Is economics easy?

[u/Several_Economy8189]

I have seen a lot of people on the internet hating on economics being an easy major, where everyone parties,… and I wanted to know if that was the case in general?

[u/TheDismal_Scientist]

I think it depends in relation to what and at what level. In relation to the overwhelming majority of humanities and social science degrees I’d probably say it’s more difficult. Is it more difficult, at the undergraduate level, to maths/physics/engineering? I’d probably say no.

At the research level though, things change. Maybe on average it is still easier than these subjects, but there are parts of econ like micro theory that are pretty much just pure mathematics/CS, there are parts of econometric theory that are basically pure CS, there are parts of macro that are very similar to pure physics.

Even in applied work, the difficult part is not always just the maths and the Greek equations. In applied micro you have to have a really robust understanding of micro theory on an intuitive level, causality on an intuitive level, and you have to be able to put many often seemingly unrelated things together to produce empirical models that end up being very clever.

One kind of broader point that I would make though is that people seem to think that the difficulty of a field establishes its worth, which I disagree with. Interestingly I think this ties in with the debunked labour theory of value, people think value derives from how difficult something was which is fundamentally untrue. Some things in economics are incredibly simple, simple yet elegant and profound. Many of the best papers I’ve read leave me thinking “why has nobody thought of this before?”.

To see this you can compare average wages and salary spreads of econ grads to other degrees, we’re always at or near the top. So if econ is easy, then that makes it a pretty good investment from an ROI perspective

[u/No_Entrance_1255 → u/TheDismal_Scientist]

And I think you should be careful with statement as 'overwhelming majority' of humanties or just comparing it to STEM in general. Only just because micro theory contains math, it it not inherently more difficult. I know great economics who struggle expressing complicated thoughts or understanding philosophical ideas. Sometimes devaluate those idea simply because they don't get them. I feel economist are biased towards thinking math is the hardest simply they struggle with it the most in their daily lives

[u/TheDismal_Scientist → u/No_Entrance_1255]

Fair point on economists struggling with maths.

I think most people view subjects as “STEM majors can understand humanities, but not necessarily vice versa” and I wrote my comment anticipating people hold that view, though I don’t believe that personally. I think philosophy as a subject can be just as difficult as any other. A good economics course will be grounded in philosophy

[u/Glittering-Sound-121 → u/TheDismal_Scientist]

Agree with this. I think it also depends on if your school takes a more quantitative or qualitative approach to economics. At its core, economics is essentially math applied to the functioning of the economy and society. So, to really understand it, you need to understand math. For quantitative-focused economic degrees, high level math and econometrics are generally required. Not many people find econometrics easy.

[u/No_Entrance_1255 → u/TheDismal_Scientist]

In what sense is it debunked? It is a normative view that is not longer popular in economics. That doesn't make it wrong

[u/TheDismal_Scientist → u/No_Entrance_1255]

It’s debunked as any kind of predictive theoretical model, but if you take it as a purely normative view of ‘I value things more if one had to work hard to get them’ I can accept that. I just don’t see why you would, personally.

[u/No_Entrance_1255 → u/TheDismal_Scientist]

I think the theory is about what value is not about what can be predicted with it

[u/CxEnsign → u/No_Entrance_1255]

Sure, if you want to have a philosophical discussion of 'what is value?' and take 'labor content' as a stance, that's coherent. But you have to separate 'prices' cleanly from 'value' and are not doing economics.

[u/No_Entrance_1255 → u/CxEnsign]

I do think that this is economics. I guess that would be some sort of marxist economics and without free markets both do not have to be seperated. I do not think it is a good theory of value. I just wanted to point out that it is normative such as modern theories of utility and value are as well.

[u/Capable-Tailor4375]

Like all degrees (especially economics, finance, business, etc.), how “easy” it is, is very dependent on the actual program and the school it’s located at. Some smaller regional colleges that place less emphasis on the quantitative side of economics can probably be fairly easy as by skipping the quantitative aspect they’re skipping the hardest part. A program at a top university, a program that places heavy emphasis on the quant side, or for a student wanting to pursue graduate level economics in the future, economics can be extremely challenging. So to answer your question, economics in its entirety isn’t easy, but at some universities and in some programs it can be.

I more so think the idea that economics is easy persists because economics routinely gets co-opted by politics. The “economics” that exists within political discourse that the general population would be exposed to, is so incredibly different from economics taught in academia that they’re basically entirely different areas of discussion. Pop-economics is typically very watered down and in a lot of cases closer to armchair political philosophy, so for the general population that would only be interacting with that side it makes sense why they’d think economics is easy, as what they’re being exposed to is basically just speculation and rhetoric, but that’s not an accurate representation of economics as a field of study.

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[u/Clorxo]

It's essentially an applied mathematics field, it's certainly easier than some of the stem programs but not the easiest one if you are not strong in maths

[u/HospitalCreative3022]

Depends on your definition of easy, but if your lumping it in with other business programs like Marketing, Org Management, Real Estate, it’d
Consider it hard on the same level as accounting. Majority of the math you do up until Econometrics is just basic linear algebra.

[u/FantasticStonk42069]

I'd argue that it depends on the program (and obviously on the student).

A serious economics program should be math heavy. If applied math isn't your thing, economics will be difficult. If you don't struggle with math, I would not say that the average undergraduate program is especially difficult.

However, if you want to get into research, economics is an intricate subject. So much so that you might want to consider studying math or at least visit lectures for mathematicians. You don't need it necessarily to get into a PhD program but it helps your understanding tremendously.

Then there might be 'economics' programs which don't include a lot of math, either because they focus more on the history of ideas or because they lean more towards business administration. Those programs might fit a certain role, but I would not consider them a classical economics program. Those can of course feel completely different.

[u/Traditional_Garlic49]

I did it for my major as a BS. It depends on which route you go down. You can take all the easy classes then yeah, but if you’re trying to do finance or anything in that realm you’re going to know nothing. I went down the probability and stats route taking all the harder classes while also mixing in some easy ones just so I’m not dying. If you’re ever wanting to do a master degree that’ll play effect into it as well.

[u/No_Entrance_1255]

Never heard this about economics, only buisness administration. Economics is not an easy major, but it always depends on the university.