Economics Applicant Thread UCAS 2012

not a bad choice to have to make which one are you edging to atm?

flip a coin to decide? Chances are, you'll be wanting it to land on a certain side, and that way you'll know where you really want to go before it's even landed.

Has to be LSE.

LSE BRO!

Because you're interested in postgraduate studies LSE is probably better, having said that it's not like you are going to get turned down from any postgraduate courses with a 1st from UCL being the reason!

offer from warwick for economics yesterday

Yes it depends what you want to do, I just think (at least for what i want to do at first) that a whole year is overkill. Work experience (both paid - for uni expenses, and not - for career experience) can be gained in holidays, especially spring and summer breaks of which you will have at least 3.

I asked about the usefulness of the 'year in industry' during my couple weeks work experience last summer as i was deciding on courses to apply to. The trading floor manager who i spent some time sat next to said they are a waste of a year (in asset management and IB) because you simply can't do much when you have not graduated - at least not enough to productively fill a year, or even achieve what you could during a summer internship. The result is you end up doing jobs that any A level student of above standard capability could do (basic spreadsheets and research, filing, coffee - if they trust you to make it correctly )

If that's not the stuff you want to go into then what i said doesn't apply to you and I'm sure you should know better than me whether the year will be useful for your career whatever that happens to be just not for me

Agreed on the disruption of the placement year

still waiting for Warwick and LSE for Econ. Got rejected by Oxford, Durham and UCL though :/ Had pretty decent grades, don't know what went wrong.

After the open day, I can't decide between LSE and UCL. They're both miles ahead of every other university on terms of research for Economics. Sigh...life was easier when I thought there was only one top university for that catagory

Who gives a toss about research at undergraduate level. You aren't learning groundbreaking new theories at undergraduate anyway. This is why people don't often choose places like UCL over Cambridge. Cambridge offers a better undergraduate education and more rep, independent of research quality.

One massive advantage of longer internships that can't be ignored is that they are far more likely to offer you a job post graduation if you established solid relationships etc.
I'm on a year long Gap Year internship and only understood what the hell i was doing three months in! :P

Do people realise Investment Banking isn't the only career economics undergrads can go into?

It's not about the quality of the undergraduate degree - both courses are excellent. However, since I intend to do research, and will probably end up doing it at the university I did my undergraduate at, I may as well choose wisely and factor in the long term advantages.

But of course, your words ring true for the majority of the more sane people who want get into IB or something >_>

still waiting for Warwick and LSE for Econ. Got rejected by Oxford, Durham and UCL though :/ Had pretty decent grades, don't know what went wrong.

Do people realise Investment Banking isn't the only career economics undergrads can go into?

Seems to me, in general, attitudes go like this:

State schooled economics applicant: "I hope to study economics as it is a subject I very much enjoy, and hope that it stretches me intellectually at University, and in addition from the knowledge and experience that I will gain, I hope to graduate with a degree that is recognised as being rigorous, and will help me find a career where I can apply the knowledge I have learnt for the greater good of society, but also a career that allows me to live a comfortable lifestyle."

Private School economics applicant: "[private school whiney voice] Ohhhh, I doooohh hhhoooope that daddy can get me a job in IB once I get my degreey. I couldn't staaaaand the possibliliteh that I would ever go into another line of work - just the prospect of meeting poor people makes me shudder"

Of course, I'm sure it's not always like that....

Seems to me, in general, attitudes go like this:

State schooled economics applicant: "I hope to study economics as it is a subject I very much enjoy, and hope that it stretches me intellectually at University, and in addition from the knowledge and experience that I will gain, I hope to graduate with a degree that is recognised as being rigorous, and will help me find a career where I can apply the knowledge I have learnt for the greater good of society, but also a career that allows me to live a comfortable lifestyle."

Private School economics applicant: "[private school whiney voice] Ohhhh, I doooohh hhhoooope that daddy can get me a job in IB once I get my degreey. I couldn't staaaaand the possibliliteh that I would ever go into another line of work - just the prospect of meeting poor people makes me shudder"

Of course, I'm sure it's not always like that....

Can't judge really, but this looks very stereotypical - never seen anyone like that.

Just out of interest what school type would you guess I go to based on my posts in here?

Do people realise Investment Banking isn't the only career economics undergrads can go into?

Seems to me, in general, attitudes go like this:

State schooled economics applicant: "I hope to study economics as it is a subject I very much enjoy, and hope that it stretches me intellectually at University, and in addition from the knowledge and experience that I will gain, I hope to graduate with a degree that is recognised as being rigorous, and will help me find a career where I can apply the knowledge I have learnt for the greater good of society, but also a career that allows me to live a comfortable lifestyle."

Private School economics applicant: "[private school whiney voice] Ohhhh, I doooohh hhhoooope that daddy can get me a job in IB once I get my degreey. I couldn't staaaaand the possibliliteh that I would ever go into another line of work - just the prospect of meeting poor people makes me shudder"

Of course, I'm sure it's not always like that....

still waiting for UCL, LSE, Warwick I'm starting to get a little impatient...