Requirements of the undergraduate economics major: An update and comparison

Abstract

The undergraduate economics curricula for most of the 793 U.S. colleges and universities that conferred an economics bachelor’s degree in 2019 are described in this article. Besides updating the prevalence of the economics major core requirements and their differences by institution type, the authors record new information on requirement variations across economics degree types, as classified by the National Center for Education Statistics, including STEM-designated degree types. They also investigate the prevalence of calculus-based intermediate courses and find that 63 percent of economics degrees require calculus for intermediate microeconomics and macroeconomics. In addition, 67 percent of degrees require single-variable calculus, 10 percent require multi-variable calculus, and 54 percent require basic econometrics (up from 41% in 2010). These requirements also vary highly by degree type.

Keywords:

• Quantitative methods
• undergraduate economics education

JEL codes:

• A22; C10

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Marie Petkus and John Perry for their encouragement and helpful feedback on this project. They also thank Bill Goffe for his helpful feedback as discussant and the other active participants in their session at the virtual 2021 Conference on Teaching and Research in Economic Education (CTREE), as well as their discussant and other participants at the 2021 Southern Economic Association Annual Meeting. They additionally thank two anonymous reviewers and the associate editor for feedback that substantially improved the readability of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 These data are collected on every college, university, and technical or vocational institution with federal student financial aid programs by the NCES as required by Title IV of the (amended) Higher Education Act of 1965.

2 The CIP code “provides a taxonomic scheme that supports the accurate tracking and reporting of fields of study and program completions activity. CIP was originally developed by the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) in 1980, with revisions occurring in 1985, 1990, and 2000” (U.S. Department of Education, CIP n. d., online).

3 We also exclude degrees classified as Business/Managerial Economics (CIP code: 52.0601).

4 We are missing requirements data for 212 degrees from 187 institutions listed in IPEDS as conferring an economics degree in 2019 that did not include information online about their degrees.

5 Given differences across institutions, we developed a taxonomic guide to help maintain consistency in cataloging. In most cases, we viewed lists of degree requirements and course titles, descriptions, and prerequisites as needed. If, after thorough consultation, we were unable to confirm the requirements of the degrees, we coded some or all the requirements as missing. This taxonomic guide is available upon request or online here: https://tinyurl.com/2w7c2wsn.

6 The Basic Classification is an update of the traditional classification framework developed by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education in 1970 to support its research program. The Basic Classification was originally published for public use in 1973 and was subsequently updated in 1976, 1987, 1994, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2018. See https://carnegieclassifications.iu.edu/classification_descriptions/basic.php for additional details and methodology.

7 The weighted requirements better reflect the typical or average student experience. These percentages are the probability that a randomly selected degree conferred in 2019 required that course.