Ep. 123 - What is the BS in Quantitative Economics?

Economics is getting a glow-up at CSUSB. In this episode, Matt and Julian sit down with Dr. Daniel MacDonald, Professor and Chair of Economics, to unpack the new Bachelor of Science in Quantitative Economics and what it means for current and future students. From critical thinking, research, and career paths, this conversation shows why economics is more than charts and numbers. It is about asking big questions, analyzing the world around you, and learning how to think in ways that open doors. Whether you are econ-curious, exploring majors, or wondering how a degree can connect to real-world impact, this episode has plenty to chew on. 

Have questions? E-mail Dr. MacDonald at dmacdonald@csusb.edu. 

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Transcript

Matt Markin  
Well, hello and welcome back to the CSUSB Advising Podcast. This is Matt Markin along with 

Julian Trujillo  
Advisor Julian.

Matt Markin  
And on today's episode, Julian and I get to chat with Dr. Daniel McDonald, Professor and Department Chair of Economics, to tell us more about the Bachelor of Science in Quantitative Economics. Dr. McDonald, welcome back to the podcast. 

Daniel MacDonald  
Hey Matt. Good to be here again. Hi, Julian.

Julian Trujillo  
Hello, hello,

Matt Markin  
So for listeners, Dr. McDonald has been on the podcast before, previously talking about the BA in Economics, but that has now changed into the BS in Quantitative Economics. We're going to unpack all of that. What does that mean? What does that mean for you as a student, but before we dive into all of that. Tell us more about you and your journey in higher ed. What's your origin story?

Daniel MacDonald  
Oh, sure, yeah. What is my origin story? Well, first of all, thanks again, Matt, for having me on it's always great to be a guest on your podcast, and I love listening as well. So yeah, just thanks so much for the opportunity. So yeah, I mean, I live and breathe higher education, to be honest, it's changed my life very literally, and I haven't left it since I started college. I think that's the best sign that it's really been just so amazing for me. I enrolled at Seton Hall University after graduating high school, and I there I double majored in math and economics. I got my degree in economics and mathematics four years later. And right after that, I started a PhD program at University of Massachusetts, Amherst. And six years later, I got my PhD in Economics from University of Massachusetts Amherst. Shortly after that, I moved out to SoCal, and I started at CSUSB, so it's just been one after the other, especially public higher education. I just really love it. I love teaching. I like doing research. I like helping students succeed. It's pretty much my life. Higher education is a place for me where ideas and quality of thinking matter more than anything else. And I very much believe in the pursuit of truth, you know, I think especially in today's very complicated, uneven world. You know, the pursuit of truth is an important thing, if not the most important, to hold on to. It really gives you a kind of a guiding light to kind of hold on to something when you know everything else is uncertain. The pursuit of truth, which is what higher ed is all about, it gives you that you know that guiding light.

Julian Trujillo  
All right, perfect. Thank you for that information. Those are interesting experiences that you shared. And now, with that being said, you did a state that higher is kind of the light, right, opening up the view to life and the things that encompass that. For someone that doesn't know what economics is, or you say, Hey, I'm an econ major, or I'm interested in econ. I know there's lingua what not. But when someone that doesn't know what econ is, or economics specifically, students, how would you describe that to them? And how would you explain that give them an idea of what that is and how it functions with the world? 

Daniel MacDonald  
Yeah. I mean, that's, that's a great question, just thinking about, you know, what economics gives you in this whole process, right? Because I do think you know, the pursuit of truth is, ultimately what we in economics is all about. But I think also the exciting thing about it is that it is a debate. You know, you can have two Nobel Prize winners in economics disagree on something like the effects of minimum wage on employment or the effects of tariffs. Two very smart economists can look at, you know, the theory or the data differently and and come to different conclusions, they're still ultimately in pursuit of the truth, right? But so that's how I would describe economics. You're using theory, you're using data to understand just where are we right now, you know, where are we going if a politician is proposing some policy, right, or if a business wants to figure out what's the next decision to make, right? Economics can be used to evaluate those policies or decisions and to basically be figuring out, well, you know, is that politician right? Can I come up with some data or some theory to maybe counter that if I don't think that's right? And so that's really, to me, the exciting thing about economics is that, you know, it's, it's using this combination of theory and data. We'll get to this a little bit later, like, if you want to talk about, like, you know, misconceptions of econ majors and everything, but, yeah, that's ultimately what we're trying to do. So I think that's how I would respond.

Matt Markin  
And I guess let's kind of bring that to CSUSB. Let's talk. About this new degree program that you have. Can you tell us more about the BS and quantitative economics? Maybe the change from it going from you having a BA degree program to moving it BS, what can you tell us about it?

Daniel MacDonald  
Yeah, that's, that's a good question, Matt and it, it's a very important question to me. I started as chair of the department. This is my fifth year now being chair. And just, you know, being chair of a department like it's one thing to be in a department and teach classes and to be a faculty member, but to be a chair, you really see everything, right? You see all of the amazing work that all of the faculty are doing. You see all the amazing work that all of our students are doing, and you start to feel a real responsibility to them. And so to me, the Bs in quantitative economics, which is the program that we have starting in fall 2026 is literally it's just a recognition of all the amazing work that our students and faculty are already doing. So it's true like we're getting rid of the BA in economics and we're starting this BS in quantitative economics, but the courses are exactly the same. The concentrations in general, applied Mathematical economics. We'll talk a little bit about, you know, the different tracks later, I'm sure. But all of those are the same, so it's just really a recognition of the fact that, hey, we do great work here, and we want to recognize both our faculty and our students for that work. And that's what a BS does, right? Because it gives us a stem designation. When you go on CSUSB website now, and you you know, search for programs that you're interested in, there's a little filter for STEM we show up there now, right, because of this change to the BS. So it's just this recognition that like, Hey, we're kind of sitting on a gold mine here, and the Bs is just one more way of bringing that out and recognizing all the hard work that our students are doing in classes like, you know, things that they're doing, like linear modeling, operations analysis, policy evaluation, just critical thought, you know, all of these things we're already doing. And so the Bs in quantitative economics is just a recognition of, hey, when you go out on the job market. Now you've got a degree that's really going to speak volumes about what you're doing here. And I hope that it's just going to kind of pronounce that a little bit more.

Matt Markin  
And I guess kind of going into that, can you talk a little bit more about those concentrations or tracks?

Daniel MacDonald  
Sure, yeah. So we have the general economics if you just want an economics degree, you've got it. If you want something more on the business end, we have something called the Applied Economics track. This is very popular, because a lot of our students are coming from community colleges, and they've taken a semester of accounting, maybe even two semesters of accounting. Well, guess what those classes count towards your Applied Economics track. So you're getting a kind of a business econ degree. It's still an econ degree, but you've got that business side of it that's going to put you in competition for those kinds of jobs that are traditionally given to people that you know have a bachelor's in Business Administration. You can do that with econ. It opens those kinds of doors. It's our most popular concentration, actually, is the Applied Economics concentration. And then we have a Mathematical economics concentration within the BS and quantitative economics, which is for students that want to go on to like graduate school or really get some deep mathematical training. So take a couple more semesters of calc take linear algebra, do some programming. You're already going to do these things in our econ degree, but this gives you a little bit more of training for that. And our students become very competitive for master's programs and getting fellowships and things like that. So those are the kinds of things that that, the that we do in the in the different tracks, it really covers, I would say, all the bases that you need for an econ degree. And again, it's all headed under that BS in quantitative econ.

Julian Trujillo  
Sweet. Yeah. So I know you mentioned, you know, different things that students will be kind of learning in a class, the different concentrations of varying, the popular concentration they had was applied econ, correct?

Daniel MacDonald  
Yeah, that's right, yeah.

Julian Trujillo  
So what would a classroom kind of look like for like an intro class, and where is the class that I think students can end up realizing, you know what? This is something I want to pursue. What are the things that they kind of learn? I know you mentioned debating. There's data, things like that, and I guess you can kind of blend that with what skills can the students expect to gain from those classes?

Daniel MacDonald  
Sure, yeah, that's, that's a great point. Yeah, at CSUSB, we're really about, you know. Of learning by doing. I don't want to steal that. That's technically Cal Poly Pomona is like, motto is learning by doing. So I don't want to, like, steal that from them. But that's kind of what we do in our classes, too. It's very much hands on. You know, we're looking at graphs, we're looking at trends. We're constructing forecasts. We are debating. You know, for example, just this week, the Fed is going to meet and decide what to do about interest rates. It's always an amazing exercise that I give to my students. What do you think the Fed is going to do? Is it going to because it's very clear, you can raise interest rates, you can lower them, or you can keep them the same. So what are you going to do if you were in charge of the Fed, what would you do? And why? Right? Where do you think the economy is? Because that's ultimately why you're going to raise or lower interest rates. It's about, do you think the economy is healthy right now or not? And so I'll put charts on the board, and I'll say, you know, some economists think the economy is very healthy right now, and I'll have students snickering, you know, well, tell me why. Why do you think that's not true? So it's not just, you know, kind of sitting behind a computer and coding or doing math problems. It's really about talking about these things, right? Because the economy is something that we all live so it's something that you can talk about and practice, and you don't need to, you know, just kind of sit there and do math problems all day. It's funny because we did a survey of econ graduates a few years ago. So basically looking at all the alumni from our program and the top skill that they said their employers value in them was not necessarily data analysis or some special software or programming language. It was critical thinking. It was the ability to kind of think through things and understand, okay, you know, big picture, like, where are we? That's economics in a nutshell. It's not about some particular, you know, market or, you know, some particular, you know, forecasting technique or something. It's really that ability to just kind of think very broadly about a lot of things in the world.

Matt Markin  
And I like that you have kind of those discussions with students where it's like, tell me your opinion, but also back it up. Why do you have that opinion? You know? So definitely, kind of really developing those skills now, going from the BA to the BS. Do you still also have the minor in economics?

Daniel MacDonald  
We do, yeah, and it's not very well subscribed, but, and we're willing to work with students on what they want to get out of a minor, but basically we can work with you. You know, if you want a minor that's more geared toward the policy end of economics, right? We can do that if you want, like, you know, more of those kinds of hard skills. I've talked to some finance majors about picking up an econ minor because, you know, we have some linear modeling courses and some economic data courses that would really complement what they're doing over in their finance degree. So we can really work with you on kind of design it, and that's how the minor is set up. By the way, you've got maybe two or three classes you've got to take, but then after that, you've got nine credits. And just like, you know, again, whatever you want to do in econ, let's talk. Or, you know, we can, we can set something up. So we do offer that as an option if you want to kind of check things out and see whether econ, you know, might even if it's not your main thing that you want to do, whether you can still pick up something on the side.

Julian Trujillo  
Nice, yeah, that sounds like there's a lot of variety, like customization within the minor So, yeah, something good for students that maybe find out about econ later down the road, right? Maybe they can pick up a minor in econ, or even for the ones that started in one specific minor, I mean, major, and then they can probably transition to the Econ component. My next kind of question here is, I know you mentioned that there's kind of situations where in class, there's like, debates, things like that. Is there any events, bigger events, that other students can kind of watch or participate? Are there internships, things like that that can kind of expose students more for econ and kind of what it really is?

Daniel MacDonald  
I mean, we're a small department, but we definitely have things going on, I like to say we're kind of like, you know, the best kept secret at CSUSB for now anyway, because we are doing a lot of things, there's a lot of buzz in the department, but because we're kind of small, you know, so, so one thing we've got summer research. Last summer, one of our junior faculty just did a really great summer research project with three of our students on the relationship between capitalism and public health. So looking at another one of these big issues, you know, how does our economic system interact with health care or, you know, labor markets or unions. And that was really cool. Also that that particular junior faculty is continuing to work with students. They're even publishing a paper together. So that's pretty exciting. Give you something to put on your resume. I mean, not just something, right? We've got a club Economic Impact Network that started by one of our previous students, one of our one of our graduates, Tristan folds, who did an amazing work to set this club up. And one of the most exciting things that's come out of that is that we've got an internship pipeline with ASI. So ASI has hired two of our majors to look at some election data and some event participation data from ASI, and what they're doing is they've got student level data. So they've got data on all the students that participated in an ASI election, or all the students that participated in these ASI events, and they've got this data over years. So I just talked with one of my students doing doing this project earlier. They work in the ASI office, and they're basically analyzing trends in participation, in event participation, in election participation, by college of major or by, you know, some simple data stuff. But it's, it is student level data. It's all anonymized, by the way, so they don't know anything about these you know the actual identity of these students, but they're basically making a report. They're both putting together a report, and they're going to present it to the ASI Board of Directors in May. So it's a really cool internship program. It just started this spring. I'm very excited to see what these students are able to find. And, yeah, they're kind of acting kind of like, what I like about it, going back to what we were talking about earlier, Julian about, like, different careers and different skills that the students can can pick up from the degree. One of the one of the hottest fields that econ majors go into is consulting, which basically like, what is consulting? Well, it's pretty much, you can do what you want. You can consult for law firm, consult for governments, right? And you're basically what you're doing is you're advising these people, law firms or governments. It's like an expert witness or subject matter expert on something that you know, you know a lot about, and they want to know about. So it's this really kind of high energy kind of relationship, and that's basically what these students are doing for asi. So it's um, it's, yeah, it's called the EIN Economic Impact Network ASI internship pipeline. We've got two students that are working on it right now. It's an unpaid internship. They're getting course credit for it, three credits each, and, yeah, it's just another thing that we're doing.

Julian Trujillo  
I have a quick follow up with that, when would be a good timeline for a student to consider looking into an internship, whether they're econ students. Do they have to be con students or not, or a minor like, when would be a good time that you think a student should consider? Okay? I think I'm ready to start looking internships.

Daniel MacDonald  
Well, the earlier that you start looking, I think, is just you get that experience. Because honestly, part of the work of getting an internship is just going through the experience, applying to places, talking to places. But I would argue that, you know, in general, the start of the spring term, because there are a lot of summer internships. For example, you know, county like, 50% of econ majors work in the public sector, 50% and there are a lot of, like, local government internship opportunities, you know, at like, with a supervisor, so, like, a district supervisor's office, or even in your own city, every city has its own economic development department, and they employ interns, you know, not all the time, but maybe one or two. We just had a career fair at SBS, and Moreno Valley was advertising for a paid student intern at their economic development office. So every city has an economic development office, and it's one opportunity for econ majors. We've had several work in economic development offices, but yeah, any kind of, you know, county government or economic development agencies, you know, they have summer interns, and that's a great time to look. But yeah, I mean, really, just, you know, getting the experience of looking and talking to people, I think, you know, you can start that whenever.

Matt Markin  
yeah, and they're definitely able to apply what they're learning in their classes and put it into practice with this and it's so timely and relevant as well. Now, earlier, you were mentioning misconceptions, and I was ready can talk a little bit more about that, of maybe misconceptions that not just students, but anyone might have when they hear. Your economics, sure.

Daniel MacDonald  
Yeah. And I would love to hear from you guys too. You know, maybe you have some inside scope. Maybe you hear from students that are like, I don't want to do econ because I'm x right? So, yeah. I mean, it's true. There are some misconceptions. I think probably the biggest one that I was thinking of like as I was coming in today, is how econ majors are thought about as being kind of conservative. So politically, you know, they're like free market, or, you know, they're more likely to be Republican. But just to go back to something I was saying earlier, you know, you can have two very smart economists disagree on things, right we have there are Nobel Prize winning economists that believe that the minimum wage is a good thing for workers, that it doesn't have bad effects on the economy. Right? They've actually like, they've done some very deep statistical research to find this. So you can be right. You can you can be anywhere politically and and engage, you know, economics majors, a lot of one of the things I hear from a lot of econ majors is that they want to change the world. And, you know, you don't have to be, you know, someone politically conservative to want to change the world. Especially in our department here at CSUSB, I think you would find a real home if you're looking for alternative economic ideas and how to put those into practice. You know, our economics department teaches and does research on health economics, feminist economics, Markin economics, right? There are all different approaches to econ. It's a very diverse field. It's a very pluralistic field. Again, what unites us is really, you know that that that Guiding Light of wanting to know the truth right, and wanting to help people to I think so our students are the same way. You know. We've got students that, you know, just love to debate and argue and so getting those kinds of ideas, that's, that's what, really, what our department is all about. And, yeah, absolutely do not, you know, discount yourself if you're a little bit more on the progressive side, or even if you are a little bit more on the free market side, you've definitely have a home in economics, and it's a very diverse field. So what about you guys? Do you hear? I don't want to put either of you on the spot, right? But if you have anything, you know, I would love to hear it, and then maybe I can respond, or maybe I just won't respond.

Matt Markin  
I think the one thing I'll say is, you know, I think it's, it's and what's good about us working with you, you being on the podcast today is to give this information out about economics and address like the career question, the what it's all about, what they're learning their classes. Because I think, let's say, a high school student applying to CSUSB, they may not have taken an economics class in college, or it may have been only a one semester requirement in their senior year, and they're just like, I'm ready to just graduate from high school. And you know, when they get to orientation, they might hear from other friends or the students they meet that are in different majors, or they might hear information that they hear in movies or in TV shows, or they just, you know, read online about what they think economics is so. And I think it goes back to the finding the truth and things like this, can give that information out, right?

Daniel MacDonald  
Yeah, I think you're right, you know, whatever kind of conceptions you have of it from a high school course economics is very exciting. You know, one of the things that we've always prided ourselves on is we have very high satisfaction rates coming out of our program. So students are very happy by the time they leave. You know, it's they probably didn't expect, you know, or know what they were really getting into, you know, until they get an email from a professor saying, hey, why don't you try this out? You know, why don't you try majoring in econ? You know, it seems like you're really excited about this stuff, or you're really doing a great job, and then all of a sudden it turns out, oh, wow, this is actually pretty cool. So, yeah, I think you're right that those are, you know, the surprise factor, I think is something that comes up with econ a lot. 

Julian Trujillo  
One of them had been, in my experience, kind of relating to the high school experience. You know, I did take this class years ago in my senior year, and I think reflecting now, it was a professor that I liked class, that I like the content that I liked, but there's not a lot that I remember. And I do remember that we're kind of discussing a bit of like taxes and doing things like that in class. But now, like in current time, I wish that I could have gotten more of that content right to help me in my current situations and my current life, my current point. But now kind of moving into a scenario where you imagine self, maybe in an elevator right walking down the hall with the student or someone that. Kind of important. How would you pitch this, this major, to a student?

Daniel MacDonald  
Oh, okay, so someone who's not an economics major, and you just kind of want to help, kind of try to convince them, you know, to try it out. Well, yeah, so I would say, like, in an elevator, kind of pitch situation, you've got like, 30 seconds. I mean, these days the SBS elevators are taking forever, but maybe a little bit longer, but yeah, I would say with with a degree in economics, you can do anything. You know, 50% of economics majors work in the public sector. Economics majors can be found in banking, environmental policy, labor unions, health care, logistics, many important fields, what ultimately matters with econ, what sets you apart right from others is not necessarily what you know, but it's how you think about things. Right? We've got sports economists, right? Economists that literally analyze statistics for baseball or basketball and, you know, and try to, you know, give information about salaries, or, you know, what the market is like. Marketing research is done by economists because they have the data skills right to analyze and model different pricing scenarios and different strategies. So it's really, you know, we're just kind of giving you some tools, and we're saying, try to figure out, you know, figure out the problem, right? So it's, it's about how you think, I still remember, you know, think about advisors and everything. The first time I was advised in college at Seton Hall was when I went to my summer orientation, and I actually got to speak with my department chair, and I remember he was just talking to me, and he learned that I was a math major and an economics major, and he was just saying economics when it comes to the different terms like opportunity costs and taxes. You can learn all that in one semester. What really sets you apart as an econ major is your ability to just think more broadly about the world, and train you to do that. So that's, that's probably a little bit longer than the typical elevator pitch, but that's what I would say.

Matt Markin  
Love it, yeah. I mean, I just like that. A lot of what they're learning, it's, it's a broad major that can go into so many different paths that they may not think about and hopefully listen to this, it broadens their horizons, broadens their mind on what they can actually do. And maybe they might consider, hey, let me switch my major. Or maybe they're an incoming student that's listening to this, and maybe they want to now declare this when they apply to CSUSB. But thank you so much for being on the podcast. I'm always learning something new from you.

Daniel MacDonald  
Yeah, thanks. Bad. I always learned a lot from you guys, too, so I and I appreciate all the work that you guys are doing. So yeah, I just think, thanks for the opportunity. And you know you've got my email if you have any questions, I'm always happy to talk or respond to students. I've got long email threads with with students from the past. So I love engaging with students and answering any questions that anybody might have. So yeah, just thanks for the opportunity.