Contents

Mathematics

Students may find it useful for future study to take some courses in mathematics and logic in their first- and second-year. Some example courses include: "Introduction to Linear Algebra", "Calculus and Its Applications", "Proofs and Problem Solving", "Logic 1", and (at a later date) "Advanced Mathematical Economics".

Disclaimer: Mathematics courses require a serious effort and have high failure rates. Most importantly, you should discuss your plans with your Personal Tutor.

Links for more information:

• American Economic Association's Math Preparation for Graduate School.

Self-Study Mathematics

Ever since the day of Cournot and Dupuit, as well as the Marginal Revolution, mathematics has played an important role in the study of economic theory (for better or for worse), so it could be beneficial to be well-versed in areas of mathematics (especially calculus).

Khan Academy

Additional resources to study mathematics are available at Khan Academy, which offers courses in AP Statistics, AP Calculus BC, Multivariable Calculus, Differential Equations, and Linear Algebra.

https://www.khanacademy.org/math

MIT OpenCourseWare

MIT OpenCourseWare also has a number of courses on mathematics which may be useful for students. Some relevant ones may include 18.01SC Single Variable Calculus, 18.013A Calculus with Applications, 18.02SC Multivariable Calculus, and 18.06 Linear Algebra.

https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/

Reading

EconPALS Reading List

This reading list was compiled by approaching various lecturers who have participated in the teaching of the Economics 1 and Economics 2 pre-honours courses, as well as Statistical Methods for Economics, with the following question: “Imagine yourself in the shoes of a dictator. What readings, if you had your way, would you have all students read?” Lecturers were free to interpret “readings” however they wished and it was entirely flexible as to what readings they chose to recommend - they were not necessarily required to be economics-focused or suitable for pre-honours students. Many thanks go to them for taking the time to respond and making this list possible.

https://www.ed.ac.uk/files/atoms/files/econpals_reading_list.pdf

American Economic Association Reading List

"Blogs, books, and links. Places to learn more about economics"

https://www.aeaweb.org/resources/students/books-and-links

Cambridge University Reading List

"This reading list is designed to provide information about the scope and content of Part I [Year 1] of the Economics Tripos at Cambridge. [...] Books marked with an asterisk are recommended texts for the course concerned, and are therefore more advanced."

http://www.econ.cam.ac.uk/ba/PrelimReadingList.pdf

LaTeX

"LaTeX is a high-quality typesetting system; it includes features designed for the production of technical and scientific documentation. LaTeX is the de facto standard for the communication and publication of scientific documents." (Source: https://www.latex-project.org/)

Overleaf is "an online LaTeX editor that's easy to use. No installation, real-time collaboration, version control, hundreds of LaTeX templates, and more." It enables users to prepare documents and presentations (via Beamer) written in LaTeX without installing software to their computer.

• https://www.overleaf.com/

  • Documentation: https://www.overleaf.com/learn

• https://www.latex-project.org/

Anki

Anki is a powerful, free open-source flashcards program that supports content including images, audio, videos, and scientific markup (via LaTeX). It operates under two central concepts that the field of psychology has found to be a very effective way of learning new material: (1) active recall and (2) spaced repetition. Somewhat self-explanatorily, active recall entails actively recalling information from memory, whereas spaced repetition is based on the concept of Hermann Ebbinghaus' forgetting curve of memory retainment. For further information, please consult the Background section of Anki's User Manual https://docs.ankiweb.net/#/background. It is also possible to create "decks" of flashcards and share them with other people.

Users may need to install LaTeX to their computers for scientific markup to display correctly on Anki.

Anki's website can be found at: https://apps.ankiweb.net/index.html

"Using LaTeX to create Anki flashcards" [Video, 36:29 minutes]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwcr25334J8

Computational Economics

In addition to our StudyPALS' Python workshops which focus on data- and financial-analysis in the programming language Python (see our StudyPALS page on this website), another valuable resource is QuantEcon, an educational resource for "open source computational tools for economics, econometrics, and decision making." Founded by Thomas Sargent and John Stachurski, extensive lectures cover Quantitive Economics for Python and QuantEcon DataScience.

• https://quantecon.org/

Advice

You will often have the freedom to take other non-economics subjects in your first- and second-year. Economics is sometimes dubbed the 'Imperial Science' as it borrows from or studies topics that are typically thought to be the within the remit of many other disciplines including Psychology, Mathematics, Environmental Science, Politics, Computing Science, and Philosophy - so explore your interests! It may be possible for you to take on extra course load credits or to audit certain courses if you’re especially keen!

Get involved with clubs, societies, and opportunities that interest you.

Get to know your faculty: use your lecturers’ office hours!

Build your CV; make the most of your summers with jobs, internships, and volunteering.

Employment

• Economic Futures: https://www.economicfutures.ac.uk/

• Government Economic Service (GES): https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/civil-service-government-economic-service

• Economist careers in the Scottish Government: https://www.gov.scot/publications/economist-careers-in-the-scottish-government/

Further Resources

• American Economic Association: https://www.aeaweb.org/

  • Student Resources: https://www.aeaweb.org/resources/students

• Royal Economic Society: https://www.res.org.uk/

• The Economics Network: https://www.economicsnetwork.ac.uk/

  • Student Resources: http://www.studyingeconomics.ac.uk/

• CEPR Policy Portal: https://voxeu.org/

• Fraser of Allander Institute: https://www.strath.ac.uk/business/economics/fraserofallanderinstitute/

• The Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET): https://www.ineteconomics.org/

• CORE - Economics for a changing world: https://www.core-econ.org/