Teaching and Exams

Economic theory is timely in a world that constantly evolve. It allows economists to rigorously focus on the most relevant aspects of a problem in a given context. Different contexts call for different models, and the skill of choosing the proper model in each different context is critically important. The advent of big data and machine learning cannot go without a sustained focus on understanding the underlying mechanisms driving economic behavior. Such a theoretical knowledge is essential to inform, design, and ultimately implement policy interventions aimed at correcting market failures and other forms of economic inefficiencies.

Quantitative modelling skills allow economists to gauge the size of the causal effects that economic theory predicts, use machine learning to uncover data patterns to make predictions, and harness the data revolution to measure the economy in real-time.

History and real-world context allows economists to draw on the 'lessons from history' and put theory insights into context. The practical implementation of a theoretical idea also stands a much higher likelihood of success when combined with fine-gained contextual background, not least knowledge of earlier attempts at implementing the theoretical idea into policy.

Communication skills allow economists to explain their analyses to stakeholders. To be effective as a policy advisor, the economist must be able to communicate clearly and concisely to busy people. Moreover, the economist's advice must be directly relevant to the advisee's policy agenda in a timely way.

Intellectual flexibility allows economists to better navigate the rapidly changing economic landscape. Textbook knowledge ca quickly become the old way of thinking. Economists should have confidence in their ability to learn, while being ready to question the textbook solution to a problem. Most importantly, the first step towards expertise is awareness of what you do not know.

While still focused on the core and historical issues of  production, consumption, and distribution of goods and services, the economist of the 21st century must also face a whole new set of problems and challenges such as climate change, growing inequality, automation, artificial intelligence, decentralized internet, etc. An economist must be able to leverage her or his own training and knowledge, while incorporating insights and techniques from other disciplines to address these new questions.

Our teaching is firmly grounded in the ambition to train smart, capable, and open-minded economists. Yet, mastery of the competences outlined above also provide our students with invaluable tools to analyze a broad array of problem pertaining to noneconomic spheres. Put another way, we equip students with a set of skills that are transferable to many other domains.