Bean6618

I think if you're trying to go to one of the programs I mentioned earlier, work experience does not matter because they're not training students to go work in government, they're training them to work in academia. At the end of the day, harris and HKS are not really only public policy schools in name--they're quite distinct from the other public policy schools that are training students to work largely outside of academia. As far as your profile goes, that seems like what they'd looking for--especially because it sounds like you do have research experience.

From what I understand, the absolute top public policy schools (harris and HKS) do very well at placing political economists, but that is because they operate more like applied micro degrees than typical public pol schools do. If you look at the faculty of those schools, they're all political scientists and economists at the top of their field, not practitioners. Outside of getting into one of those schools, you're probably better off going to a top poli sci/econ department.