The kinds of economists hired by these places are basically just applied statisticians with more practical training in causal inference. Microsoft/Google/Amazo

The kinds of economists hired by these places are basically just applied statisticians with more practical training in causal inference. Microsoft/Google/Amazon aren't hiring macroeconomists to forecast interest rates or whatever; they're (mostly) hiring microeconomists who can estimate causal effects and design experiments. Also, any applied economist at a top tech firm knows undergrad level applied ML.