The Ph.D. in Economics at Indiana University was designated as a STEM program in August 2020.

The University Graduate School requires doctoral students to complete 90 credit hours, with approximately half of these hours as formal coursework.

Our doctoral students are required to take one semester of optimization theory, two semesters of microeconomic theory, two semesters of macroeconomic theory, three semesters of econometrics, one research skill, and three fields (one primary and two supporting).

If you have conducted graduate work elsewhere, you may transfer all or part of that work and receive credit at Indiana University (with the approval of the director of graduate studies). Up to 30 hours may be transferred and counted toward the 90 hours required for the Ph.D. However, graduate work done elsewhere is not automatically transferable.

In addition to the formal course work required for our Ph.D. degree, you are required to participate in at least one workshop. Our department encourages graduate students to present papers at workshops and scholarly meetings, and to publish their research. You can gain teaching experience by enrolling in a course specifically designed for training in the teaching of economics, assisting in large undergraduate courses, and by teaching their own smaller courses.

In the third year of your study, you are required to write, under the guidance of a preliminary advisory committee, a substantial research paper. The paper is expected to be of sufficient quality to be a basis of a dissertation chapter. The overall goal of the third year paper requirement is to facilitate your transition from coursework to dissertation research.

Learn more in our Student Portal