VoxTalks Economics S9 Ep2: Has AI eaten the economics major?
Jan 9, 2026
In this engaging discussion, Dame Wendy Carlin, a Professor of Economics at UCL and co-founder of the CORE Project, explores the future of economics education amid the rise of AI. She highlights how CORE transforms traditional teaching by focusing on real-world applications and critical thinking. Wendy emphasizes the need to develop skills in ambiguity and independent judgment, which AI cannot replace. She also addresses employer concerns about graduates' soft skills and shares innovative ideas for integrating AI as a cognitive partner in learning.
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Start With The World, Then Teach The Model
- CORE reorients teaching by starting from real-world examples and then applying models to explain them.
- This flips the usual model-first approach and trains students to judge where models succeed or fail.
Gen AI Excels At Structured Tasks
- Generative AI excels at structured, well-defined problem-set tasks and can act as an adaptive tutor.
- That strength lets educators free students from drudgery while tailoring repetition to learning needs.
Employers Want Nonroutine Skills
- Employers value communication, teamwork, critical thinking, and applying models to real problems more than routine quantitative skills.
- Those non-routine skills are the ones threatened least by Gen AI and most worth teaching.