding to questions on here are still undergraduates. I hadn't taken Real Analysis, and I know a few people in my cohort who hasn't. I also happen to know a few people at Harvard and MIT who hasn't taken any math beyond multivariable calculus and linear algebra. If you already gotten an A in Real Analysis, then stop there. If you're passionate about math then go ahead and take a few more. But you don't need anymore. What you NEED are good letters. And I can't stress this enough. Letters are the only thing you need to get into a top program. How do I know that? My relative is on the adcom at Chicago.

Here's some harsh but honest advice that you may not want to hear. Don't apply to PhD programs without research experience and good LORs. Unless you have a special reason for having a 3.1, like your whole family died in a car crash so you couldn't focus on college, or if you've been juggling college with a mortal challenge, like cancer or being shot in the head because women are not allowed to go to school where you live, then no, you'd get no sympathy for not doing well enough in college. PhD admissions are looking for two things essentially - research potential and diversity. All the talk about it being a meritocratic process is rubbish. Research potential can be measured only by your LORs. A student can have 5 years of RA experience and no LORs to verify them. LORs must also be written by influential economists, not by lecturers or professors with embarrassing publishing records. If you've been to a T10 school, and haven't gotten to know the stars in the economics department, then I'm afraid you'd have to do an M.A. Just to reconnect with the field. Diversity is determined by many factors. Whether you've been shot in the head because women are not allowed to go school where you live. That's one. Sometimes it may be as simple as being from Nigeria, or Kenya, or Sri Lanka. If the department feels that some countries and/or regions have been underrepresented, and you fit the description, you're in luck. We have a couple of those every year at Princeton. Brilliant people but it's obvious why they were chosen over similarly qualified candidates. May I ask why you're doing a PhD in Economics? Instead of a PhD in Sociology or Psychology? You realise that economics is not all empirical applied microeconomics. In fact, your training at a PhD in Economics program will not necessarily make you a better empiricist. A lot of what we learn during grad-level sequences are theoretical and applications are not always given a lot of attention. You'd be better doing an M.P.P or M.P.A.

My advice is not to get too hung up on the concept of 'grade deflation'. Many schools have grade deflation (Berkeley, Chicago etc.) and successful (unconnected) candidates to T10 economics departments often still get near perfect GPAs. How well did you do on math courses? Have you done multivariable calculus, linear algebra, and real analysis? What grades have you gotten in those? The most important thing to remember that even with poor grades and test scores, you have a shot at a T10 school if you have recommenders who will make calls for you to the relevant departments to which you are applying. PhD admissions is a political exercise, more than anything. Good grades does give you a better chance, but the increase is marginal as they will be hundreds of applicants with similar grades trying to be admitted. What makes successful applicants stand out are their LORs. A large proportion, and don't be surprised that it's over half, of classes at a T10 department will be filled by RAs or former RAs/students of faculty. That means you'd see a lot of whitebread undergrads from T10 schools being admitted without any further mathematical preparation beyond multivariable calculus. Levitt, was admitted at MIT having only taken calculus. I hadn't taken real analysis and I was admitted to Princeton on the back of LORs. I also got a C+ in Vector Analysis (Calc IV). The whole process is idiosyncratic. So whether you're at a grade deflated school or not is really not that relevant. There will be applicants from your school with perfect grades. Of course, you'd probably have a better shot intrinsically by not being from a lowly-ranked state school with an unranked economics department for example. Many students from very lowly ranked schools apply for T10 schools with their 4.0 GPA and grad-level math and econ courses but I think they do not necessarily have a better shot than a 3.5 in econ from UChicago with minimal math and no grad-level courses. I've sat in classes at a flagship state school in Baton Rouge and the material is frankly embarrassing. You can essentially get an A by just showing up to class. I think top departments know that and low ranked schools are generally taken less seriously unless they have an M.A from a high-ranked school. Few applicants outside of the "circle" get admitted straight out of college anyway. My advice is either do an M.A/M.S in statistics or data science at schools like Harvard and Stanford, or M.A in Economics from Toronto/Duke/NYU. The intention is not necessarily to learn anything out of them. You'd learn all you need during your PhD. The intention is to get good letters out of those schools. Be proactive and get to know your professors. You'd be fine. Good luck.