Economics (BS)

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

Economics is the study of how people choose to use resources. Economics is a way of thinking, and students can apply this way of thinking to nearly any aspect of the world. The undergraduate curriculum in economics is designed to:

• provide a firm grounding in modern economic theory;
• instill the capacity for independent thought about economic policies and problems;
• develop the capacity for quantitative research, and
• provide basic descriptive knowledge about the US and the world economy.

An undergraduate major in economics opens many possibilities for employment. Many large firms, including banks, other financial institutions, and manufacturing companies, accept economists in substantial numbers. There are also many opportunities for employment in government at the state, federal, or international levels. In addition, a growing number of research and consulting firms employ large numbers of economists in such areas as forecasting, industry analysis, and litigation.

An undergraduate economics training also provides excellent preparation for business school, the study of law, or for pursuing doctoral studies in economics, business and public policy. 

A typical undergraduate major in economics has three choices to concentrate. First, they can either choose to focus on general curriculum in economics, or they can choose to concentrate on data science. Alternatively, they can choose one of the BUS major concentrations.

Concentrations

General Curriculum

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The General Curriculum in Economics consists of at least 6 units of 3000-4000 level (upper division) ECON courses plus 15 units of any upper-division courses.

Accounting

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The accounting concentration prepares students for careers in public accounting (tax, audit and advisory), private industry, government, and not-for-profit organizations. Faculty build curriculum with the industry in mind to give students a thorough knowledge of accounting and tax laws along with the confidence to use those skills in leading a business toward success. The program is built upon a commitment to career readiness that empowers students to Learn by Doing through working with clients, tackling complex tax cases, and serving the community.

Consumer Packaging

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The Consumer Packaging Concentration presents an ideal pathway for business majors seeking entry into the dynamic packaging field — a rapidly evolving industry driven by global manufacturing expansion and intricate customer-supplier relationships. Innovative strategies in value chain management, product development, and packaging technology have facilitated these shifts.

By blending technical packaging courses with marketing and entrepreneurship curriculum, the program teaches students how to conceptualize packaging designs that meet customer needs and validate designs with data and customer insights. Our Learn by Doing curriculum will help students gain familiarity with packaging materials and related test equipment in addition to qualitative and quantitative marketing analysis practices.

As the only packaging program within a business school, the Cal Poly Packaging Program has earned a national reputation for excellence while maintaining small class sizes. The world’s leading technology companies, agricultural producers and marketers, and retail ventures seek Cal Poly’s packaging alumni to fill dynamic roles in designing, developing, and testing. The Learn by Doing curriculum challenges students to create value-added, sustainable packaging that contains, protects, and markets highly competitive consumer products in an increasingly globalized economy.

Economics for Data Science

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

Emphasizes the skills needed to analyze market data in fast-paced industries such as manufacturing, financial services, and advertising, and provides the technical training required to engage in consulting. There is also a continued need for quantitative analysis by lawyers, accountants, engineers, health service administrators, urban planners, and local, national, and international government agencies. The concentration prepares students for jobs that entail forecasting, data analysis and quantitative economics, and provides a solid foundation for graduate study in economics and business.

Entrepreneurship

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The goal of the Entrepreneurship concentration is to empower students to create economic and social value either for a startup or as part of a high-performing entrepreneurial team within an existing organization. Students in the Entrepreneurship concentration will acquire the tools, develop the skills, and cultivate the mindset of an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurship concentration comprises a carefully-curated set of required and elective courses, leading to a hands-on, balanced and interdisciplinary approach to entrepreneurial leadership that is applicable in for-profit and non-profit contexts; local and global settings; and service-, product-, or technology- based companies.

Financial Management

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The Finance Area offers Financial Management (FM) and Real Estate Finance (REF) concentrations. Both provide a rigorous, coherent, real-world, and up-to-date curriculum to prepare students for rewarding careers. The FM concentration is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA®) Institute Affiliate Program and a CFP® Board Registered Program, enabling our students to pursue both designations. Finance is a diverse and rapidly evolving field that encompasses a wide range of career paths—from managing corporate finance and advising individual clients to building models for global investment firms and developing technology-driven financial solutions. To help students better prepare for the demands of the modern finance industry, the FM concentration offers three optional specializations focusing on Financial Analytics, Financial Management, and Financial Planning and Wealth Management.

Information Systems and Analytics

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The Information Systems and Analytics (ISA) Concentration prepares students to enter the exciting world of information technology in business. Students learn to integrate key ISA concepts and technologies through coursework in database systems, application development, systems analysis and design, infrastructure and security management, and business analytics. The ISA faculty develop students for professional careers by focusing on teamwork, strong interpersonal skills, turning theory into practice, and employing state-of-the-art technologies in the classroom. ISA graduates are in high demand by recruiters because of their ability to apply an understanding of technology to problems while maintaining a focus on the business context. ISA graduates enjoy exciting career opportunities as analytics specialists, social media and web application developers, business consultants, IT infrastructure designers, business analysts, project managers, and data/database administrators, among many others.

Management and Human Resources

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus and Allan Hancock College

The Management and Human Resources (MHR) concentration prepares students for general leadership and management positions, and careers in more specific Human Resources (HR) positions. The HR portion of the curriculum prepares students to hit the ground running as an HR generalist and in specific HR functions such as recruitment, staffing, compensation and training and development. The Management portion of the curriculum prepares students for entry-level leadership and management positions, such as management training programs in large corporations, management consulting, and managerial positions in family businesses and other small organizations. Students will develop management skills such as leadership, organizational design, development, and change, global management, and negotiation.

Marketing Management

Real Estate Finance

Offered at: San Luis Obispo Campus

The Real Estate Finance concentration provides a program of study that focuses on emerging trends and issues in real estate markets. Students in the Real Estate Finance concentration learn to apply finance, economics, and computational techniques to real estate markets and projects with the major goal of producing rigorous price and investment analysis. In addition to quantitative methods, students are exposed to institutional details and current practice of the real estate industry through case study classes, industry guest speakers, field trips, professional licensing, and real estate competitions. The program prepares real estate professionals for private and public sector jobs in fields such as real estate brokerage, acquisition analysis, property appraisal, residential and commercial development finance, corporate asset management, mortgage lending, and real estate capital markets.

Program Learning Objectives

1. Apply economic reasoning to evaluate everyday problems.
2. Demonstrate correct use of economic analyses to evaluate specific business proposals, economic policy proposals and current events.
3. Recognize the role of assumptions about the structure of the economy as well as ethical assumptions in arguments made for and against economic policy issues.
4. Describe how to use empirical evidence to evaluate an economic argument.
5. Summarize statistical methodology and interpret statistical evidence.
6. Conduct appropriate statistical analysis of data, and explain the statistical problems involved.
7. Communicate effectively about specific economics issues.
8. Identify and examine diverse perspectives when evaluating business, economic and social policy reform.
9. Utilize the tools of economics to evaluate economic and social policies based on equity, efficiency, and sustainability.

Concentrations

Accounting

1. Prepare journal entries that measure and record the impact of financial transactions on the firm.
2. Analyze and prepare financial reports.
3. Explain effects of transactions on income statements and balance sheets.
4. Recognize the ethical dimensions and tax related implications for transactions.

Consumer Packaging

1. Conceptualize innovative packaging systems tailored to specific customer requirements.
2. Validate designs through data analysis and customer insights.
3. Develop a comprehensive understanding of various packaging materials and the associated testing equipment.
4. Execute both qualitative and quantitative marketing analyses for diverse products.
5. Explore critical considerations for package design, such as inclusivity, sustainable practices, and prevailing industry trends.
6. Consider intricate supply chain management and logistics issues.

Economics for Data Science

1. Apply economic reasoning to evaluate everyday problems.
2. Demonstrate correct use of economic analyses to evaluate specific business proposals, economic policy proposals and current events.
3. Recognize the role of assumptions about the structure of the economy as well as ethical assumptions in arguments made for and against economic policy issues.
4. Describe how to use empirical evidence to evaluate an economic argument.
5. Summarize statistical methodology and interpret statistical evidence.
6. Conduct appropriate statistical analysis of data, and explain the statistical problems involved.
7. Communicate effectively about specific economics issues.
8. Identify and examine diverse perspectives when evaluating business, economic and social policy reform.
9. Utilize the tools of economics to evaluate economic and social policies based on equity, efficiency, and sustainability.

Entrepreneurship

1. Demonstrate entrepreneurial discovery skills (questioning, observing, experimenting, associating, and networking) and the ability to generate new insights that impact a startup’s business model.
2. Contribute to the creation or iteration of a startup’s business model.

Financial Management

1. Distinguish among various financial intermediaries and markets.
2. Apply time value of money concepts.
3. Formulate and explain the relationship between risk-return tradeoff.
4. Synthesize data using appropriate visualization and statistical techniques.
5. Apply knowledge of advanced methods in financial data science to extract and report insights from financial data in various forms.
6. Employ discipline knowledge and skills orally and in written form in a professional manner.

Information Systems and Analytics

1. Develop business computer applications that implement basic programming constructs.
2. Apply concepts and techniques associated with relational database design and development.
3. Demonstrate technical skills in managing information systems infrastructure and addressing security issues.
4. Apply concepts and techniques associated with data analytics in the business environment.
5. Demonstrate interpersonal and teamwork skills required for information systems professionals.

Management and Human Resources

1. Describe how organizations function as social systems.
2. Apply theory to develop and change organizations.
3. Apply basic skills in human resources management.
4. Demonstrate interpersonal skills required for HR and managerial roles.

Marketing Management

1. Assess the role of marketing in a business enterprise.
2. Apply consumer behavior concepts to marketing.
3. Describe and apply the strategic marketing planning and execution process.
4. Identify the roles of advertising, sales promotion, and personal selling in integrated marketing communication.
5. Collect, evaluate, and apply primary and secondary customer data to solve marketing problems.

Real Estate

1. Evaluate physical real estate (land and building analysis).
2. Evaluate real estate as a security (REITs, securitization).
3. Produce investment analysis for real estate.
4. Assess risk related to real estate.
5. Conduct market and best use analysis (zoning and build code requirements).
6. Explain the role of leverage and taxes.

Degree Requirements and Curriculum

In addition to the program requirements on this page, students must also satisfy requirements outlined in more detail in the Minimum Requirements for Graduation section of this catalog, including:

• 40 units of upper-division courses
• 2.0 GPA
• Graduation Writing Requirement (GWR)
• U.S. Cultural Pluralism (USCP)

Concentrations

General Curriculum in Economics

The General Curriculum in Economics consists of at least 6 units of 3000-4000 level (upper division) ECON courses plus 15 units of any upper-division courses.

Accounting

Consumer Packaging

¹

Courses taken to meet a major course requirement cannot be double-counted in the concentration.

²

CHEM 1120 is recommended for those pursuing the Consumer Packaging concentration to fulfill GE Area 5A & 5C.

Economics for Data Science

¹

If a course is taken to meet a Major or Support requirement, it cannot be double-counted as an Elective for the concentration.

Entrepreneurship

¹

Units in excess of total will be applied towards major's free electives.

²

Courses taken to meet a major course requirement cannot be double-counted in the concentration.

Financial Management

¹

All students need an approval from the finance chair to enroll in the Financial Management concentration.

²

Courses taken to meet a major course requirement cannot be double-counted in the concentration. Units in excess of total will be applied towards major's free electives.

³

Highly recommended for students in the Financial Analytics track.

⁴

Highly recommended for students in the Financial Management track.

⁵

Highly recommended for students in the Financial Planning and Wealth Management track.

Information Systems and Analytics

Management and Human Resources

¹

Courses taken to meet a major course requirement cannot be double-counted in the concentration.

²

Units in excess of total will be applied towards major's free electives.

Marketing Management

¹

Courses taken to meet a major course requirement cannot be double-counted in the concentration.

²

This course does not have an activity. Marketing requires this course to be four units.

Real Estate Finance

¹

All students need an approval from the finance department chair to enroll in the concentration.

²

All students enrolled in the concentration are recommended to pursue a minor with the CAED department. The most popular minor is the Real Estate Property Development minor.

³

Courses taken to meet a major course requirement cannot be double-counted in the concentration.

⁴

Highly recommended for students concentrating in real estate finance. This course also counts toward the real estate development minor.

General Education (GE) Requirements

• 43 units required, 6 of which are specified in Major and/or Support.
• If any of the remaining 37 Units is used to satisfy a Major or Support requirement, additional units of Free Electives may be needed to complete the total units required for the degree.
• See the complete GE course listing.
• A grade of C- or better is required in one course in each of the following GE Areas: 1A (English Composition), 1B (Critical Thinking), 1C (Oral Communication), and 2 (Mathematics and Quantitative Reasoning). 

¹

Required in Major or Support; also satisfies General Education (GE) requirement.

Coming soon