Greetings from the Chair

UC San Diego's Department of Economics is a global leader in economics research and teaching—and home to one of the most collegial groups of economists I have encountered. As Chair, my goal is to protect what makes it exceptional: a space where undergraduate students master the analytical tools of economics and learn to apply them to problems relevant to a range of careers, where graduate students develop the skills to pursue cutting-edge research, and where faculty push the knowledge frontier across many fields of economics.

Our undergraduate program graduates roughly 700 students per year, sending them into careers in business, finance, government, law, and academia, among others. Our faculty have long emphasized rigorous foundations in economic theory and econometrics, and we have more recently expanded our focus on real-world application and impact. To that end, we have launched an in-house Industry Engagement office that builds our alumni network and connects students with career opportunities. We also continually work to improve our existing majors and develop new ones in specialized fields related to students’ career goals. 

Our graduate program produces top researchers who go on to work at leading universities, think tanks, multilateral organizations, governments, and businesses. We have a non-hierarchical culture in which PhD students work alongside faculty as they develop their research portfolios. Students participate in seminars and workshops as equals, and many collaborate with faculty on joint projects. They specialize across a broad range of theoretical and applied fields, with mentors drawn from the Department and our many partner units across campus, including the School of Global Policy and Strategy, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the Department of Political Science, the Southwest Fisheries Science Center, the Rady School of Management, and the Halıcıoğlu Data Science Institute.

Founded in 1964, we are the youngest economics department to consistently place in the global top-20. The latest U.S. News & World Report rankings place us 14th in economics PhD programs and 18th in undergraduate economics programs nationwide—4th among public universities in both categories. Our faculty have included Nobel laureates, members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and fellows of the Guggenheim Foundation and Econometric Society, as well as many affiliates of the National Bureau of Economic Research. We currently have more than 40 faculty members working across microeconomics, macroeconomics, econometrics, experimental economics, labor economics, public finance, international trade, development economics, environmental economics, health economics, and political economy.

If you are a high school student exploring college options, please visit our undergraduate program. If you are a prospective PhD student, please visit our graduate program. And if you are an alumnus, we would love for you to explore ways to stay connected. We hope to see you on campus!

Regards,

Tom Vogl

Professor and Chair