Econ PhD (U.S. & India)

Last updated in April 2024

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT & OTHER RESOURCES

1. I would like to thank Dr. Somdeep Chatterjee, under whose able guidance I got the opportunity to experience the entire application procedure for Econ PhD. The information provided in the following sections is mostly due to him.

2. Would also like to thank Lakshya Narula for giving me the permission to link below, as a complement to my guide to PhD Economics, the following document prepared by him and his co-authors: Chakravorty et al. (2021): Applying to PhD Programs in Economics: An Extensive Guide

3. Another useful resource for understanding the context of and procedure for applying to PhD Economics in the US in the American Economic Association's webpage on 'Preparing for Graduate School'. You can read this resource in parallel with my blog post below and Chakravorty et al (2021) above. 

4. The final and probably most diverse resource is EconGradAdvice which is a webpage that features several resources for PhD Econ aspirants and students all the way from applications to developing research ideas to getting on to the job market.

CONTENTS:

Why Econ PhD?

Presumably, you have completed your masters in economics and have realized that research in the discipline is your calling. Or you do not have a background in economics at all, but have a keen interest in research in the same. And now you are contemplating pursuing a PhD. A standard PhD in economics begins with mandatory coursework whose duration varies from 6 months to 2 years, followed by a dissertation period of about a couple of years (or more), at the end of which the candidate needs to defend their thesis. What the programme equips you with is sophisticated tools for in-depth analysis in specific questions in economics. If this sounds interesting to you and if you have the perseverance to survive the entire duration of the programme, then PhD is definitely the way to go. The job prospects after this degree include mostly academics (you would begin with the Assistant Professor title at universities/institutes), but a good proportion of graduates also join the industry as consultants in consulting firms like BCG and Deloitte. Some people even join the government or its agencies in the area of economic advisory and consultancy. 

From where and why?

The best place to pursue a PhD in Economics would be a good university in the U.S.A. (United States of America). There are several reasons for that, and they are listed below. If you have constraints because of which you can not leave India, your best bets would be the top 6 I.I.M.s (Indian Institutes of Management) and I.S.B. (Indian School of Business, Hyderabad). If you do not have a constraint, the best strategy would be to apply to some universities in the US, along with the IIMs and ISB as back-up.

The following are the reasons why it is advisable to pursue an Economics PhD from universities in the U.S. or from the IIMs/ISB in India:

1. SOP v/s RP - Most universities in India, Europe, and Australia would ask you to submit a Research Proposal (RP) at the time of applying for PhD. This is a detailed written piece documenting your intended area of research, literature review, research gap, and research question(s). This is something that most aspirants are not well-versed with or have almost no idea about. Besides, having zeroed-in on a topic at the outset restricts one's possibilities. What if you change your mind after the course-work? Or what if you realize later on that the data required for your area of research is difficult to lay hands on? In the US and in the IIMs/ISB on the other hand, one is required to submit a Statement of Purpose (SOP) instead, which tells the admission committee as to why you wish to join the programme and why you might be a good fit for their department. This is something that is easier to write for aspirants who have no inkling of how to conduct research. At the end, the admissions committee simply wishes to judge your 'potential for PhD', rather than wanting to judge your 'choice of research topic'. You get to choose the topic once you complete the course-work. 

2. Course-work - The course-work at the places I recommend would be rigorous, optionally inter-disciplinary, and would span about 2.5 long years (which means you get to learn in-depth, which is the primary aim of a PhD) as opposed to just 6 months or a year in India, Europe, or Australia.

3. Advisors - In the US and at the IIMs/ISB, you get to choose your advisors only after completing your course work. This means that you first get to know all faculty members in your department really well before requesting some of them to be your mentors. As opposed to this, most universities in India, Europe, and Australia (and some institutes in India like the IITs) ask you to choose your advisors right at the beginning, which means that if later on you do not strike a chord with them at any level, it could get really difficult.

4. Funding - If you get accepted to universities in the US, it is almost certain that your PhD would be funded entirely (a full tuition-waiver) by the economics department of that university (this is the case for almost all international applicants). Given that tuition is really expensive in the US, this is a great incentive to apply there (however, you would still be required to pay some student fees, which are around $1500 per semester as of June 2019). If you get accepted at the IIMs/ISB, it is 100% certain that you would be funded by the institute. On the other hand, admission to most universities (and even some institutes like the IITs) in India is conditional upon external funding (like the UGC's Junior Research Fellowship (JRF), for which one has to take a separate exam called the National Eligibility Test). In the case of Europe and Australia, it is difficult to get tuition waivers, without which the PhD is not financially feasible. 

5. Teaching Assistantship and stipend - If a university in the US offers you a PhD admit with full funding, it would most probably come with a Graduate Teaching Assistantship offer that pays you a stipend. This means that along with completing your course work and attending classes, you would be working as a teaching assistant for the economics department, and would be earning an income that is anywhere between $1300 - $1900 per month (it is always indexed to the living cost of the city where the university is situated). This easily covers your living expenses and your student fees. The tasks at the job would include grading papers and assignments of undergraduate students, maintaining their attendance records, taking tutorials/holding discussions, and teaching some lectures. So you get to study for free and also get to earn! However, you might not get a GTA offer at all the IIMs. Regardless, if you get an admit at an IIM, you would be paid a fellowship (a transfer made to you every month without any work conditions) in the range of Rs. 25000 - Rs. 35000 per month, and the same for ISB is around Rs. 48000 per month (as of June 2019).

6. Eligibility Test - Universities in the US require you to submit your GRE and TOEFL scores as a pre-requisite for considering you for admission. The IIMs/ISB accept any one out of GRE/CAT/GMAT scores. This means that even if you apply to all of these places put together, this can be accomplished with taking just two tests, i.e the GRE and the TOEFL. On the other hand, most universities and other institutes (including the IITs) in India hold separate entrance tests that quiz you on different types of economics (mainstream/heterodox/mathematical/Marxist/etc.), which means that you would have to prepare for each one of them separately. That's a bummer.

7. Admission Criteria - In the US and at the IIMs/ISB, your entire profile would be considered before you are offered an admit. The dimensions include: (a) your work experience, (b) prior research work, (c) recommendation letters, (d) the SOP, and (e) past academic performance. Above all, you do not need to attend a dreaded interview for admission to the US (however, the IIMs and ISB do have this requirement)! As opposed to that, most other universities and some institutes in India judge your competence based only on your performance in their entrance test and interview, and the content written in your RP. Though I do not condemn this procedure, it surely reduces one's chances of landing an admit, given the extant fierce competition in India. As far as Europe and Australia are concerned, one usually needs to convince a professor in the department of their calibre and capabilities even before they can apply. This takes time and effort, and the final judgement would be based on a single professor's viewpoint.

8. Publications - Universities in the US and the IIMs/ISB do not expect you to have published papers in any journal before you apply for a PhD in economics. Most Indian universities and some Indian institutes, on the other hand, give preference to those candidates who fulfil this criterion. Most Indian journals (where most candidates try to publish), with all due respect, are not part of category A journals. If at all, you could try publishing a paper in category A or A* journals with the help of your mentor(s) and/or professors. Publishing initially in any journal with a lower rank would amount to jeopardising your career in the long run. However, it is not a requirement to do so if you apply to the US and the IIMs/ISB. As far as Europe and Australia are concerned, I am not informed of their stand on the topic.

9. Reputation - A PhD from any university in the US or from the IIMs/ISB is reputed world over and valid in every country. The research methods taught there are cutting-edge and the most contemporary ones. This reason in itself should be enough to convince you!

CAVEATS

1. As of June 2019, the IIMs and ISB offer an FPM (Fellow Programme in Management) degree rather than a PhD degree. This is a doctoral-level programme that is valid in B-Schools across the world, but not at universities. This means that after attaining an FPM degree, you would be able to apply for the Assistant Professor position only at B-Schools, but not at universities or other institutes. If you are OK with this caveat, go ahead by all means. Otherwise, if you still can not leave India and would require a full-blown PhD degree, you can have a look at a list of all institutions that offer PhD Economics in India here. UPDATE FEB 2020: IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIM Calcutta, and IIM Kozhikode now offer full-time PhD degrees rather than FPM degrees. This is good news! However, some of the other IIMs still offer FPM degrees. Please check the institutes' respective websites for updates on the same, or contact their admin via a phone call to confirm.

2. Qualifying the comprehensive exams at the end of the first year (after the second semester) of the PhD programme is mandatory at any university in the US. You are given two attempts to qualify them, failing which you are not allowed to continue in the PhD programme. Some Economics departments allow you to get a masters degree in Economics after not being able to qualify comps, but you would have to check that before applying. Qualifying comps is required in the US across PhD programmes in other disciplines as well, but to the best of my knowledge, no other programme apart from Economics requires students to do so at the end of the first year itself (most of them have that requirement at the end of the second year). This makes PhD Econ a tad more difficult, at least in the sense of this requirement. The comps are extremely difficult and require loads of preparation. They are that difficult for two reasons: (1) The difficulty level of questions asked is way above what you would encounter during semester exams. (2) You don't get a score (or 'marks') on comps. The professors try to judge whether you can 'understand problems and set them up in a way they can be solved' and either pass or fail you in a binary manner. 

NOTE

1. If you wish to apply for PhD Economics in the US and are looking for professional guidance along with work-ex and an academic certification, you should consider applying to the one-year long Economics Pre-Doctoral Programme at IIM Bangalore. The programme exempts you from all tuition and fees and also pays you a monthly stipend of Rs.25000 (as of June 2021). It requires the student to complete PhD-level courses (subjects/papers) in order to get prepared for a doctoral degree in the US and to work under the supervision of faculty members for conducting research work and to narrow down thesis topics. It also exposes you to several individuals who have obtained doctoral degrees from the US and provides guidance on the entire application procedure. This is a one-of a kind programme available in India as of 2021 and I would recommend that you look into it if you are serious about applying to the US. 

2. You could also check out predoctoral positions with Aaditya Dar (Faculty member at ISB Hyderabad)

3. If you do not wish to be a part of another academic programme before joining a PhD programme in the US, you can (and should) apply to MIT's Economics Application Assistance and Mentoring Program that provides free advising from MIT and Harvard Econ PhDs regarding the application process, funding, and life as an Econ PhD student in the US.

That said, the information that follows would still be useful for you.

Finances

An indicative matrix of requisite funds for the application and transition procedure is displayed below (approximate costs mentioned as of June 2019). If you are applying to both universities in the US as well as to the IIMs/ISB, you would need to spend some money in Indian Rupees, and if you finally go to the US, some amount in USD. It is always good to be aware of the total amount of funds required for PhD applications beforehand. I wish somebody had presented this spreadsheet to me before I had begun with the procedure!

*Correction: Vaccinations for the US = 10,000

*Addition: Doctor's prescription and medicines = 5000

Addition: Smart Phone = 300

Though the total cost of all this would turn out to be around INR 8-9 Lacs (if you apply to around 15 universities in the US and 7 institutes in India), there are three things to consider: 

• One, you would not be undergoing as massive a debt as bachelors and masters students in the US do (which runs into tens of lacs and sometimes around a crore). 

• Two, the return on investment in these expenses is extremely high, given that you would earn really well after a PhD from the US or from the IIMs/ISB (this is essentially a small investment in your human capital which has a huge payoff in the long run). 

• Three, you would most likely be able to recover these costs as savings out of the stipend that you would receive as a Graduate Teaching Assistant (GTA) while pursuing your PhD in the US (but only if you can manage your resources well and account for uncertainty in the future; in a nutshell, only if you are a good economist!).

Application and Transition Procedure

1. Find a Mentor - This might be much easier said than done, but it really, really helps to have a mentor who has had experience of pursuing an Economics PhD in the US. They can guide you through every step, which is a humongous relief. This is almost imperative because unlike popular masters programmes such as computer science, one cannot even rely on private (Study Abroad!) consultants who can help you with the application procedure (and even if you do find one, I would strongly advise against availing their services because the PhD application procedure is highly specific and requires academic rigour). Although I had found my mentor while working as a Research Associate at IIM Lucknow at a time when, honestly, I wasn't even looking for one, I realized later that many people apply for such jobs with the purpose of getting guidance from their superiors and to also convince them to provide recommendation letters for their PhD applications when the time arrives. Hence, applying for RA jobs for projects that are headed by eminent faculty members at reputed institutes like the IIMs/ISB or the IITs would be a good strategy. You can find resources for applying to such positions here. However, do not, ever, make this intention of yours explicit to any of your potential employers during the hiring process. Faculty members are well aware of these intentions but it leaves a really bad taste in the mouth if the applicant spills the beans, and it reduces your chances of getting hired manifold.

2. Timeline - Session begins in the US in August each year, and the application portals for the same open almost a year before. At the IIMs and ISB, session begins around June. Let us suppose you wish to join the PhD programme in year (t). Then, you would need to begin the entire process (starting with making the list of universities and starting prep for the GRE) by March (t-1) - April (t-1). Any later than that would not be advisable. Take the GRE (as many attempts as it takes to get the desired score; most people obtain it by the second attempt) by the end of August (t-1), and take the TOEFL as well (you should be able to score well on this one on the first attempt itself). Start working on your SOP right after the GRE. It could take months to perfect the SOP. Application portals for uniersities in the US would have opened by then. Apply to the schools of your choice in the US latest by the end of December (t-1). If you are applying to the IIMs and ISB as well, complete those applications by then too, because their application portals would have opened in November (t-1). Your admits should begin to be offered between mid-March to mid-April of year (t) (interviews for the IIMs would be taking place around the same time, and admit offers would reach you about a week after the interview dates). In the event that you do not receive any good offers from the US, you must accept an offer from the IIMs/ISB, if you receive any. If you do receive offers from the US, you must accept the best among them (along with the GTA offer) by the beginning of May (t). By mid-May (t) you would receive a document called he I-20 which would be issued by your university, on the basis of which you can apply for a US visa. You should be done with your visa by end of June (t). And then finally, you fly off to the US in August (t).

3. Obtain your transcripts - You would need to submit transcripts during the application procedure. A transcript is an official score card (mark sheet) of your bachelors and/or masters degree(s) that is sealed in an envelope and stamped by the issuing university/institute. Obtaining these in India might take a long time, sometimes even months. So apply for these at your previous universities way ahead of time.

4. List of universities - Refer to rankings of economics departments from websites like US News, QS World, and Ideas Repec, and make an exhaustive list of universities in the US with details of each department and their accepted GRE scores. Reconcile these rankings with rankings based on perception with the help of your mentor(s) (commercial rankings are only indicative and not accurate when it comes to PhD). Based on the range of GRE scores that you think you can achieve, short-list some universities, but only tentatively at this point. You could also apply some subjective criteria for this purpose, like climatic conditions (in case you do not want to spend 5 years in extreme weather). And based on the approximate cost per US application mentioned previously, fix an approximate number of universities you can apply to according to your budget (this is an important parameter).

5. GRE and TOEFL - Prepare well for the GRE and for the TOEFL. The entire prep should not take more than 5 months at the maximum. For the GRE, you must score above the 80th percentile on quant and above the 75th percentile on verbal. Anything below this would require really, really strong recommendation letters to land you a university of your choice. The TOEFL is an easy test, but it is imperative for you to score above 27/30 in the Speaking section to be able to be considered for GTA (Graduate Teaching Assistant). Practise the Speaking section really well by recording your voice on your phone and listening to it in order to correct your errors. You should be done with both the tests and should have gotten desired scores by the end of August (t-1).

6. Re-jig the list of universities - Based on the GRE score you achieve, re-jig your list of universities for the last time. This could take some time, and here you would need help from your mentor(s). Try to keep an extra university in the list, in case the application criteria of one of the others do not suit your liking.

7. Talk to current Indian students - Visit the websites of each of the universities you have finalized and go to their economics department page(s). Search for Current Graduate/PhD Students, and look for Indian faces. Their email IDs would most likely be mentioned over there. Contact them over email and ask them questions regarding the department, the university, campus life, living costs, etc. This is an imperative step. You would be surprised to know that first, most of these people would actually reply to your mails, and that second, they might give you information based on which you might want to back off from applying to the university(s) in question.

8. Recommendation letters - This is where your mentor(s) and previous professors step in. Catch hold of your mentor(s) and your professors who know you really well from your bachelors and/or masters and request them to submit recommendation letters for your candidature (recommenders need to be academics). Allow them some time to prepare the letters. You would be required to send at least 3 recommendations per application, so be ready with the combinations of your recommenders for each university. When you prepare the online application, each of these persons would receive a link on their email IDs through which they can submit your commendation.

9. Write your SOP - This is one of the most daunting tasks. It is even more important than your GRE score, because this document tells the admission committee why you might be more fit for the PhD programme than all the other applicants. Basically, you need to weave your life's story around economics and, without lying (of course!), present it in a manner which portrays the fact that most of your choices and experiences in life have moulded and prepared you towards the Economics PhD. You also need to mention briefly your intended area of research and also need to include similar research work that faculty members in the department(s) you are applying to might be carrying out, along with telling them why you wish to join the very university you are applying to. You can look at sample SOPs on the internet to get an idea (some examples are available here). This piece needs to be highly personalized and should be extremely unique, because this is essentially going to highlight your unique selling points. This document makes up for the fact that the application procedure does not include a technical interview. Take advantage of that, take as much time and as many revisions as needed, and produce the best ever version of your story on paper. Send your SOP to your mentor(s), to your professors, to your friends who might be studying in the US, and to your friends who are good at writing and editing. Ask for their inputs and include them in your edits. Do this multiple times before you freeze a version of the SOP. 

10. Get an International Transactions Debit/Credit Card - You would need a credit/debit card with international transactions switched on. It should not be anything other than Visa or MasterCard. You would need to make at least 3 transactions per application. It would also be advisable to open a savings account with a private bank if do not already have one, because dealing with public sector (government) banks for international transactions has a high opportunity cost in terms of time taken for grievance redressal. As of June 2019, Kotak Bank offers zero-balance accounts (called 811 accounts) which could be opened from your home (the representative comes to your place to verify all documents) and can be operated entirely from your smartphone or net banking (to the extent that I haven't ever visited my bank branch). Please be aware that this is not an endorsement; it is mentioned here only because it is one of the very few convenient options that I am aware of. Depending on when you read this post, there might be several other options which might be equally good or better than the one mentioned here.

11. Apply - To be considered for GTA, you would need to complete your applications before an early deadline, which usually varies from 15th Jan to 15th Feb (t) for most universities (for some it is as early as 1st Dec (t-1), so keep a tab on it). For each (online) application, you would need to fill out a form, upload documents like your transcripts, CV, and SOP, send link to your recommenders, pay the application fee, and submit the application. Apart from that, you would need to report official GRE and TOEFL scores from their respective websites to each university you are applying to. Both of these together cost around USD 50, bumping up the average cost of each application to USD 100 - USD 120, which is roughly INR 10,000. Keep following-up with your recommenders regarding their recommendation submissions (professors are usually a busy lot and sometimes require humble but multiple reminders). The entire procedure of the actual application can take up to a month (or even more), given that each application portal is different and that each university has nuanced application requirements. If you are applying to the IIMs/ISB as well, get done with them simultaneously. Ideally, your target must be to complete all the applications by the end of December (t-1) so that you play safe.

12. Offers - You should start receiving offers by mid-March (t). If your application was strong, most of these offers would include both a full tuition waiver and teaching assistantship with stipend (along with health insurance). Anything less than that would not be financially feasible. I suggest you use MIT's Living Wage Calculator to compare and see which of the offers would be financially best for you. However, don't forget to take into account the relative reputation of each of the departments you receive offers from. The procedure is that you first accept the GTA offer given by the economics department, then the Graduate School (admissions office) of the said university sends you a PhD admit offer with a full tuition waiver, and then you accept that. In case you receive multiple such offers, you can easily withdraw from one and accept a better one till 15th April (t) (this is a date agreed upon by the Graduate Schools Association of the US). Switching beyond this date involves risk. While switching, you simply need to send a mail to the department as well as the Grad School of the university mentioning the change in your plan. If you have to do this, try doing it before 15th April (t), not after the date. While accepting and/or choosing among offers, try to ascertain that you would be able to cover these costs from the offered stipend amount (for this, contact current PhD students at the universities and ask them those details). Be wary of universities that give you an M.A. + PhD offer (which means that your initial visa would be for an MA degree, that you would be an MA student for the first year, and that you would be given PhD student status only from the second year for which you would have to apply for a visa again). Be specially wary of schools that make this clarification only after you accept the GTA offer. This had happened with me, and it had led to a lot of administrative confusion; thankfully I had received a couple more offers which were much better than that one. In case you do not receive a good offer from the US, you must attend the interviews at the IIMs and ISB and try to crack them. For that, you must be prepared well with micro, macro, international econ, econometrics, and current affairs in the Indian economy.

13. ISFS Document - Once you have finalized and accepted an offer, the Grad School of the respective university would ask you to fill out a document called the International Student Financial Statement (ISFS). This is simply a declaration of the fact that you are capable of paying the student fees (not the expensive tuition, which would be waived for you). This is somewhere around $3000 per year. Although you would actually be paying this out of your stipend, the Grad School still wants proof of your capability to pay it for the first year. Fill up that form, and send it to them along with you bank statement with the requisite balance. Once the university accepts this form of yours, they will start processing your I-20 document.

14. I-20 Document - This is a document that is issued by the US Government along with your university. It states your purpose of being in the US, i.e. academics, and certifies you as a legitimate international student. A sample I-20 can be seen here. You need to be sure of the fact that under the FINANCIALS section of the document, the Scholarship and Teaching Assistanship field in the right hand column is not blank, and that the the Totals in both the columns are equal. The Personal Funds field in the right hand column denotes the amount of student fees that you would have to pay, so you would need to show proof of that much balance in your bank account during your visa interview (you would actually be paying that out of your stipend, but the American Embassy/Consulate doesn't consider future assistanship income as a source of funding). Depending on the university, they might or might not charge you a fee for shipping the I-20 document to you in India (usually between $50 - $100). You would receive this around 15 days after accepting the admit. Keep it safe and with utmost care, since this document is as important as your passport and visa. You would need to carry all these documents with you at all times when in the US. After receiving the I-20, you need to pay the SEVIS fee online (around $350), the link for which would be provided to you by your university.

15. Vaccination - Each and every state in the US has different vaccination requirements for incoming international students. As soon as you accept you offer, start inquiring with your university officials regarding the same. The entire procedure can take up to three months, since some vaccines are to be taken in multiple doses with a gap that ranges between 15 days to 3 months. Be particular about this, otherwise the same vaccines would cost you a fortune in the US. And without these certifications you would not be allowed to attend classes. Keep aside around Rs.10,000 for this purpose.

16. Practise cooking and living alone - Unlike in India, you wouldn't get inexpensive food from restaurants or wouldn't have it prepared for you by someone like a domestic help. Even the meals at the dining halls (the messes at the university campus) are expensive as anything. Same goes for household chores. Hence, you need to practise cooking for yourself and taking care of your household chores, and balancing all of this with academics and work. This kind of time management, unfortunately, is something we Indians are not used to, thanks to the extremely low labour wages of our domestic helps and campus employees. Thus, before you fly off to the US, stay alone and away from home for about 3 months and practise taking care of yourself. If you do not attempt this exercise, you would definitely have a hard time later on.

17. Indian Students Association - The next and one of the most important steps would be to get in touch with the Indian Graduate Students Organisation at your university. They are going to be your life line and support system in the US. Search for this organisation at your university's website and contact the current board members. Ask them all your burning questions. Ask them for help with housing and with transport from your arrival point in the US to the university campus. In case the university provides a bus service for the latter, the Indian Association would help you get access to it. And given that you would be entering a whole new country, it would be advisable to avail that service. Look at the dates at which the bus service is available and then book your flight ticket accordingly. The organisation's members (who are senior students at the university) would most probably be willing to host you initially, which is a breather because the alternative of staying at a hotel could be both costly as well as risky. Also, don't forget to ask them regarding Indian grocery stores in your town and how they procure Indian stuff on a regular basis, unless you plan to go entirely American in terms of your consumption!

18. Housing - Make sure that you sign a rent agreement (known as a lease in the US) for 12 months for the first year. This is because even though the academic year would end in 10 months (the duration of most leases in and around university campuses), you would need to take your comprehensive exams in the last two months and thus, would need housing for that duration as well. Trust me, you would NOT want to shift right before your comps, unless you wish to deliberately fail them. Ask current graduate students and representatives from the Indian Students Association of your university regarding when and how you should start looking for housing and what would be the appropriate time to sign a lease (i.e. before leaving India or after reaching the US). Also inquire regarding the type of housing that would be appropriate for you: (1) on-campus v/s off-campus; (2) leasing an entire house with your roommates' names on the lease with yours v/s leasing a room/bed without other people's names on the lease. These are important questions to ask and ponder on. I wish I knew about all this before coming to America! Caveat: Most current graduate students living in the US going from India are MS students whose preferences regarding housing maybe be starkly different from your needs and thus, they may provide their (honest) advice which may be not be appropriate for PhD students like you. So, it would be advisable to ask for peripheral information (like contacts of landlords/property managers etc.) from MS students, and for finer details (like choice of roommates and lease durations) from current PhD students at your university. In short, look for people who are likely to have utility functions similar to yours!

19. Dollars and ForEx/Travel card - You would need to carry a few thousand US dollars with you. Carry part of it as cash and the other part in a ForEx card. The latter is like a pre-paid coupon with some amount loaded on it and can be used as an ATM cum debit card without having a bank account in the US. Once you open a local bank account in the US, you can transfer the funds from the ForEx card to your bank account. You may want to add your ForEx card to your Uber, Lyft, Walmart, Amazon, etc. accounts before leaving for the US. It is better to be prepared than to be sorry!

20. Visa and Flight Ticket - PhD Students with full funding get a US visa with relative ease. Fill up the form called DS-160 with extra care, submit it, and book your interview appointment with the high commission/consulate (not any later than end of June (t)). You can find the detailed visa process here. The list of documents to be carried for biometrics can be found here, and that for the interview here and here (if you are applying for PhD and have received scholarship and a GTA offer, you would not require any documents related to loans or the CA). Attend the interview with a cool head. Once your visa is approved (which is on the same day as the interview), book your flight ticket to the US.

21. Doctor's prescription and medicines - Carry medicines for common ailments and for any other medical problems you might need medication for, along with valid prescriptions. These would come in handy during your travel to the US and during your initial months there till the time you get accustomed to the American healthcare system. Although you would most probably have access to health insurance thanks to your PhD offer, the American healthcare system is quite confusing and can take some time getting used to (you can find general details on the American Health Insurance System here on the Stanford website). Purchase only those medicines from India in the quantities that are prescribed by the doctor. You would need to show the prescription during immigration at your airport of arrival in the US. 

22. Communication - You would need your primary Indian phone number to be switched on throughout your travel and during your complete stay in the US, since most probably this number would be attached to several services like Aadhaar, banks, etc. Enquire with your carrier regarding how much it would cost you to keep your number working in the US on an annual basis such that you receive at least SMS alerts from India. During your flight to the US and for the initial period there, you might even require internet connection on your Indian SIM, so check that too. Once in the US, you would definitely need a local SIM card. However, be aware that purchasing communication services in the US is a little convoluted. Unlike in India, carriers in the US work only on certain phones. So you would have to check the compatibility and might have to even buy a new phone. Keep aside around $300 for that. Electronics in the US are cheaper than India and relatively easily accessible.

23. Stuff to pack - You could have a look at a couple of lists of things to pack here.

Surviving Econ PhD in the U.S.

Here is a good quick start guide on Econ PhD in the US: Shanjun Li's Phd Econ Resources

Here is an excellent website that provides free resources for PhD Economics: EconPhD.net

THE FIRST YEAR

One of my biggest observations was that apart from requiring good mathematical skills, the PhD programme consists of introducing 'uncertainty' in both microeconomics and macroeconomics in the first year. This is quite unlike undergrad or masters level economics. It makes sense because with an increase in the level of modelling the economy, economists try to get closer and closer to the real world which is full of uncertainty. This means that you need a good grip on probability and expectations and related concepts of statistics.

Here is some of my advice for acing the first year of PhD Economics in the US:

1. Study Carrel - Concentrating on your course-work or working in the shared office space provided to you along with your classmates is going to be pretty difficult because of all the chaos and distractions. Studying at home might also be troublesome because of noisy housemates. In the long-run, you need a place where you can study in peace and on your own terms. Try to find out if your university library has these small rooms called 'study carrels' which they can reserve for you. These are tiny rooms with desks and chairs that can house up to two persons. It is like a semi-personal office space that you an use for studying/working whenever you wish to throughout the day. You can also keep your personal belongings there since you are provided with a key to the carrel. And all of this is free of charge. But because this facility is usually limited, try to apply for it as soon as possible even though PhD students are given priority.

2. Consistency is key - Achieving excellence at any skill comes only with consistency. Acing microeconomics, macroeconomics, and econometrics requires you to study them and solve problems every week with a pre-designed schedule. Being inconsistent has pretty high costs.

3. Focus on comprehensive exams - For the most part, your focus must be to qualify your comprehensive exams for microeconomics and macroeconomics. Most schools usually give you qualifying grades for the initial two semesters so that you can prepare well for the comps, but don't quote me on this. It depends on the culture of the school. So, inquire (off-records) with senior PhD students in your economics department. Regardless, qualifying the comps should be your primary goal.

4. Grasp each instructor's psyche separately - Given that each course is going to be extremely instructor-specific, you need to really grasp every professor's thought process even before you attempt to understand their respective courses, especially for the ones that you would be taking comps for. Each of them would have a very different approach to the same material and would want you to learn a specific set of skills and techniques. Based on that, they frame and word questions on the comps. Don't be surprised to see radically different styles of questioning within the same comp if the component courses were taught by different instructors!

5. Study ahead - Trust me, the professors are going to be teaching at Godspeed, and you would definitely have 2-3 homework assignments to complete each week. And most of the problems on those assignments would be written by the professors themselves, so there would be no way to look for help from online resources. The only help provided to you would be by the TA of the course and the professor themselves. But do not approach them without attempting the assignments yourself or with general queries. Be as specific as possible so that they know that you have put in the effort to actually solve the problems. All this is going to be really hard. So make it easy by studying ahead. Contact your seniors before beginning the programme and ask for detailed course descriptions for each of the courses so that you can read prescribed texts beforehand and be ready for huge amounts of work being thrust in your face day in and day out.

6. Be reactive - Begin your homework and TA work as soon as it is assigned and finish it ASAP. These are the tasks that have deadlines that must be met. However, what is more important is your weekly (or rather, daily) review of all material including homework assignments, because this is the real deal; this is what  would help you master all course material. If you do not begin these urgent but relatively unimportant tasks (i.e. homework and, especially, TA assignments) as soon as you receive them, there is little time left for review, and before you know it, the comps would be upon you.

7. Fair it out - Once you submit your homework assignments, you would most probably receive solutions from your professors. Whether those solutions are lucid (the 'good' end of the spectrum) or excessively concise (the 'bad' end of the spectrum) depends entirely on the professor's teaching style and intent. Hence, it is imperative that you fair out each and every homework assignment after receiving its solutions. This is apart from attempting new assignments each week. This has two benefits. One, you get to correct your mistakes (trust me, there would be several). Two, having solutions to questions written in your own handwriting is extremely handy for revision/review right before exams. That is because many exam questions are based on homework assignments.

8. Previous exams - Your department would most probably make previous test papers (including all midterms, finals, and comprehensives) available to you at various points during coursework. If not, explicitly ask for those from your graduate director and keep reminding them until you actually obtain the test papers. Practise each previous midterm and final before the respective exams. And right after the first and second semesters end, dive in to previous comprehensive exam questions. Christmas break is a month-long and ideal break for you to cover comprehensive exam questions from the first semester. Do the same with the (relatively shorter) break after the second semester. Make sure to solve all of them to perfection. Be particular about this.

9. Get a Tutor from your Econ Department - Yes! Senior PhD students usually offer (paid) tutoring service especially for 1st year PhD students in economics. Apart from (or in retrospect, instead of) attending TA office hours in order to clarify queries that you may have, getting queries resolved with a personal tutor is highly recommended. This one is going to be the most effective tip when it comes to qualifying your comps. Of course you would need to budget for this purpose, but it would be an extremely healthy investment with a highly positive pay-off. You should contact the Grad Director of your economics department and ask for recommended tutors from the department. You could try out sessions with some of them before settling with a tutor who is most effective for your understanding. Holding weekly sessions with them throughout the first year would be the best. You could increase the frequency during breaks like Christmas and Spring. Often the problem isn't that you don't understand what is going on, but what and how each and every professor wants you to learn, especially from the point of view of the comps. Since grad school is highly instructor-dependent, having access to wisdom from a tutor who has survived the comps would be priceless. A caveat is that you shouldn't go for just any tutor in town but for one from within your department. 

10. Follow a routine - Doing household chores while pursuing a PhD is not an easy task. It is only through setting up a routine that you can decrease your workload. You don't want to be out of food right before an exam, or have no clean clothes to wear right before a discussion with your students. Try planning and preparing meals for the week (or for at least 3 days), and schedule laundry and cleaning so that you can be on autopilot and focus on the tasks that are more important.

11. Online groceries - It is a custom in the US (and many other Western nations) to buy groceries from supermarkets every week. Unlike in India, vegetables and fruits aren't sold in the US on carts on every street. It may be OK to buy packaged stuff once a month from supermarkets, but it costs a lot of time to make frequent visits to these stores to buy fresh fruits and vegetables (called 'produce' in the US) each week. This is because most of these supermarkets are massive and also because it is not certain that you would get a house near one of these stores. Thus, it would be costly (at least in terms of time) to make these frequent trips unless you own a car. The solution is to order everything online from options like Walmart, Amazom Prime Now, Instacart, etc. If you have a big chain Indian store like Patel Bros in your city, then you could even order Indian groceries online. Otherwise, you must try to strike a deal with your local Indian store for them to deliver to your doorstep. All this may cost a little more than usual in terms of money, but it would most probably fit your budget and would save you loads of time. Trust me, you will thank me later.

12. Cultural exchange - Try interacting with as many Americans as possible in order to better understand their culture. After all, if you join a PhD programme in the US, you would have to work according to the institutional setting of that nation for a long duration. One of the biggest challenges for international students (which, by the way, does hamper their academic performance) is accepting a completely different culture alongside studying and working as a TA in a new land. Search online for terminology and jargon used in American vernacular and try associating those terms with the words you already know, because this saves time in the long run. Sign up for something like a Family Friendship Programme of your university where they match you with a local American family for cultural exchange. You would be amazed at how much can be learned about a new culture even after several meetups. 

THE SECOND YEAR

1. Congratulate yourself - First of all, pat yourself on the back if you have made it to the second year of PhD Econ. Qualifying the comps is no joke and the devastating experience must be compensated for with at least a month's worth of break before the next semester begins!

2. Forget textbooks - Yep, now it's all about reading research papers, one after another. You will be bombarded with research articles to read each week in every course. This can be challenging because every author's writing style is different, and it takes a while to get a hang of it.

3. Choose electives wisely -  You may want to specialize in a sub-field of economics, but what matters more apart from your preference is whether the courses of your choice are on offer during your second and third years. This is when you will gain the tools required for conducting research in your specialization. In case your preferred courses are not on offer, you should have other preferences lined up so that you choose the second best option rather than the third or fourth best. Check out the course roster of your department and contact those professors whose PhD courses excite you. Ask them for their previous syllabi in order to gauge whether you would actually want to take those courses with those professors. And then, be clear about your preferences. Once you know which courses are on offer, it won't take you much time to finally choose. Inquire with your graduate director about how many specializations you are required to completed by the end of the PhD programme, what constitutes a specialization, and what paper work (if any) is required for it.

4. Technology - It would be extremely beneficial for you to invest in a really good quality laptop such as the Apple Macbook Pro (especially now that it comes with the highly efficient and world-leading M1 chip and its variants) for running heavy statistical analysis and a nice tab such as the Apple iPad Air/Pro for the purpose of note-taking and reading. It is perfectly fine if you prefer reading and writing on physical copies of books and journal articles, but be aware of two disadvantages: first, you would need to arrange for a printer to be able to frequently print material for yourself, and second, by the time you are done with your PhD, there would be much more physical material for you to carry and move around with than you actually can.

5. Statistical software - Arrange for yourself to learn some statistical software like R or Python (or STATA, but I would recommend the first two instead because they are open-source software) before you begin the semester. This is because none of the professors teaching economics courses would teach you how to use these software but will instead expect you to be experts at them. They will give you assignments that require several kinds of regressions to be run. If nothing works out, contact the Maths and Statistics department of your university and inquire if other graduate students are willing to tutor you. That should work well.

6. Research papers - Be ready to write full-fledged research papers in your 2nd year courses. Although the professors won't expect articles that can be submitted to journals right away, they want to push you into the river so that you can learn how to swim without a life jacket. 

7. Research questions -  You must practise coming up with new questions that every research article you read opens up. Try to list about 2-3 questions for each paper (with details such as the independent and dependent variables) and do some background research to see if the ideas are novel. Once you shortlist, try looking for datasets online that may be used for those research questions. Keep dumping these questions-cum-proposals into a document of some kind for future use. This will come in handy for writing papers for courses as well as will save time during your third year when you need to present a good quality paper and defend it in front of a committee.

8. Methods - Invest a good portion of your time learning methods that can help you establish causality in your research questions. A general causal question is something like, "How does changing X by one unit change Y?" One wishes to siphon off the effects of everything else on Y except that of X. Whether it is micro or macro that you are interested in, invest your time in not just learning these identification methods but also in looking for recent advances in them by searching for econometrics papers.

9. New Economics Papers - You can get email updates about new and exciting working papers about several sub-fields within economics using this wonderful (free) service from RepEc called New Economics Papers. Each list is curated by eminent researchers in their respective sub-field and they send a weekly update with a list of working papers in their area. This is a great way to keep abreast of the research going on in the sub-fields of your interest. I would highly recommend signing up for it.

10. Rapport - Apart from learning research methods and methodology and reading tons of papers, the second year is for you to engage with faculty members from your department outside of classes. Discuss your ideas and their feasibility and other details with as many professors as you feel comfortable with. Be clear about how many academics are required for your advising: principal advisor, co-advisor(s), and advising committee members. Ask your graduate director if you can have any of these from not just outside of your department but also from anywhere around the world. If yes, it can open up a lot of possibilities for building relationships with good-quality mentors. By the end of your second year, have a rough idea about your advising committee so that you can finalize it in the third year.

11. #EconTwitter - If you haven't already, create a professional Twitter account ASAP in order to receive the latest developments in various sub-fields of economics via #EconTwitter (click here to understand how hashtags work on Twitter). This is one of the most indispensable resources out there for economists around the globe. For instance, I got to know about and attended some great and independently-organized lecture series only via this hashtag. The economics community on Twitter is much more vibrant than on any other social media platform. See Anne Burton's Guide to #EconTwitter here (also refer to various related resources on slide 60). Yo can start with first following this bot on Twitter that automatically retweets all #EconTwitter tweets, and then following individual people from this feed that are aligned with your specific interests. This is how you can easily grow your economics network on Twitter. This network will be useful when you are on the job market. So being on #EconTwitter is a long-term investment of a little bit of time and effort.

12. Your Website - It is time for you to create a website for yourself that can act as an online portfolio for other researchers, prospective employers, peers, and the general public to get information about you from. Being present on several social media and not having a personal website that collates it all and presents an intimate version of you can be quite detrimental in the long run. You need to start small. Initially, there won't be any content for you to put up on a website and the idea will seem pretty stupid, and you would want to wait for more content to come your way for you to create your website. But try not to get caught in that web, because there is almost never a perfect moment for you to take the first step. No researcher in the world had all the content they have on their respective websites today on the first day itself, and neither did I. It is all about taking small steps in that direction. You can look at several other economists' websites to get an idea about what pages and sub-pages would suit your personal website, and you could also use mine as a possible template. Most researchers, such as myself, usually create their websites on Google Sites just because it is simple, intuitive, doesn't charge for hosting, and also because it doesn't charge extra for connecting your domain name with the website. However, several economists are now making theirs on github.io as well, so you might want to look into that. If you are looking for a super-simple website-making experience, try Weebly (but be aware that Weebly is better-suited for businesses than researchers). You can start with any of these platforms at zero cost.

THE THIRD YEAR AND BEYOND

1. Dissertation Committee - In most probability, you would be required to select one principal advisor (henceforth, advisor) and at least two committee members for your dissertation committee. This is a matching process which takes and time, and also requires you to have backup options in hand. Given the bunch of rudimentary research questions/ proposals that you would have prepared in the 2nd year and the interactions that you would have had with several faculty members from your department, try to figure out candidates for your advisor (and possibly, co-advisors, if your department policy allows for it). The candidates should match the field of specialization your questions fall within and should also care about the specific outcome variables that constitute your research questions. Propose to those faculty members that you would like them to be your advisor, and if they politely disagree, move on to the next available option. This is an accepted practice so you should not feel bad about either being rejected or moving on to the next one. Follow the same procedure for selecting committee members too. A caveat: apart from being a good researcher, your supervisors should be good human beings to the extent that I would weight it slightly more than the former. This is because you need to have a close relationship with them for a good part of your PhD (and beyond) and also because they will be the ones pushing you on the job market. You don't want people who can't resolve small differences with a cool head to be there on your committee.

2. Collaborations - It is highly advisable to enter into collaborations with other researchers for working on projects that will finally be part of your dissertation (maybe even your job market paper; but make sure that your advisory committee members are OK with such a setup for you). Some people collaborate with their advisors, but depending on what amount of load they are ready to take on, this setting may turn out to be burdensome for you. The idea behind collaborations at this stage is for you to share the load and also learn coding in the context of your applied method. In such a scenario, there is only one type of people who fit the bill: your peers. But I'm not talking about your cohortmates or your juniors. In particular, I'm talking about senior PhD students (in your department or others) and recently graduated PhDs or Postdoc students (from your department or others). Hence, networking is key for this purpose. However, before you decide to coauthor with such a person, be sure of the fact that they are willing to help you out with coding if you get stuck; this is crucial because often, one gets stuck at several points while coding but doesn't really know how to solve it. From my experience, generative AI like ChatGPT Plus can be helpful at times in situations like this but not always, because it is not easy to explain the nuanced context of your research project to an AI. Hence, network with your peers. 

3. Third Year Paper  - Try categorizing the bunch of research proposals that you have been curating into high-payoff, low-payoff, and nascent ideas. An advantage of this is that you will know which ideas to prioritize based on the motivation of the question and the availability of the data. Talk to your supervisors regarding this and try to move questions across the 3 categories and to finally narrow down on an idea for your third year paper. Start working on this research project during Christmas Break so that you have at least some results to show your supervisors in the Spring semester, based on which they can suggest changes to fine-tune your paper. Try to be particular about this because you need to present this paper at the end of the Spring semester of your 3rd year.

4. Systems vs Goals - Read this blog post by Paul Niehaus (an economist) and watch this video by Ali Abdaal (a productivity guru and a medical doctor) to understand the importance of following systems rather than running after goals. 

5. Teaching - Apart from being just a TA, seek out opportunities to become an Independent Instructor for different courses within your department. If not during the regular fall and spring semesters, at least teach one or two courses in the summer/winter terms in your entire PhD duration. You can also apply to other universities for teaching courses, which you may also find more lucrative than your department in terms of pay. The output that you need from these teaching stints are the evaluations your students would provide you with. Save these and your TA evaluations for when you get on the job market.