Kathryn Linton is a senior Economics Major (with minors in Philosophy and Computer Science) from Alameda, California. This past summer she interned with the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), a unit of the U.S. Department of Labor. Kathryn considered opportunities with the federal government after speaking with Tom Walcott (class of ’99, Trustee of the College) who also studied Computer Science at Beloit College.

Kathryn spent much of her time working on the Consumer Expenditure Survey, which is used to calculate the Consumer Price Index (CPI). Kathryn found the work to be challenging and meaningful.

“I couldn’t help but be struck by the fact that I had a job where I was contributing in a practical sense to things I had only heard about in theory in class. Even as an intern I was invited to meetings where economists would present on the latest inflation figures and discuss information that I would see on the news in the following days. The ability to work at a job where I could see the subject matter in daily life that would later be analyzed by my coworkers made the whole experience give me a sense of purpose. Beyond that, this work experience helped solidify how economics is an important subject in addition to being an interesting one.”

Kathryn’s day-to-day work included reviewing and cleaning the data, testing alterations to the code of the survey collection instrument, and updating an internal survey that goes out to the field representatives that administer the survey.

Job well done, Kathryn! We can’t wait to see what you do next.