I try not to chart the course of my life by advice given from random people on the Internet, but this Student guy really seems like he’s got something going, yah know?
“I try not to chart the course of my life by advice given from random people on the Internet, but this Student guy really seems like he’s got something going, yah know?”
Student is special. He’s a thinker, an innovator, a leader… You can learn a lot from student. He’s a great man, and an even greater dancer.
My uninformed opinion is that an economics major is useless. Who’re you gonna work for? The government or some institute?
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505145_162-37246116/20-best-paying-college-degrees-in-2011/
It’s one of the better paying degrees out there. Besides all that if one really wants to talk the talk in economics, or whatever it looks a lot better if you actually do the degree.
Alright, but what job do you expect to find as an economist?
Bank
&
Influence.
With these two come the other things that you want.
Money
Car
Nice House
Capitalism.
All around results in
???
Profit!
Uh. What?
That reminds me, I’m starting to run out of influence.
The Fonz might be cool, but Ron Paul is my homeboy.
This.
Big fan!
I think it depends on where you want to wind up in 5 years. If you like the idea of working with data and doing research, an undergrad Econ degree could help you get a job as a entry level policy or financial analyst. So that would be one reason to follow that degree path even if you disagree with some of the things you learn in class (but note an a double majored in Econ and some kind of engineering could be useful here too).
I guess that brings
Up your question of whether academia can be suffocating for someone of an Austrian bent. Really, it probably depends on your school. I was lucky in that we had faculty members that were interested in economic intellectual history and even Austrian Econ in some cases (that was partly how I became interested in AE myself).
But even if your faculty isn’t Austrian friendly, you nay the experience of grappling with unfamiliar methods engaging and not suffocating. Especially if your teachers are open to lots of questions and chats during office hours.
Hope this helps!
Err that was for Rcder and I can’t edit the post to say so. 
“That guy really is something.”
Value is subjective. Econ 101.
Oh, you wish to suggest that the man is literally nothing?
“Uh. What?”
It’s an incredibly vague reference which I forgot was quite as vague as it was and so probably wasn’t worth posting
“The Fonz might be cool, but Ron Paul is my homeboy.”
The Fonz would beat Ron Paul in a fight.
Surely the Fonz would never be so uncool as to start a fight with Ron…
Perhaps…but it sounded like you were saying “bank & influence” were two reasons to become a professional economist…as in, becoming a professional economist generally brings you those things…which is probably one of the most dumbfounding things I’ve heard. It sounds like the punchline of an economist joke.
“Surely the Fonz would never be so uncool as to start a fight with Ron..”
True. That would be most uncool.
“Perhaps…but it sounded like you were saying “bank & influence” were two reasons to become a professional economist…as in, becoming a professional economist generally brings you those things…which is probably one of the most dumbfounding things I’ve heard. It sounds like the punchline of an economist joke.”
Oh, I thought you meant the phrasing.
Well basically. It depends on what you do. I’ve never met an economist with a phd who’s in any way struggling (and yes, I have actually met a fair number even though I was actually surprised by the average paycheck shown in Vive’s link) and one can’t deny that economists wield a fair amount of influence when compared to a normal person. This is especially true depending upon how much influence they attempt to take, be it within the economic field itself (which tends to make its way out, however vaguely to public policy and opinion), with political groups (like Krugman or Murphy both of whom have a fair amount of sway over very different groups), or through public policy (Bernanke, economic advisors and the like).
I’m not saying its the best paying or most influential position, but if you’re just going for a PHD it’s hard to go too much further in these areas than with a degree in economics
First of all, that was not the average paycheck. That was the median paycheck. There is big a difference, which you might want to look up. Second, that was mid-career salary, as in after 15 years of experience in the field. Third, as far as I could see the survey does not offer any information regarding the number of people who hold such degrees versus the number who are employed at any salary…let alone that one.
What exactly is a “normal” person? Somone who has an equivalent degree in some other field? Someone who has no degree at all? Or someone who simply doesn’t have an economics degree?
And I guess it would need to be made clear what kind of influence we’re talking about. You might be talking about influence in a specific department at a specific educational institution or something of that sort. Generally when people talk about a posititon of influence they mean in the sense of indirect power…as in someone who can individually affect great change. Of course you can point to Ben Bernanke or Paul Krugman…but if you’re going that far I could easily point to virtually any profession and say it has vast influence on geo-politics, the economy, and even war and peace. I could say soccer players have influence and point to Pele single-handedly stopping a civil war in Nigeria. I could say agronomists have influence and point to Norman Borlaug. I could say destitute people have influence and point to Gandhi.
Naming the extreme exceptions does not help support a claim about “average”.
The question was “what job do you expect to find as an economist?” And what’s more, it sounds like your post was answering “why would someone get a degree in economics?”
And for those two questions, I honestly don’t see “bank & influence” being very accurate answers. Other than Krugman and his insane obsession with living in an Isaac Asimov novel, I honestly don’t see many people looking for money and power saying “I know…I’ll get a graduate degree in economics!”.