Economics major?

[ryuu99]

hey all,

i recently finished my Econ degree, but i'm having trouble trying to apply for work. most analyst jobs require experience and knowledge of software that was never taught to me in my 4 years. i do have some SPSS knowledge but that was it. no SQL, no VBA, etc.

are there any entry-level jobs that i should look for? i've probably taken only 2 Finance courses, and most of my Econ classes have been theoretical. add the fact that the software that we used for my econometrics classes isn't even used by anyone outside my university, i think. and no, i don't have any experience whatsoever.

does a company train people on SQL, etc.? i've been looking for a job the past 2 weeks or so and everything requires some software knowledge. please help! am i doomed??

[umop]

Is getting a job related to your major really important to you? Will you be disappointed if you wind up doing something else? If not, try looking at some jobs that require a degree, but not a specific one. I've also seen some postings that say, "degree in finance, business, or economics." Maybe you could give those a try.

But if you really want an econ job, perhaps seek help through your school's career centre? Also ask your classmates what they're doing.

I'm an econ student myself and you're right that it's mostly theoretical. I'm close to graduating and I haven't really learned anything.

One other piece of advice I've heard is to apply to jobs even if you don't have all the credentials. Lack of fully qualified candidates and/or a stellar interview may get you in.

Also, two weeks isn't that long. Keep trying. If you can't find anything after five months, then it may be time to start worrying.

[Mark77]

Normally those are skills that you'd try and learn on an internship if you had one. With the job market packed as it is with people these days, they're going to have a real leg up on you. SQL and VBA aren't the easiest things to learn, IMHO, if you don't really have any real-world applications to use them to solve. SQL especially; you can formulate SQL queries till the cows come home, but there is little substitute for having hands-on experience with actually solving a data problem by way of SQL queries.

[CRAZYBUBBA]

Really, do you want to work as an analyst?

Internships are a slippery slope.

I was an econ grad some years ago, found myself almost unemployable for the typical insurance/analyst positions, picked something entry level admin (in manufacturing) and now have a pretty cushy job (company car, rental, regular travel/vacations).

Your degree is pretty open-ended, you needn't choose from a narrow field of typical options.

[divx]

why would an econ major job require programming? SQL and VBA for econ? No, you are an econ grad, your job is to deal with the economy and not programming. check out jobs in banks, government and credit agencies.

[Golaso]

hey all,

i recently finished my Econ degree, but i'm having trouble trying to apply for work. most analyst jobs require experience and knowledge of software that was never taught to me in my 4 years. i do have some SPSS knowledge but that was it. no SQL, no VBA, etc.

are there any entry-level jobs that i should look for? i've probably taken only 2 Finance courses, and most of my Econ classes have been theoretical. add the fact that the software that we used for my econometrics classes isn't even used by anyone outside my university, i think. and no, i don't have any experience whatsoever.

does a company train people on SQL, etc.? i've been looking for a job the past 2 weeks or so and everything requires some software knowledge. please help! am i doomed??

I think that's pretty much like how some jobs say "MS Office knowledge required", i.e. something you can learn on your own. My advice is to just download those programs and learn how to use them.

[Jeff1221]

Econ is my second major alongside math. I am in a similar situation, lots of quant jobs require knowledge of various software. It's something you do on the side (self learning) or (if you have the money) take classes for in college or something to teach yourself the basics.

That only goes so far though, as someone already mentioned, it's supposed to be stuff you pick up in a job. Pretty much a catch 22 though.

[HTTP04]

hey all,

i recently finished my Econ degree, but i'm having trouble trying to apply for work. most analyst jobs require experience and knowledge of software that was never taught to me in my 4 years. i do have some SPSS knowledge but that was it. no SQL, no VBA, etc.

are there any entry-level jobs that i should look for? i've probably taken only 2 Finance courses, and most of my Econ classes have been theoretical. add the fact that the software that we used for my econometrics classes isn't even used by anyone outside my university, i think. and no, i don't have any experience whatsoever.

does a company train people on SQL, etc.? i've been looking for a job the past 2 weeks or so and everything requires some software knowledge. please help! am i doomed??

You can do what a dumb*** from my school did: Make up work experience to make up for the hideous, actual, telemarketer resume. That kid has balls, I have heard of people fluffing their position a bit, but making one up out of nowhere, just wow. Only a matter of time before he gets caught by 3rd party HR. Then let the hilarity ensue!

Kidding, dont.

If you have no experience whatsoever, I will be straight with you, you are in a very screwed up situation. I know alot of bright people from university with HIGH GPA (3.6+/4) and because of the lack of work experience, they are all unemployed or working bottom of the barrel jobs: CSR/telemarketer/Bank teller/etc

Alot of the stuff you do on the job is taught, however, because of the lack of WE you will have trouble even being picked for an interview.

How is your GPA? I really hope for your sake that it's top notch

[Mark77]

why would an econ major job require programming? SQL and VBA for econ?

For starters, there's a huge realm of stuff that economists have to evaluate on behalf of the firms they are working for.

For instance, most Canadian banks offer lines of credit, and have a minimum monthly payment.

An economist assigned to evaluating how 'sound' the portfolio is, might want to take a look at a few things:

a) How much of the portfolio, by each individual account, is rising or falling.

b) How many people are merely visiting the ABM every month, withdrawing an amount of cash equal to the minimum monthly payment, and then re-depositing it as the payment.

c) How many accounts have experienced a substantial deterioration in balances over certain timeframes.

d) Is there any correlation between large amounts of individual customer spending at liquor stores, and decreasing levels of credit-worthiness?

The answers to all of the above, against a banking database, can be computed by formulating and running proper SQL queries.

This isn't sophisticated quantitative "high-finance". Economists who write these queries to test hypothesis' are not "quants". This is just routine analysis that a lender may perform on portfolios. The analyst submits those SQL queries to the mainframe, and a few hours or a few days or weeks later, receives responses.

SQL is easy enough, relatively speaking, that one doesn't need an in-depth programming course to learn it.

Financial institutions keep massive amounts of transactional data, and modern economists can/should be expected to use such transactional data in carefully and skillfully crafted ways to improve business decision making. For instance, the line of credit of the heavy drinker could be reduced or called to minimize the bank's exposure to a default.

My advice is to just download those programs and learn how to use them

Good luck with that.....just downloading and setting up a SQL server and making a few rudimentary queries isn't going to teach you anything about how to really use them.

[ryuu99]

that i'm quite doomed, going by your replies. crap.

[Mark77]

that i'm quite doomed, going by your replies. crap.

Welcome to the club. Electrical/Computer Engineers have been dealing with this crap (and worse) for years. Qualification inflation even though the skills aren't all that hard to learn.

[divx]

For starters, there's a huge realm of stuff that economists have to evaluate on behalf of the firms they are working for.

For instance, most Canadian banks offer lines of credit, and have a minimum monthly payment.

An economist assigned to evaluating how 'sound' the portfolio is, might want to take a look at a few things:

a) How much of the portfolio, by each individual account, is rising or falling.

b) How many people are merely visiting the ABM every month, withdrawing an amount of cash equal to the minimum monthly payment, and then re-depositing it as the payment.

c) How many accounts have experienced a substantial deterioration in balances over certain timeframes.

d) Is there any correlation between large amounts of individual customer spending at liquor stores, and decreasing levels of credit-worthiness?

The answers to all of the above, against a banking database, can be computed by formulating and running proper SQL queries.

This isn't sophisticated quantitative "high-finance". Economists who write these queries to test hypothesis' are not "quants". This is just routine analysis that a lender may perform on portfolios. The analyst submits those SQL queries to the mainframe, and a few hours or a few days or weeks later, receives responses.

SQL is easy enough, relatively speaking, that one doesn't need an in-depth programming course to learn it.

Financial institutions keep massive amounts of transactional data, and modern economists can/should be expected to use such transactional data in carefully and skillfully crafted ways to improve business decision making. For instance, the line of credit of the heavy drinker could be reduced or called to minimize the bank's exposure to a default.



Good luck with that.....just downloading and setting up a SQL server and making a few rudimentary queries isn't going to teach you anything about how to really use them.

does that mean anything or just all gimmick? lenders fell for subprime mortgage and greek default. what did the database say about that?

[brownbobcat]

hey all,

i recently finished my Econ degree, but i'm having trouble trying to apply for work. most analyst jobs require experience and knowledge of software that was never taught to me in my 4 years. i do have some SPSS knowledge but that was it. no SQL, no VBA, etc.

are there any entry-level jobs that i should look for? i've probably taken only 2 Finance courses, and most of my Econ classes have been theoretical. add the fact that the software that we used for my econometrics classes isn't even used by anyone outside my university, i think. and no, i don't have any experience whatsoever.

does a company train people on SQL, etc.? i've been looking for a job the past 2 weeks or so and everything requires some software knowledge. please help! am i doomed??

Most real "econ" jobs, i.e. anything resembling what you learned in school, will require grad school or above. However, there are still a wide range of entry-level jobs out there for business/econ majors, check out your school's career centre. I would focus on building advanced Excel skills before learning SQL. While an instruction manual is no substitute for real experience, it will help you gain some familiarity with the software and could enhance your resume.

[divx]

I rarely agrees with Mark but he is right about SQL being hard to master, you think it's easy when you only need simple commands to use it but to figure it out it takes a lot of effort just like any other programming language.

[rapashoo]

I, like OP, graduated with Econ degree but to be honest, I find Econ (BA degree, to be precise) pretty useless when it comes to job finding. Most office jobs look for fresh graduates with Business Administrative degree in one particular stream (that is either Finance or Accounting), otherwise you MUST have some experience. I ended up taking CMA route (by taking whole lot of accounting courses at York) and now find myself employed in accounting field.

If you like Economics and want to find the job in that field, try Economic policy area in government but they too look for Master degree now lol...

Or, if you are really good with numbers, you can find a job at major bank and do CFA...