Wednesday, January 13, 2010

What I'm Going to Be When I Grow Up

Remember how I've been whining for the past 9 months that I don't know what I'm going to be when I grow up? How a large portion of my blog posts were about my lack of purpose and direction and my wavering between one option and another?

Well, that's over, at least for the next month. I've come to a semi-decided conclusion about my future career path. I'm feeling really good about it (at least right now- hopefully I'll feel the same after a few weeks) and am very excited about the possibilities.

I'm going to be a regulatory economist.

This in essence means that I have two career options. I can work for the Competition Bureau to regulate industries that are taking advantage of market conditions to exercise market power. Or, I can work for a large company to help them find loopholes in the regulations so that they can keep exercising market power. Doesn't it sound exciting?

This all started last semester when I got interested in my Industrial Organization class, the one where we learned about conspiracies between firms to rip us off. I found it quite intriguing, so when my professor announced that he would be teaching a follow-up course next semester on Regulatory Economics, I pondered the possibilities. My first class was yesterday, and I'm already in love. We get to write a research paper on regulation in Alberta, choosing a specific industry- I'm pondering postage-stamp pricing in electrical transmission or the allocation of water rights. The Competition Bureau is coming in to the class in two weeks to hold a recruiting session, and the Department of Economics organizes a summer internship program that is only open to students who have completed this course series. But the best part of this class? There are only 7 students. I know this a regular occurrence for some of my friends who major in Byzantine Studies or take senior-level Russian classes, but I have never been in an undergraduate class smaller than about twenty people. I'm super excited and I think it'll be a great course.

3 comments:

Eileen Young said...

I;m excited too.
Grannie

Angela said...

Woo!
Now I just need to figure out what I want to be when I grow up...

Katey said...

You already know? Or you have now figured out part of it? I'm still figuring out what I'll be when I grow up, it's an evolving sort of thing...