| source Northwestern (X) |
level |
department ECON Economics (X) |
Most people believe that understanding economics is important, but it is not clear how many people do understand it, or whether they appreciate the range of issues to which economics applies. This seminar provides a remedy for these two problems by: (1) providing a clear but non-mathematical outline of the major principles of economics, and (2) illustrating these principles in the context of a variety of practical contexts (including economic analysis of adultery, religion, psychiatric illness, war, rioting, and love, among others).
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An introduction to economics with emphasis on macroeconomics. The first three weeks cover aspects of general economics that everyone should know, including how the market system works, how prices are determined, why shortages and surplusses occur, and, mosting interestingly, why some people earn high incomes and others earn low incomes. Topics include: supply and demand, competition vs. monopoly, inflation, unemployment, recessions, booms, fiscal and monetary policy, budget deficits, international trade, and exchange rates.
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Formally, economics is the study of the allocation of scarce resources among competing ends. Informally, economics helps us understand how household, business and government decision makers respond to incentives; the importance of proper-functioning markets in a modern capitalist economy; and the role of government in alleviating various market failures. Microeconomics focuses on individual decisions (typically using cost-benefit analysis) and the inner workings of specific markets. Picking up where macroeconomics left off, this course will introduce the principles of microeconomics and teach you how to apply these concepts to real world scenarios. Thus, this course is aimed not only at potential economics majors, but also at any student who desires the ability to understand the popular press, critically analyze government policies, and use microeconomics to make better choices as a consumer, producer, representative, or voter.
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This course is concerned with the specification and estimation of relationships between economic variables, and with inferences about these relationships. It begins with a brief survey of basic statistical concepts, and follows with an introduction to the simple and multiple linear regression. The course will also deal with issues that arise from relaxing the assumptions of the classical linear regression model.
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The first part of the course compares economic structures and performance of modern industrial nations, including the U.S., U.K., Germany, France, Sweden, and Japan. Differences in performance are studied from the perspective of theories of economic growth and related to differences in labor markets, financial markets, business structures, monetary and fiscal systems, welfare policies, etc. The second part of the course reviews the experiences of Central and East European nations in their transitions from central planning to market systems.
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The course studies the role that money and interest rates play in the operation of the U.S. economy. The aim is to give students an overview of the U.S. financial system and an understanding of the theory and practice of monetary policy. The topics will be a blend of theoretical modeling and empirical/historical discourses.
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This course develops several simple models for thinking about the determinants of variables like aggregate employment, unemployment, investment, consumption, interest rates, inflation, exchange rates and the balance of trade. The framework is used to address issues such as: what is the role of saving in determining the long run wealth of the country; what is the role of money in accounting for inflation; what are the factors accounting for the recurrent fluctuations in employment and output called the business cycle; what factors account for fluctuations in the US dollar; what risks, if any, do the high US government deficits and large U.S. international deficits pose for the health of the US economy. Particular attention in Fall 2009 will be given to the causes of and solutions to the U. S. financial market meltdown of 2008-09 and the global economic crisis of 2009.
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The course examines the economic development of the United States between independence and the Civil War. It focuses on both long-term economic trends (like settlement of the west, development of agricultural technology) and the economic causes and consequences of particular events (like slavery or the Civil War).
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The course examines the economic development of the United States since the Civil War to the present. It focuses on both long-term economic trends (like technological advance and industrialization) and the economic causes and consequences of particular events (like the Great Depression).
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This course examines the process of economic growth and social change in Europe between 1750 and 1900. We will study the origins of the Industrial Revolution and its diffusion throughout the continent with a focus on changes within and across sectors and the role of technology, organisational and institutional change, as well as the impact of economic development on social structure and standards of living. We will also analyse the pattern of integration and disintegration of the economy at the national and European level. The long-run approach will be framed by the question what historical experience can teach us about modern economic questions and about the theoretical and empirical tools we use to understand them.
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This course explores how economists translate intuitions about decision making under risk and uncertainty into rigorous, tractable models. It illustrates how these models help us understand important aspects of economic phenomena such as investment in financial assets, insurance, information acquisition, intertemporal allocation of resources, etc. We shall also point out some shortcomings of `standard' models of choice under risk and uncertainty, and briefly examine proposed extensions that overcome them.
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An important practical objective of empirical economic research is to predict the consequences of alternative public policies. Economists combine data with assumptions to draw conclusions about policy impacts. The strength and credibility of these conclusions depend on the data and assumptions brought to bear, as well as on the analytical methods used. This course will study basic methodological problems in policy analysis and examine how economists perform policy analysis in practice. The methodological discussion will place special emphasis on problems of extrapolation that arise whenever one attempts to evaluate policies that differ from the status quo. The discussion of practice will examine actual research analyzing a range of policy questions.
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This course introduces the student to the economic analysis of the market for human resources: The Labor Market. After a brief introduction we will analyze the determinants of Labor Supply and Labor Demand followed by discussion of Labor Market Equilibrium. The acquisition of Human Capital (overall skill level of a person) plays a major role in modern societies. We will outline the basic theory of Human Capital formation with an application to education. After reviewing Signaling as an alternative reason for the acquisition of educational degrees the course introduces Compensating Differentials as the basis for occupational choice. We then examine worker mobility with an emphasis on geographic mobility (Immigration). In what follows we will document the large change in the Wage Structure and the ensuing increase in income inequality that the U.S. has experienced in the recent decades and will also describe the evolution of gender and racial differences in wages. The course closes with an economic analysis of Unemployment.
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This course applies economic analysis to family issues, broadly defined. These issues include marriage and cohabitation (hetero and homosexual), children (including reproductive technology and adoption), divorce, sexual behavior (including adultery), abortion, and gender reassignment. These phenomena will be modeled as the outcomes of rational-choice processes, with hypotheses concerning these choices evaluated in the context of relevant empirical evidence. Special attention will be focused on public policies influencing 'family' decisions.
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This course deals with the economics of colleges and universities. This course applies economic theory and econometric techniques in analyzing selected topics relating to the economics of higher education. Topics include financial and other returns to higher education investments, pricing and need-based/merit-based aid discounts, peer effects, productivity measures, ethical dimensions to economic analysis, etc
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Despite economic principles praise the power and efficiency of competitive markets, we do not live in such a perfect world. Many aspects our lives are affected by government regulation and antitrust. This course will take you to an economic world with the presence of the government. We will use microeconomic theory to illustrate problems associating with imperfect competition resulted from certain firm behavior and market structures. We will then discuss the economic rationale of antitrust regulations as well as efforts made by governmental agencies to pursue a more competitive environment in various industries. In addition, we will study important antitrust cases to supplement the economic theories.
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This is a first course in corporate finance. The course is designed to introduce students to the concepts and techniques necessary to analyze and implement optimal investment decisions. The course covers the effect of time and uncertainty on decision making. Topics include discounting techniques and applications, stock and bond valuation, asset pricing models, diversification and portfolio choice, capital budgeting, capital structure decisions and basic option theory. If time permits, additional topics may be introduced.
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This course takes an in-depth look into the economic aspects of the American medical care system. The United States medical system is very complex and involves both a variety of players and very different economic issues that cannot be simply address through basic economics. We will carefully study and economically evaluate the overall health care system as well as the different players within the healthcare market including the consumers of health care, hospitals, health insurance firms, government provided insurance (Medicare and Medicaid), physicians, subsidiary medical staff, pharmaceutical firms, legal firms, nonprofit and for-profit organizations; and medical technology providers. We will also look at alternatives to the current system and the consequences of the same.
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The government frequently intervenes in markets for a variety of reasons. In this course, we focus on economic regulation of industries and the workings of the U.S. antitrust system. The affected industries usually show clear signs of market failure. Is that the motive for intervention? Is it the only one? What are the difficulties the government faces in its attempts to restrain the markets? How do the courts decide what constitutes anticompetitive behavior? Using economic analysis, we survey and discuss government policy.
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This course is an introduction to economics with an emphasis on macroeconomics. The first part of the course will cover general topics such as: scarcity, choice, how the market system works and how prices and wages. The course will then focus on the study of the aggregate economy and will cover topics such as economic growth, booms & recessions and the roles of monetary and fiscal policy. The course will conclude with a look at the US in the world economy and will focus on topics such as international trade and exchange rates.
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The goal of this course is to provide the student with an introduction to microeconomic principles. The focus will be on decision making by consumers and firms and the coordination of these decisions by the market. Economics is not a sequence of facts definitions; rather, it is a method of analysis, and by the end of the course, the student will be able to apply the newly learned analytical tools to a variety of economic and public policy issues.
Score: 11.820578 Details | Listing | Web page
This course is concerned with the specification and estimation of relationships between economic variables, and with inferences about these relationships. It begins with a brief survey of basic statistical concepts, and follows with an introduction to the simple and multiple linear regression. The course will also deal with issues that arise from relaxing the assumptions of the classical linear regression model.
Score: 11.820578 Details | Listing | Web page
This intermediate course in microeconomics examines consumption and production theory and the properties of equilibria in competitive and monopolistic markets. The course is the foundation for all the 300-level courses offered by the Department of Economics. It is meant to introduce students to the main concepts and analytical techniques in modern microeconomic analysis. The first part of the course examines the demand side of the market: consumers' preferences and behavior, individual and market demand. The second part looks at the supply side: it examines the economics of production and shows how to derive and use cost functions to solve the firm's profit maximization problem. Finally, the last part of the course examines perfect competition and monopoly. Equilibrium in oligopolistic markets is discussed in the follow-up course, Economics 310-2.
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This course will survey central topics in microeconomic theory that are typically not reached in 310-1. The emphasis is on elementary presentation of some of the main ideas of modern microeconomics. Among the topics covered are: social choice theory, applications of elementary game theory, general equilibrium in perfectly competitive markets and the economic consequences of uncertainty and imperfect information.
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The aim of this intermediate course in macroeconomics is to give students an in-depth understanding of the workings of the economy at the macro level and of the models that macroeconomists use to explain macroeconomic phenomena, such as economic growth, fluctuations, unemployment, government deficits, and inflation. The first part of the course will focus on issues relating to economic growth: what determines the rate of growth, how some countries grow to be rich while others remain poor, and what the effect of government policies is on economic growth. In the second part, after reviewing some issues regarding how macroeconomic variables are measured, we will introduce an extension of the basic growth model that we will use throughout the course. This model is based on microeconomic principles and explicitly models the behavior of consumers and producers in the economy. The use of this model will allow us to put special emphasis on understanding the microeconomic behavior that underlies different macroeconomic phenomena. We then use this model to examine the factors that affect the macroeconomic performance of the economy, and to answer questions like how the rate of unemployment and that of inflation are determined and what is the effect of different fiscal and monetary policy instruments on economic outcomes.
Score: 11.820578 Details | Listing | Web page