Economics at Oxford: is there enough maths?

Offer holder for History and Economics here.

My long-term ambition is to complete a PhD in Economics at a top US or UK university before pursuing a career in research. I appreciate that it might be a little early for me to be considering postgraduate study, but I have a lot of time on my hands to think about the future at the moment.

I'm aware that the flexibility of the History and Economics course is such that I will be able to take as many economics papers as PPE and E&M students, which I indeed plan to do. Specifically, I'd like to take "Quantitative Economics" and "Econometrics" as more technically rigorous options. However, having done a little research into PhD programmes in the US, I'm worried that there simply isn't enough mathematics in Oxford's economics courses to allow me to make a competitive application.

Since Oxford's "modules" don't seem to work in at all the same way as those at other universities, it's quite difficult to work out how much pure maths will be covered in the course. In the US, the degree system means that the majority of undergraduates interested in economics research careers have the opportunity to take quite advanced maths courses. At Oxford, my options are essentially limited to which areas of economics I'd like to cover, with no real equivalent to courses like Harvard's "Math 112: Real Analysis". Is the maths at Oxford "hidden" within the more mathsy economics papers, or is there just very little maths at all?

I took A-Level Maths and did Further Maths to AS, so I think that I've covered some of the required maths content for such PhD programmes, but it's difficult to be sure. It'll also have been nearly three years since I finished my A-Levels by the time I'm applying to postgraduate courses. There's the potential option of attempting to get a more quantitative Master's degree before applying, but I am now concerned that my undergraduate degree won't allow me even to access those. I am highly doubtful that Oxford would allow me to transfer to a course like Mathematics and Statistics, which increasingly looks to me like it would be more adequate preparation for the path I'd like to take. If I'd have realised my ambition earlier then I'd certainly have applied to a different course.

Any advice would be much appreciated, thank you for your time

Hey! I’m a PPE offer holder, and I have exactly the same concern

It looks like we do multivariable calculus in first year, but no vector spaces, which is a bit different to other unis. (https://www.spc.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/inline-files/Economics_Maths_Workbook_2019_0.pdf) Also, I can’t seem to find where the advanced stats is covered - e.g. at LSE they do this in ST102 in first year - so unless you’re correct in saying it’s hidden in a second year econ module, I’m worried we won’t get to cover it at all.

I’d love an answer to your question too. I’ve done FM and I really enjoy maths, so don’t want to miss out on this at uni, and am also worried about not covering the level of maths required by a US postgrad/LSE postgrad.

Hmm, the issue is top grad programmes in economics in the US usually expect or at least strongly prefer you have taken real analysis - which won't be possible at Oxford. It is possible to take that at LSE (if you took introduction to abstract mathematics in first year) or as an option at Warwick, however.

Hmm, the issue is top grad programmes in economics in the US usually expect or at least strongly prefer you have taken real analysis - which won't be possible at Oxford. It is possible to take that at LSE (if you took introduction to abstract mathematics in first year) or as an option at Warwick, however.

Not an expert at economics but would getting a one year masters in something like:
-econometrics
-mathematical finance
or similar

compensate for the lack of real analysis in this undergrad?

This is what I’m worried about. I got rejected from both LSE and Warwick so I did not have the option to accept somewhere other than Oxford. I’m now worried that the PPE course at Oxford will close doors of the postgrad courses that I’m interested in...

Not an expert at economics but would getting a one year masters in something like:
-econometrics
-mathematical finance
or similar

compensate for the lack of real analysis in this undergrad?

So I dont know how much Oxfords maths is in History and Economics.

But id imagine the economics course has lots of econometrics given further maths is one of the common A-level choices, id imagine many of these modules are also open to your course (so load up as many whilst there).

I suspect you'll be fine with this choice for a PhD at US schools for a couple reasons:
-Brand name, everyone knows Oxford, & Oxford economics is known to attract elite students
-If you perform well at Oxford get a 1st everyone will know you've been an excellent student relative to a very competitive class.
-You can perform strongly on the econometrics modules you take....
-There is more to a PhD application then just undergrad, have you done any prior smaller research projects (internships/dissertation etc.) how did these go...
-What specific field of research are you keen on ...


IF this is not enough you can do a quantitive finance or maths & economics 1 year taught masters to give you that bump

In the UK sure, for a PhD in the US, I'm not so certain; the top econ programmes (for pure econ rather than something like PEG at Harvard) seem to like their grads to take real analysis (and linear algebra, although this is covered in the computational manner more in most economics programmes in the UK) even just to prove they can/have beyond whether it's really needed for their eventual project. As far as UK degrees go you would probably be better served by a maths (or maths and economics) degree than something like history & economics or PPE for those programmes. That said some programmes (such as I believe Harvard) do in theory take applicants without real analysis (although you'd need to take it once you started there).

That said, is there a particular reason for targeting those programmes rather than ones in the UK? Particularly if you wanted to study e.g. economic history, you may find plenty of equally good or potentially better (e.g. LSE, which has a specific programme in quantitative economic history). Even for economics more generally, depending on what are you want to go into you could get your PhD in that area without needing to fulfill some possibly arbitrary requirement in real analysis in the UK (and you'd be able to go straight into research rather than taking classes for a couple years before getting to start your research project).

Tagging in @.ACS. who is far better qualified than I to advise on graduate study and research in economics and might be able to help advise!

In the UK sure, for a PhD in the US, I'm not so certain; the top econ programmes (for pure econ rather than something like PEG at Harvard) seem to like their grads to take real analysis (and linear algebra, although this is covered in the computational manner more in most economics programmes in the UK) even just to prove they can/have beyond whether it's really needed for their eventual project. As far as UK degrees go you would probably be better served by a maths (or maths and economics) degree than something like history & economics or PPE for those programmes. That said some programmes (such as I believe Harvard) do in theory take applicants without real analysis (although you'd need to take it once you started there).

That said, is there a particular reason for targeting those programmes rather than ones in the UK? Particularly if you wanted to study e.g. economic history, you may find plenty of equally good or potentially better (e.g. LSE, which has a specific programme in quantitative economic history). Even for economics more generally, depending on what are you want to go into you could get your PhD in that area without needing to fulfill some possibly arbitrary requirement in real analysis in the UK (and you'd be able to go straight into research rather than taking classes for a couple years before getting to start your research project).

Tagging in @.ACS. who is far better qualified than I to advise on graduate study and research in economics and might be able to help advise!

Hmm, the issue is top grad programmes in economics in the US usually expect or at least strongly prefer you have taken real analysis - which won't be possible at Oxford. It is possible to take that at LSE (if you took introduction to abstract mathematics in first year) or as an option at Warwick, however.

!

.

?

Offer holder for History and Economics here.

My long-term ambition is to complete a PhD in Economics at a top US or UK university before pursuing a career in research. I appreciate that it might be a little early for me to be considering postgraduate study, but I have a lot of time on my hands to think about the future at the moment.

I'm aware that the flexibility of the History and Economics course is such that I will be able to take as many economics papers as PPE and E&M students, which I indeed plan to do. Specifically, I'd like to take "Quantitative Economics" and "Econometrics" as more technically rigorous options. However, having done a little research into PhD programmes in the US, I'm worried that there simply isn't enough mathematics in Oxford's economics courses to allow me to make a competitive application.

Since Oxford's "modules" don't seem to work in at all the same way as those at other universities, it's quite difficult to work out how much pure maths will be covered in the course. In the US, the degree system means that the majority of undergraduates interested in economics research careers have the opportunity to take quite advanced maths courses. At Oxford, my options are essentially limited to which areas of economics I'd like to cover, with no real equivalent to courses like Harvard's "Math 112: Real Analysis". Is the maths at Oxford "hidden" within the more mathsy economics papers, or is there just very little maths at all?

I took A-Level Maths and did Further Maths to AS, so I think that I've covered some of the required maths content for such PhD programmes, but it's difficult to be sure. It'll also have been nearly three years since I finished my A-Levels by the time I'm applying to postgraduate courses. There's the potential option of attempting to get a more quantitative Master's degree before applying, but I am now concerned that my undergraduate degree won't allow me even to access those. I am highly doubtful that Oxford would allow me to transfer to a course like Mathematics and Statistics, which increasingly looks to me like it would be more adequate preparation for the path I'd like to take. If I'd have realised my ambition earlier then I'd certainly have applied to a different course.

Any advice would be much appreciated, thank you for your time

Offer holder for History and Economics here.

My long-term ambition is to complete a PhD in Economics at a top US or UK university before pursuing a career in research. I appreciate that it might be a little early for me to be considering postgraduate study, but I have a lot of time on my hands to think about the future at the moment.

I'm aware that the flexibility of the History and Economics course is such that I will be able to take as many economics papers as PPE and E&M students, which I indeed plan to do. Specifically, I'd like to take "Quantitative Economics" and "Econometrics" as more technically rigorous options. However, having done a little research into PhD programmes in the US, I'm worried that there simply isn't enough mathematics in Oxford's economics courses to allow me to make a competitive application.

Since Oxford's "modules" don't seem to work in at all the same way as those at other universities, it's quite difficult to work out how much pure maths will be covered in the course. In the US, the degree system means that the majority of undergraduates interested in economics research careers have the opportunity to take quite advanced maths courses. At Oxford, my options are essentially limited to which areas of economics I'd like to cover, with no real equivalent to courses like Harvard's "Math 112: Real Analysis". Is the maths at Oxford "hidden" within the more mathsy economics papers, or is there just very little maths at all?

I took A-Level Maths and did Further Maths to AS, so I think that I've covered some of the required maths content for such PhD programmes, but it's difficult to be sure. It'll also have been nearly three years since I finished my A-Levels by the time I'm applying to postgraduate courses. There's the potential option of attempting to get a more quantitative Master's degree before applying, but I am now concerned that my undergraduate degree won't allow me even to access those. I am highly doubtful that Oxford would allow me to transfer to a course like Mathematics and Statistics, which increasingly looks to me like it would be more adequate preparation for the path I'd like to take. If I'd have realised my ambition earlier then I'd certainly have applied to a different course.

Any advice would be much appreciated, thank you for your time