Business and economics
Economics
A mathematical social science about how resources, prices and incentives behave. Far more quantitative than students expect, and the requirement is mathematics rather than economics.
- How long
- Three to four years, with a placement or exchange year common.
- Called
- BSc Economics · BA Economics · PPE · بكالوريوس الاقتصاد
What you actually study
As opposed to what the name suggests.
- Microeconomics — the behaviour of individuals, firms and markets, formalised mathematically.
- Macroeconomics: growth, inflation, unemployment, monetary and fiscal policy, and the arguments that have not been settled.
- Econometrics, which is statistics applied to observational data and the most professionally useful part of the degree.
- Mathematical methods — optimisation, calculus and linear algebra, used constantly rather than occasionally.
- Optional fields: development, labour, environmental, industrial organisation, behavioural economics.
The hardest part
The mathematics, for students who chose the subject expecting current affairs. A serious economics degree is closer to applied mathematics than to business studies, and the second-year econometrics course is where that becomes unavoidable. The other difficulty is intellectual honesty: economics makes strong claims from weak data, and the discipline of knowing when a result is not identified is the hardest thing it teaches.
What you need to get in
By school system. Requirements are set by individual universities and change — confirm on the course page for the year you apply.
Saudi curriculum track
requiredمسار إدارة الأعمال — Business Administration, or a science track
The business track is the natural route domestically, and a science track is not a disadvantage — a strong mathematical background is an advantage in an economics degree wherever you sat it.
A-Level
requiredMathematics
helpsFurther Mathematics · Economics · History
Mathematics is required at every selective economics department, several of which state explicitly that A-Level Economics is neither required nor preferred. Take economics because you want to; take mathematics because you must.
IB Diploma
requiredMathematics: Analysis and Approaches HL
helpsEconomics HL · History HL
AA HL is named by the selective departments; some accept AI HL and the list is not predictable, which makes AA the safer choice.
Advanced Placement
helpsAP Calculus BC · AP Statistics · AP Microeconomics · AP Macroeconomics
Both economics APs are worth taking and neither substitutes for calculus, which is what US economics departments actually screen on.
IGCSE
Extended-tier mathematics above all. Economics IGCSE is useful mainly as a way to find out whether the subject interests you.
Tests and other gates
- TMUAOctober
Required or advantageous for economics at Cambridge, LSE, Warwick and Durham among others.
- TSAOctober
Oxford PPE and Economics and Management.
- SAT or ACTGrade 11 to early Grade 12
For US applications; economics is a large and competitive major at most universities.
- Qudurat and TahsiliGrade 11 and 12
The Saudi admission composite.
What closes this door
- Without A-Level or IB HL mathematics, every selective economics department is closed — and this is the most commonly misunderstood requirement on this page.
- Choosing business studies instead of mathematics at sixteen forecloses the good economics departments entirely.
Where it leads
Careers written up on this site, and the reason each one follows from this degree.
- Economist
The direct destination in government, central banking, consultancies and international institutions.
- Investment Banker
One of the most common destinations, and the one the degree is often chosen for.
- Management Consultant
A very large employer of economics graduates, and less quantitative than the degree.
- Policy Analyst
Economic and public policy, where the econometrics is the qualification.
- Quantitative Analyst
Reachable for the mathematically strongest, usually with a master's.
- Actuary
The professional exam route, which economics graduates enter regularly.
- Data Scientist
Econometrics is applied statistics, and the transition is short.
- External Auditor
Accounting and audit routes are open through professional qualification after any degree, and economics is a common starting point.
And, without a page here yet
- Central banking and financial regulation
- International organisations and development institutions
- Corporate strategy and commercial analysis
- Competition and regulatory economics consulting
- Academic research, via a doctorate
What it is not
- That it is business studies with theory. It is a mathematical social science; the overlap with a business degree is smaller than the names suggest.
- That A-Level Economics is required. It is not, at almost any university, and taking it instead of mathematics is a costly swap.
- That it teaches you to predict the economy. It teaches you why that is hard, which is more useful and considerably less satisfying.
In Saudi Arabia
Economics is well placed here. The Ministry of Economy and Planning, SAMA and the financial regulators, the sovereign investment institutions, the banks and the international consultancies all recruit economists, and the diversification programme has created genuine demand for people who can model the effects of policy rather than describe them. It is also one of the few strong quantitative degrees reachable from the business track rather than the science track — which matters for students whose track decision is already made.
Consider instead
Same interest, different trade-off — the most useful section on this page and the easiest to skip.
- MathematicsThe foundation underneath, which keeps quantitative finance and research more open than economics does.
- StatisticsThe evidential half, with more rigour and less argument.
- Accounting and FinanceFirms and markets in practice rather than in theory, with a professional qualification attached.
- Political Science and International RelationsThe institutions and politics that economics assumes away.
The parts that go out of date
Entry requirements are the fastest-moving information on this site. These are the statements most likely to have changed.
- Whether a department accepts IB Maths AI HL for economics varies and changes.
- Which UK economics courses require the TMUA is republished each cycle.
Where this came from
Admission patterns stated by economics departments in the UK, the Gulf and the US, which name mathematics and frequently do not name economics. Destination patterns reasoned from consistently reported economics graduate outcomes.
Last checked 2026-09-06. The requirements above describe the pattern across universities, not any one of them — the course page for the year you apply is the only thing that is ever authoritative.