Economics Honours (B.A.) (42 credits)
Offered by: Economics (Faculty of Arts)
Degree: Bachelor of Arts
Program credit weight: 42
Program Description
The Honours Economics program (B.A. and B.Com.) consists of 30 specified credits of Honours courses and a further 12 credits of approved Economics courses.
Continuation in the Honours program from one year to the next requires a minimum grade of B- in ECON 250D1 Introduction to Economic Theory: Honours./ECON 250D2 Introduction to Economic Theory: Honours. and a minimum B- average in required and complementary Honours economics courses. Students failing to meet these requirements must switch out of the Honours program. If they continue to register in Honours, they will not be allowed to graduate with Honours. Note that graduation with Honours has more stringent requirements (see below) than these.
To be awarded an Honours degree, a student must obtain a 3.00 GPA in the required/core courses, a 3.00 average in the required and complementary credits in Economics, and a CGPA of 3.00. For a First Class Honours degree, the minimum requirements are a 3.50 program GPA in the required courses, a 3.50 average in the required and complementary credits in Economics, and a CGPA of 3.50. Students also have to meet the requirements of the Faculty of Arts for Honours and First Class Honours. In cases where a student takes a Supplemental Exam in a course, both the original and the Supplemental Exam grades will be counted in the calculation of the GPA and CGPA averages.
All Honours students are required to see an Honours advisor and also consult the Honours and Joint Honours programs available on the Department's website: http://www.mcgill.ca/economics/undergraduates/honours. For the current list of advisers in Economics and their advising times, see the Department of Economics' website.
Degree Requirements — B.A. students
To be eligible for a B.A. degree, a student must fulfil all Faculty and program requirements as indicated in Degree Requirements for the Faculty of Arts.
We recommend that students consult an Arts OASIS advisor for degree planning.
Note: For information about Fall 2025 and Winter 2026 course offerings, please refer to Visual Schedule Builder. A technical issue is causing the "Terms offered" field to incorrectly report "this course is not currently offered" for many courses in the Course Catalogue.
Program Prerequisites (0-10 credits)
For entering this program:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| MATH 133 | Linear Algebra and Geometry. 1 | 3 |
Linear Algebra and Geometry. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Systems of linear equations, matrices, inverses, determinants; geometric vectors in three dimensions, dot product, cross product, lines and planes; introduction to vector spaces, linear dependence and independence, bases. Linear transformations. Eigenvalues and diagonalization. | ||
| MATH 140 | Calculus 1. 2 | 3 |
Calculus 1. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Review of functions and graphs. Limits, continuity, derivative. Differentiation of elementary functions. Antidifferentiation. Applications. | ||
| MATH 141 | Calculus 2. 2 | 4 |
Calculus 2. Terms offered: Summer 2025 The definite integral. Techniques of integration. Applications. Introduction to sequences and series. | ||
- 1
Or equivalent (to be completed prior to U2)
- 2
Or equivalent
Required (core) Courses (30 credits)
Please refer to the Department's document "Rules on Stats Courses for Economics Students" available at: http://www.mcgill.ca/economics/undergraduates/courses/. Students who have taken equivalent statistics course may be waived the ECON 257D1/ECON 257D2 requirement. These students will normally be required to take ECON 469 in addition to ECON 468.
Normally, ECON 250D1/ECON 250D2 is taken in the U1 year, ECON 353 and ECON 354 are taken in U2, and ECON 450 and ECON 452 are taken in U3. ECON 257D1/ECON 257D2 can be taken in U1 or U2; and ECON 468 can be taken in U2 or U3.
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 250D1 | Introduction to Economic Theory: Honours. | 3 |
Introduction to Economic Theory: Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. An intermediate level microeconomics course. Includes theory of exchange, theory of consumer behaviour, theory of production and cost curves, theory of the firm, theory of distribution; general equilibrium and welfare economics. The assumptions underlying the traditional neo-classical approach to economic theory will be carefully specified. | ||
| ECON 250D2 | Introduction to Economic Theory: Honours. | 3 |
Introduction to Economic Theory: Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. See ECON 250D1 for course description. | ||
| ECON 257D1 | Economic Statistics - Honours. | 3 |
Economic Statistics - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Stochastic phenomena; probability and frequency distributions, introduction to probability theory. Statistical inference about proportions, means and variances; analysis of variance; nonparametric statistics; index numbers and time series; economic forecasting; regression and correlation analysis; introduction to general linear models, its uses and limitations; uses and misuses of statistics. | ||
| ECON 257D2 | Economic Statistics - Honours. | 3 |
Economic Statistics - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. See ECON 257D1 for course description. | ||
| ECON 353 | Macroeconomics - Honours 1 . | 3 |
Macroeconomics - Honours 1 . Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Basic macroeconomic theory, emphasizing the Classical and Keynesian ideas for the short-run determination of output, employment, interest rates and prices in the economy. | ||
| ECON 354 | Macroeconomics - Honours 2. | 3 |
Macroeconomics - Honours 2. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Elements of international economics, money and banking and growth theory. The structure of the Canadian economy. | ||
| ECON 450 | Advanced Economic Theory 1 - Honours. | 3 |
Advanced Economic Theory 1 - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Selected topics in economic theory from recent periodical and monograph literature. | ||
| ECON 452 | Advanced Economic Theory 2 - Honours. | 3 |
Advanced Economic Theory 2 - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Selected topics in economic theory from recent periodical and monograph literature. | ||
| ECON 468 | Econometrics 1 - Honours. | 3 |
Econometrics 1 - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The statistical basis of econometric modelling and treatment of the linear regression model; simple time series models; procedures for inference in linear cases; an introduction to methods for dealing with endogeneity and non-constant variance. | ||
3 credits from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| ECON 460 | History of Thought 1 - Honours. | 3 |
History of Thought 1 - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The evolution of economic thought prior to the close of the 19th century, as reflected in the writings of prominent economists from the time of Adam Smith to the emergence of marginalism and neoclassical economics. | ||
| ECON 461 | History of Thought 2 - Honours. | 3 |
History of Thought 2 - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The evolution of economic thought in the 20th century, as reflected in the writings of prominent economists on equilibrium, dynamics, games, expectations, econometrics, industrial structure, economic policy and other primary areas of interest. | ||
| ECON 469 | Econometrics 2 - Honours. | 3 |
Econometrics 2 - Honours. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Treatment of asymptotic theory and classical inferential procedures, an introduction to the bootstrap, maximum likelihood, non-linear models, mis-specification testing, non-stationarity and limited dependent variable models. | ||
Complementary Courses (12 credits)
Complementary courses are usually taken in U2 or U3.
12 credits of Economics courses at the 300, 400, or 500 level, approved by an Honours adviser. Unless explicitly approved by the Honours advisor, at least 9 of the 12 credits have to be at the 400 or 500 level. Note that Honours students are not permitted to register for majors or general Economics courses where an Honours or a more advanced undergraduate course in the same subject is offered.