Best Value / By Major

Best Value Colleges for Economics

Schools ranked by payback period — how quickly you recoup your investment through higher earnings.

50

Schools Ranked

$48,383

Avg. Earnings

<1 yr

Best Payback

30,495

Graduates

How we calculate value: Payback = (4 years of net price) / (major earnings - $35k baseline). A 2-year payback means you recoup your investment in 2 years through higher earnings vs. not attending college.

#	School	Net Price/yr	Major Earnings	Payback
1	Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cambridge, MA · Private	$2,834	$110,878	<1 yr
2	McDaniel College Westminster, MD · Private	$729	$60,623	<1 yr
3	Harvard University Cambridge, MA · Private	$2,669	$78,971	<1 yr
4	Yale University New Haven, CT · Private	$2,815	$86,621	<1 yr
5	Princeton University Princeton, NJ · Private	$5,542	$103,078	<1 yr
6	Williams College Williamstown, MA · Private	$5,576	$76,460	<1 yr
7	Duke University Durham, NC · Private	$7,160	$90,856	<1 yr
8	Rice University Houston, TX · Private	$6,152	$72,884	<1 yr
9	Northwestern University Evanston, IL · Private	$5,849	$73,035	<1 yr
10	Stanford University Stanford, CA · Private	$7,081	$85,391	<1 yr
11	University of Chicago Chicago, IL · Private	$8,375	$85,637	<1 yr
12	Columbia University in the City of New York New York, NY · Private	$8,106	$79,419	<1 yr
13	Amherst College Amherst, MA · Private	$7,793	$74,576	<1 yr
14	Vanderbilt University Nashville, TN · Private	$7,694	$72,134	<1 yr
15	Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD · Private	$8,457	$75,047	<1 yr
16	Dartmouth College Hanover, NH · Private	$12,172	$87,604	<1 yr
17	Pomona College Claremont, CA · Private	$9,365	$77,213	<1 yr
18	Swarthmore College Swarthmore, PA · Private	$11,521	$81,702	1 yrs
19	Wellesley College Wellesley, MA · Private	$10,792	$76,460	1 yrs
20	Colby College Waterville, ME · Private	$5,536	$57,995	1 yrs
21	Cornell University Ithaca, NY · Private	$9,785	$69,948	1.1 yrs
22	University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia, PA · Private	$12,020	$77,087	1.1 yrs
23	Bates College Lewiston, ME · Private	$9,845	$69,338	1.1 yrs
24	Claremont McKenna College Claremont, CA · Private	$15,962	$87,754	1.2 yrs
25	Washington and Lee University Lexington, VA · Private	$6,505	$55,964	1.2 yrs
26	Middlebury College Middlebury, VT · Private	$13,580	$75,518	1.3 yrs
27	Georgetown University Washington, DC · Private	$12,505	$74,702	1.3 yrs
28	Brown University Providence, RI · Private	$10,219	$63,302	1.4 yrs
29	Missouri University of Science and Technology Rolla, MO · Public	$11,656	$69,338	1.4 yrs
30	University of California-Berkeley Berkeley, CA · Public	$13,423	$70,379	1.5 yrs
31	University of Notre Dame Notre Dame, IN · Private	$14,020	$69,338	1.6 yrs
32	University of Michigan-Ann Arbor Ann Arbor, MI · Public	$10,481	$61,829	1.6 yrs
33	Bowdoin College Brunswick, ME · Private	$14,896	$71,015	1.7 yrs
34	Hamilton College Clinton, NY · Private	$13,321	$63,501	1.9 yrs
35	Boston College Chestnut Hill, MA · Private	$17,098	$69,069	2 yrs
36	Wake Forest University Winston-Salem, NC · Private	$10,228	$55,693	2 yrs
37	University of Washington-Tacoma Campus Tacoma, WA · Public	$8,147	$51,035	2 yrs
38	California State University-Fullerton Fullerton, CA · Public	$9,017	$52,733	2 yrs
39	Colgate University Hamilton, NY · Private	$17,557	$67,995	2.1 yrs
40	University of Richmond University of Richmond, VA · Private	$16,063	$65,821	2.1 yrs
41	University of Washington-Seattle Campus Seattle, WA · Public	$8,393	$51,035	2.1 yrs
42	CUNY Bernard M Baruch College New York, NY · Public	$7,187	$48,432	2.1 yrs
43	Tufts University Medford, MA · Private	$19,827	$71,778	2.2 yrs
44	Lafayette College Easton, PA · Private	$13,393	$58,943	2.2 yrs
45	Barnard College New York, NY · Private	$19,810	$70,456	2.2 yrs
46	Macalester College Saint Paul, MN · Private	$15,953	$64,493	2.2 yrs
47	Purdue University-Main Campus West Lafayette, IN · Public	$8,450	$50,563	2.2 yrs
48	University of Virginia-Main Campus Charlottesville, VA · Public	$16,019	$62,409	2.3 yrs
49	University of California-Santa Barbara Santa Barbara, CA · Public	$14,583	$60,790	2.3 yrs
50	University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Champaign, IL · Public	$11,505	$54,817	2.3 yrs

Top Earners in Economics

See schools ranked by earnings alone, without considering cost.

Best Value Rankings

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Payback uses earnings by major from the College Scorecard's field-of-study file, last updated June 2026, against net price from the June 2026 release. Scorecard publishes the two separately, so they are different vintages.