Economics

Course Overview

The MPhil in Economics is a one-year master’s degree that runs from mid-September to late July. This degree is specifically aimed at candidates who are interested in undertaking a master’s degree that will give them the technical training required to undertake a career as a professional economist working for, say, the UK Government Economic Service or an economics consultancy.

Learning Outcomes

On completion of the MPhil degree students should have:

1. acquired an advanced technical training in microeconomics, macroeconomics, and econometrics;
2. acquired, through optional papers, some knowledge of work at the frontiers of the subject in particular areas;
3. begun to acquire independent research skills and experience of putting them into practice;
4. acquired experience and guidance in formulating a realistic research topic and prepared written work to a strict timetable; and
5. acquired sufficient knowledge and understanding of advanced economics to proceed to a career as a professional economist in business or government, or to a research degree.

Continuing

The MPhil in Economics is designed for students who wish to obtain a one-year master’s qualification before leaving academic economics, and is not designed for students who wish to continue to the PhD programme. However, if a student is determined enough to continue their studies at the PhD level, there may be some leeway to transfer to the MPhil in Economic Research within the first two weeks of commencement of the course.

Program Outline

Each student will take seven modules plus a dissertation. All modules (except Econometric Methods) are equivalent to 18 hours of lectures. The module on Econometric Methods is equivalent to 27 hours of lectures.

Requirements

1. Attendance of the Preparatory Course on Mathematics and Statistics
2. Two compulsory module in each of Microeconomics and Macroeconomics, and one module in Econometrics [5]
3. Two optional modules [2]
4. A dissertation of up to 10,000 words

One to one supervision

Each student receives two hours of supervision for the dissertation component of the MPhil in Economics.

Seminars & classes

Six classes for each of the modules in Microeconomics and Macroeconomics and eight classes for Econometrics

Lectures

The total number of lecture hours for the course is 135 hours. Each student takes seven coursework modules; each module has 18 hours of lecture time, except Econometrics, which has 27 hours of teaching. The Preparatory Course consists of 63 hours of lecture time.

Feedback

There is an internal examination on the material covered in the preparatory course which is assessed on a pass/fail basis. Classes in problem sets take place for compulsory modules. Mid-course examinations in microeconomics, macroeconomics and econometric take place in January; marks are recorded but do not count towards the final degree result. Each student receives two hours of supervision for the dissertation component of the MPhil in Economics.

Thesis

Students submit a 10,000-word dissertation at the end of July worth 20 percent of the final overall mark.

Written examination

Students are examined on seven coursework modules in May and June. Modules are weighted at ten percent each, except for Econometrics, which is worth 20 percent of the final overall mark.