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How should trade be managed to promote both social welfare and the interests of workers and firms? How should merger policy be managed to balance the interests of merging firms and others that share the industry? How should financial markets and financial instruments be designed to promote economic stability and growth? If your first degree isn't in economics, or your economics training doesn't provide sufficient experience for our MSc courses, MA Economics may be for you.

What will a post COVID-19 world look like? Can you predict when the economy will recover? How will we adapt to overcome the challenges posed by pandemic uncertainty? Economics isn't optional to study right now: it's vital to our future well-being in a post COVID-19 world.

At Essex we push the frontiers of accepted wisdom, critically examining the decisions of individuals, the strategies of firms, and the policies of governments to understand and challenge the standard paradigms of economics. Our popular Masters in Research course (MRes) provides you with a stimulating route into PhD studies, and develops the expert research mind-set required for a high-profile job in finance or business, if you want to work in the private sector after your degree.

This course is available for both October and January entry. Our four-year PhD Economics (with research and communication skills) course has been designed to support students who do not have English as a first language.

Our three-year pathway in the Department of Economics for the PhD economics degree gives you the chance to ask difficult questions, break intellectual boundaries and create new solutions to issues of global concern. You work closely with our creative and committed academics - researchers who are pioneering new solutions to these issues, inspiring your own research.

Our four-year integrated PhD Economics follows the MRes Economics programme for year 1 before beginning the PhD study programme within the department in year 2. Our four-year pathway in the Department of Economics for the PhD economics degree provides you with training to develop the research mind-set for PhD studies and gives you the chance to ask difficult questions, break intellectual boundaries and create new solutions to issues of global concern.

How do investors make their decisions? How do firms arrange their finances? Our MA Financial Economics is designed for those whose first degree isn't in economics but who want to understand the financial aspects of economics in greater depth.Are you particularly interested in the financial aspects of economics? Do you want answers to questions such as, what drives stock prices? How should assets be allocated among a portfolio of possible investments? How do international financial markets work? Is it true that they suffer from systemic risk? If so, welcome home.

Are you interested in finance and its economic foundations? The emphasis of our MSc Financial Economics is on the ways that economic reasoning can inform and illuminate the financial decision-making of investors and the financial choices made by firms.

How do firms choose which markets to enter? How should contracts be designed to maximize incentives? Our MA Financial Economics is designed for those whose first degree isn't in economics but who want to understand industrial strategy, management as well as core economics in greater depth.

Discover the problems that face the developing world through a variety of perspectives. Our MA International Development explores the most pressing issues in international development throughout a range of social scientific standpoints.