Economics is the Evergreen Subject which has high demand at both the national and universal levels because of its utility in our day-to-day life. The economics field is very much interesting which offers a variety of subjects in it.
Students who are interested in business, finance and management should go higher studies in economics field. Economics subject, particularly in India has attained a lot of recognition and undergraduate courses have seen increase in number of applicants. Economics Honours have become one of the topmost courses of reputed universities like Delhi University. It is known to all that economics is a versatile subject and have branches in almost every sector/field. The biggest confusion in students is to choose between Economics Honours and Business Economics. In this article we’ll be comparing these two very popular courses in India.
BA (HONS.) ECONOMICS
This is an undergraduate course with time duration of 3 years. The program in economics has been designed to train the students in precisely understanding the workings of various economic systems. This course has more of theoretical knowledge rather than practical. The main subjects of the course are MME (Mathematical Methods of Economics) and Statistics. The course is full time and semester based. The general way of getting admission in this course is by cut-offs released by different universities i.e. Merit based.
ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA
You must have completed your class 12th with more than 50-60% from any recognized board like CBSE, ICSE, or state board. Some colleges have made economics as the main subject compulsory, and for meeting eligibility criteria for some universities like Delhi University you must have maths have one of the subjects in high school. Generally, you get admission on basis of merit but some colleges conduct their own entrance exams.
COURSE FEE
The annual course fee of a BA (Hons) Economics in any one of the reputed colleges of India can range anywhere between Rs. 10,000 – Rs. 1,50,000. The average course fee would differ from college to college subject to different factors such as ownership of the institution, the popularity of the course and college, and much more. There is an undeniable difference between fees of public institutes and private institute. In public institutes fee can be as little as Rs. 8000 annually.
Right Skill = Bright Future
SYLLABUS
For first-year, you have subjects like MME (Mathematical Methods of Economics), Introductory Microeconomics, and Introductory macroeconomics with some subjects like data analysis. In the second year, you get further portions of MME, Microeconomics, and Macroeconomics along with Statistics and econometrics as added subjects. In the final year, you get subjects more related to financing and business-like Economic Development of India, Financial Economics and Financial Markets as well as Foreign Economics.
CAREER OPTIONS AND JOBS
Due to the very practical and skillful nature of this course, there are job opportunities for economics graduates in almost every field/department, but you have more openings in the public sector. Some areas of employment are – Finance and Banking Sectors, public/government sectors, economic researcher, agricultural sector, commercial sector and many more. Some job profiles you can get as an economics graduate are – Economists, Sales executives, Budget analysts, operations managers, financial analysts, and government like Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Economic Service (IES), and Indian Statistical/Finance Service (IFS).
BSC ECONOMICS
Bachelors of Science in Economics or BSc. Economics is a full-time 3 years undergraduate course. This course is best suited for students who studied science in their +2, as the course has a background of the subjects of science stream. Admission to the program will be based on merit, i.e., on the basis of the candidate’s marks in the class 12 examination. However, there are some colleges that offer admission to this program on the basis of the candidate’s performance in the entrance examination. The course would help the students to learn the importance of economic development and the ways it needs to be practiced in various sectors such as the conservative use of natural resources, consumption of goods and services in the best possible way, maintenance of the equilibrium of demand and supply in the market, etc.
ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA
Right Skill = Bright Future
COURSE FEE
The course fee ranges from 50000 to 100000 per annum. There is a lot of difference in the fee charged by private and public universities or colleges. The fee for public universities is generally less as compared to private ones.
SYLLABUS
In this program, students study the subjects of Mathematics and Statistics at an advanced level. This program emphasizes more on practical knowledge and less on theoretical and so there are more practical activities as compared to other economics courses.
This course includes topics like Indian Economy, Statistics, Mathematics for Economics, Law and Economics Theory, Research Methodology, Introductory Econometrics, Primary and second research, and many more. As you can see there are more research topics to explore the field in a real environment.
CAREER OPTIONS AND JOB
A graduate in Economics can easily get numerous entry-level jobs in Banking, Finance, Insurance, Stock Markets, Sales and Marketing and also in corporations such as consulting firms or govt. organizations. Economics field graduates have a vast options and opportunity specifically in public sector as compared to private sector. Some of the popular working areas for Economics Graduate in an organization are: Educational Institutes, Finance and Banking Sector, Stock Exchanges, Transformation Centres and you always have option to appear for variety of government exams like UPSC, Baking exams, RRB Exams and SSC to secure highly paid jobs under government sector.
CONCLUSION
I hope that I have included all relevant and important points required to draw comparison between these two courses. And believe that you’ll get a fair idea about both these similar courses.
By: Nupur Bhagat
