Economics and Public Policy

Earn a joint Ph.D. in Economics and Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School and Heinz College. Research markets, policy, and institutions.

Within the Tepper School, Ph.D. students are not required to take courses, but they are required to pass qualifying examinations. Tepper School students (those in this joint program who matriculate through the Tepper School) take the following qualifying examinations:

  • Microeconomics
  • Econometrics
  • Macroeconomics
  • Public Economics

The microeconomics and macroeconomics qualifying exams are the same exams that all Tepper School Economics Ph.D. students take. The microeconomics exam covers Microeconomics I, Microeconomics II, Game Theory and Applications, and Economics of Contracts. The macroeconomics exam covers Macroeconomics I, Dynamic Competitive Analysis, and Computational Methods for Economics. Students in the joint program may satisfy the econometrics requirement in one of two ways. They may take the Tepper School qualifying examination in econometrics, or they may take the Heinz quantitative requirements course sequence and take a qualifying examination based on that course sequence. 

Students with appropriate preparation prior to their entry to the program may choose to take the qualifying exams prior to the third semester, however, they must take the entire set of qualifiers as outlined above. 

Commentary on Course Requirements

In large measure, the course requirements combine those of the separate programs. The changes are as follows: 

Tepper School

Students will have the flexibility to take either the Tepper School's or Heinz's econometrics sequences. 

Heinz

The research seminar requirement is reduced from a two to one course requirement. We anticipate that Public Economics will be taught in research seminar format. Further, we wanted to reduce the course work demands in an already demanding curriculum. Note that the research seminar requirement is similarly reduced in the joint statistics Ph.D. program. 

Please visit our Ph.D. Student Profiles page to view the profiles of our current doctoral candidates. 

Requirements

With a few modest expectations students will be required to meet the course, examination, and research requirements of both programs. 

Examination Requirements

Tepper students (those in this joint program who matriculate through Tepper) take the following qualifying examinations: 

  • Microeconomics
  • Econometrics
  • Macroeconomics
  • Public Economics

The microeconomics and macroeconomics qualifying exams are the same exams that all Tepper Economics Ph.D. students take. The microeconomics exam covers Microeconomics I, Microeconomics II, and Microeconomics III. The macroeconomics exam covers Macroeconomics I, Macroeconomics II, and Macroeconomics III. Students in the joint program may satisfy the econometrics requirement in one of two ways. They may take the Tepper qualifying examination in econometrics, or they may take the Heinz quantitative requirements course sequence and take a qualifying examination based on that course sequence. 

Students with appropriate preparation prior to their entry to the program may take the qualifying exams prior to the third semester point if they choose, but they must take the entire set of qualifiers as outlined above. 

Course Requirements 

Heinz course requirements include: 

  • Ph.D. Seminar I, II, & III (90-901/902/918)
  • Organizations (90-917) or Demography (90-912)
  • 1 research seminar
  • Seminar in Public Economics

Four course Econometrics/Statistical Methods Requirement: 

This requirement can be met by taking a variety of graduate level courses from Tepper, Heinz, and the Department of Statistics. These courses include: 

  • Statistical Theory for Social and Policy Sciences (Heinz, 90-905)
  • Introduction to Econometric Theory (Heinz, 90-906)
  • Econometric Theory and Methods (Heinz, 90-907)
  • Econometrics I (Tepper, 47-811)
  • Econometrics II (Tepper, 47-812)
  • Econometrics III (Tepper, 47-813)
  • Regression Analysis (Statistics, 36-707)
  • Linear Models and Experimental Design (Statistics, 36-708)
  • Discrete Multivariate Analysis (Statistics, 36-720)
  • Continuous Multivariate Analysis (Statistics, 36-722)
  • Time Series Analysis I (Statistics, 36-728)
  • Time Series Analysis II (Statistics, 36-730)

In addition, students must pass a qualifying examination based on the material in the Heinz sequence of 90905, 90-906, and 90-907 or the Tepper sequence of 47-811, 47-812, and 47-813. 

Commentary on Course Requirements

In large measure, the course requirements combine those of the separate programs. The exceptions are as follows: 

  • Tepper School of Business students will have the flexibility to take either Tepper School or Heinz College econometrics sequences.
  • The Heinz College research seminar requirement is reduced from a two to one course requirement. We anticipate that public Economics will be taught in research seminar format. Further, we wanted to reduce the course work demands in an already demanding curriculum. Note that the research seminar requirement is similarly reduced in the joint statistics Ph.D. program.