Economics/Geography

Economics and geography, studied together, offer a genuinely powerful combination for understanding how the world works. Economics analyses how individuals, firms, and governments make decisions about scarce resources, what is produced, how it is distributed, and what the consequences are for welfare and efficiency. Geography situates those economic processes in real places, asking how space, environment, infrastructure, and history shape economic outcomes, and how uneven development produces the patterns of prosperity and deprivation we see across regions and nations.

This four-year, full-time programme at the University of Glasgow leads to a Master of Arts with Honours and includes a year abroad, giving you the opportunity to study in a different academic environment and to encounter geographical and economic questions from an international perspective. You will develop analytical and quantitative skills through your economics study, and fieldwork and spatial thinking through your geography, building an integrated capacity to investigate real-world problems that neither discipline alone could address as fully. The combination is particularly suited to questions about regional development, urban economies, environmental economics, globalisation, and the economic dimensions of climate change.

Graduates of economics and geography combinations move into a wide range of careers, including economic consultancy, urban and regional planning, government policy, international development, environmental management, and finance. The quantitative training from economics combined with the spatial and qualitative thinking from geography makes for a versatile analytical profile that many employers find attractive. Further postgraduate study in economic geography, regional economics, development studies, or environmental policy is a natural route for those who wish to pursue specialist research or academic careers.