Comprehensive Exam Info

The Comprehensive Masters Examination fulfills the culminating experience requirement for the Masters of Economics program. Passing the Comprehensive Examination is required for graduation unless you select the thesis option as a culminating experience.

Students interested in pursuing the Thesis option are responsible for finding a Thesis adviser and assembling a committee. Generally, students who do not have a GPA of at least 3.5 should not expect to be able to assemble a thesis committee. All MA students write a full-length manuscript as a part of the required course, ECON 205, and many field courses require class papers. Each year many of our non-thesis students publish essays for scholarly and general audiences.

Comp exams are on the first Fridays of May and December.

Comprehensive Exam Information Sheet [pdf]

Contacts

Rui Liu
Graduate Advisor and Associate Professor
rui.liu@sjsu.edu
408-924-5423  |  DMH 131

Justin Rietz
Assistant Professor, SEEL Lab Co-Director
justin.rietz@sjsu.edu
408-924-5416  |  DMH 143

The sample exams that follow are from previous semesters and are provided to give students an idea of the type of questions that may be on the actual exam. There is no guarantee that thorough familiarity with the questions in the sample exams will result in a passing grade in the actual comprehensive examination.

2024 Sample Exams

Spring
Section 1: Microeconomic Theory [pdf]
Section 2: Macroeconomics and Monetary Theory [pdf]
Section 3: Econometrics [pdf]

2023 Sample Exams

2022 Sample Exams

2021 Sample Exams

2020 Sample Exams

2019 Sample Exams

2018 Sample Exams