

College economics classes - how useful are they? - dwong

I'm a college student who's debating the value of college economics classes. I didn't like the AP economics class I took in high school. It seemed too idealized and non-applicable.<p>I'm wondering what you guys think about the value of economics classes in college, especially for pursuits related to entrepreneurship. If it matters, I'm attending a top 10 school.
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philiphodgen
You'll get some subject matter information from the teacher that you'll be
required to barf back on an exam. That's useless (as is almost every subject
matter I studied in college/law school, in my experience. Statistics, a
philosophy course in symbolic logic, and calculus excluded.)

What you gain (if you're lucky) is the meta-lesson of how to think like an
economist. Meaning that you'll understand the reasoning methodologies. This
will give you an ability to understand real life in ways that mere mortals
cannot/do not. I can't say whether "thinking like an economist" is better or
worse. But it will give you perspective and an understanding of how large
groups of people behave.

Same deal with law school, in my experience. They teach you to think like a
laywer. That's the useful part. Hint: If you are trying to figure out an
answer, spend your time working out the correct question to ask. Then the
answer comes almost trivially.

Second hint: law is binary. The answer is either "yes" or "no". Phrase your
question to elicit an answer that is "yes" or "no".

I'm sure the same holds true for engineering and other disciplines. Yeah sure
you'll learn some "stuff" but more important you'll learn how to ask a
question and solve a problem.

I haven't looked at khanacademy.org's economics stuff. But I'll bet you won't
learn the meta-skills there.

Go take the class. And demand a lot out of your professor.

(Disclaimer: econ major in college.)

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jaypreneur
It will similar to your high school class in terms of being idealized and non-
applicable.

I think they are interesting courses to take and there are some great
conceptual takeaways. I'm not sure how valuable for entrepreneurship economics
would be. I would personally go for microeconomics for it's applicability to
business. However, macroeconomics is still interesting in a broader (even
political and global) sense though.

I don't know what you'd be taking as an alternative to economics, but I don't
see why you wouldn't take them. I took both macro and micro in college. I
enjoyed the courses and found them useful. As philphodgen pointed out... what
you will gain from taking the course is the ability to think like an
economist.

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dmfdmf
It is true that modern Economics is not just too idealized but also too
mathematical. Economics has math envy toward Physics so they mimic the
supposed "rigor" of mathematical analysis to give it a veneer of precision and
respectability. That said, there are crucial principles you probably should
know (Supply and Demand, Division of Labor, Comparative Advantage, etc). The
college classes may be better than your HS AP course as it depends on the
teacher more than anything. The intro classes tend to avoid the more advanced
and abstract and do try to tie it to real life examples, especially Micro-
Economics.

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ohashi
I don't know if I would call it envy. It's an attempt to try and model human
behavior - as (ir)rational as it may be. Using math to try and get a better
understanding seems like a pretty good idea. No model is perfect, but they
constantly try to adjust.

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dmfdmf
This is the exact rationale and hope in the field but it a false hope. I'm not
opposed to using math but as your comment implies, humans are not atoms or
particles like in Physics and the subject requires different methods than the
physical sciences. Economics is more closely allied with the methods of
Psychology or Ethics, identifying and validating basic principles such as the
examples I mentioned which require no math to understand. The proof of these
principles are validated via logic and observation of human action not
mathematical proofs. This methodology was dismissed as non-scientific early
last century and, in the context at the time with very successful mathematical
Physics, the mathematical economists took over the profession to counter the
charges of not really being a science since there was no math equations.

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dantheman
I think taking an engineering economics class would be incredibly useful
(something like:
[http://ardent.mit.edu/real_options/ROcse_CMI_latest/index.ht...](http://ardent.mit.edu/real_options/ROcse_CMI_latest/index.html)).
I'm a fan of the Austrian school of economics (Rothbard, Menger, Mises,
Hayek), but micro/macro are good classes to see how to address complex system
analysis - though it may be the wrong approach.

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alan-crowe
Joel Spolsky has a reputation as a programmer, blogger, and entrepreneur. His
recommendation of microeconomics

<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/CollegeAdvice.html>

is striking for its clarity and strength.

~~~
wsdom
excellent article!

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wsdom
I would say take statistic's classes and read some econ books on the side.
Also from my personal experience I found micro to be much more engaging and
applicable. This is all my personal opinion of course.

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macca321
you can meet loads of high-fliers on their way up and tag along for the ride

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felipepiresx
not much , khanacademy.org has a bunch.

