ECONOMICS

CRN	90348	Distribution	A/E
Course No.	ECON 101 A
Title	Introduction to Macroeconomics
Professor	Andrew Pearlman
Schedule	Wed Fr 11:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 201

This course begins with an examination of the aggregate behavior of modern economies: the factors leading to economic growth, explanations of booms and recessions, unemployment, interest rates, inflation, and budget deficits or surpluses. We will also analyze the government's ability (or inability) to use monetary and fiscal policies to achieve economic goals such as full employment and price stability. Throughout the course, we will debate whether the government should use monetary and fiscal policy to try to "fine tune" the economy and what the likely effects of such government involvement are. ECON 101 and 102 may be taken in either order.

CRN	90349	Distribution	A/E
Course No.	ECON 101 B
Title	Introduction to Macroeconomics
Professor	Andrew Pearlman
Schedule	Wed Fr 3:00 pm -4:20 pm OLIN 204

See description above.

CRN	90350	Distribution	E
Course No.	ECON 102 Q course
Title	Introduction to Microeconomics
Professor	Sanjay DeSilva
Schedule	Mon Wed 1:30 pm -2:50 pm HEG 102

Cross-listed: CRES

An examination of the logic of constrained choice, with a focus on the economic behavior of individuals and organizations. The mechanics of the price system are analyzed in terms of demand (utility) and supply (cost). The characteristics of alternative

market structures, from pure competition to monopoly, are derived and evaluated. The conditions under which markets allocate resources efficiently are worked out, and several causes of market failure are examined. Simple graphical and mathematical methods (high-school level of difficulty) are developed, their use reinforced by a variety of applications. Questions of microeconomic analysis and policy raised by current events are debated. Econ. 101 and 102 may be taken in either order.

CRN	90374	Distribution	E
Course No.	ECON 105 Q Course
Title	Foundations of Finance and Investments
Professor	Tsu-Yu Tsao
Schedule	Tu Th 3:00 pm - 4:20 pm OLIN 203

This course explores the foundations of the pricing of financial instruments and the structure and organization of financial markets. Methods will be developed to analyze and measure financial performance, price stocks and bonds, evaluate portfolios and understand financial derivatives as these relate to financial data. Additional topics will include: the investment decision-making process; trading practices; risk assessment and diversification. This course involves a substantial amount of statistical analysis and calculation, but no prior knowledge of statistics is required.

CRN	90344	Distribution	A
Course No.	ECON 110
Title	Economic Dimensions of Public Issues in the United States
Professor	Kris Feder
Schedule	Mon Wed 11:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 204

Cross-listed: American Studies

This course explores the economic dimensions of selected public issues in the United States. (International concerns are addressed in the spring semester companion course, ECON 115.) Students will participate in the selection of four or five topics of general interest. "Ripped from the headlines" issues might include, for example, the Microsoft antitrust case; the Bush administration's tax, energy, environmental, or other policies; or the rise (and fall?) of the "new economy." Public issues of enduring interest might include topics related to Social Security and demographic changes; welfare reform; health care; education; crime; drugs and the underground economy; the distribution of income, wealth and property; pollution; urban decline and suburban sprawl; disposition of public lands; transportation; or farm policy. Students will work in teams to conduct and present research on each of the cases selected for study. Information will be drawn from media coverage; academic scholarship; US Government reports, statistics, and congressional testimony; and the publications of think tanks and advocacy groups on opposing sides of an issue. After a general review of each issue we focus on its economic dimensions. A few simple theoretical principles will be introduced and used to illuminate the economic forces at work. In the standard economic approach, individuals are assumed to behave rationally as they act to maximize their well-being, subject to constraints on available resources, within a framework of rights and obligations defined by social institutions. Irrational or undesirable social outcomes are analyzed as the consequence of interacting choices by rational individuals in the context of particular institutions.

CRN	90351	Distribution	A
Course No.	ECON 202
Title	Intermediate Microeconomics
Professor	Tsu-Yu Tsao
Schedule	Tu 9:00 am - 11:20 am OLIN 310 Th 10:00 am - 11:20 am PRE 101

A further development of principles and analytical methods introduced in Econ. 102: demand, supply, and the workings of the price system. The positive and normative characteristics of alternative market structures - perfect competition, monopolistic competition, oligopoly, pure monopoly, and in resource markets, monopsony - are studies in depth. Market forces are examined in the context of social and political institutions that shape, and are shaped by, market outcomes. The alleged "trade-off" between equity and efficiency is debated in the context of a variety of applications.

Prerequisite: Economics 102.

CRN	90456	Distribution	C/E
Course No.	ECON 220
Title	The East Asian Economies
Professor	Qiyu Tu (Visiting Fulbright Scholar, Bard In China Program)
Schedule	Mon Wed 4:30 pm - 5:50 pm OLIN 205

Cross Listed: Asian Studies

This course is designed to provide an overview of the contemporary economic situation in East Asia and the changes in economic structure and mechanism that occurred there in the second half of the twentieth century. Emphasis will be on the underlying causes and consequences of those changes, as well as important overall trends. Topics to be covered include the role of government policy and the state, the transition from planned to market economies, the origin and nature of the Asian financial crisis, industrial division and regional cooperation, the role of the United States in the East Asian economy, and other issues connected with economic development in the region. Great attention will be focused on Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, Korea and the ASEAN countries. All economics concepts used in the course will be explained.

Prerequisite: ECON 101 or 102..

CRN	90457	Distribution	C
Course No.	ECON 229
Title	Statistics
Professor	Sanjay DeSilva
Schedule	Mon Wed 11:30 am - 12:50 am PRE 128

The first of a two-course series designed to examine empirical economics, and a prerequisite for Economics 329, Econometrics. Basic concepts of statistics, probability, probability distributions, random variables, correlation, and simple regression are introduced; the techniques of statistical inference hypothesis testing are developed. Numerous examples and computer-based exercises are included. Prerequisite: Economics 101 or 102.

CRN	90345	Distribution	A/E
Course No.	ECON 237
Title	Economics of Government and Public Choice
Professor	Kris Feder
Schedule	Tu Th 11:30 am - 12:50 pm LC 115

Cross-listed: American Studies, CRES

This course introduces the two branches of traditional public finance, corresponding to the two sides of the government budget-revenue and spending. On the spending side, we survey the economic rationales for the existence of government and for its intervention in the economy, as well as the economic consequences of government expenditures. On the revenue side, we examine the problem of efficient pricing of public sector output; the consequences of alternative tax structures for the distribution of wealth and the efficiency of resource allocation; and contemporary debates about tax reform. This course also introduces alternative approaches to the economics of collective action. The theory of public choice explains the actions of clubs, governments, interest groups, corporations, labor unions, and other associations with reference to the interacting choices of self-interested individuals. Topics in public choice theory include the economic theory of clubs; the theory of constitutions; property rights; efficiency, equity and consistency of alternative voting rules; and economic models of the behavior of legislators, politicians, bureaucrats, and citizens.

Prerequisite: ECON 102.

CRN	90346	Distribution	A/E
Course No.	ECON 242
Title	Environmental Economics
Professor	Kris Feder
Schedule	Mon Th 8:30 am -9:50 am OLIN 202

Cross-listed: CRES

The interrelationships between economic and ecological systems: the materials balance; the economic role of ecosystem services; the economic value of extractive and in situ uses of the environment as a source of productive inputs and a repository for wastes; market and non-market allocations of natural resources among alternative uses. The standard neoclassical analysis of pollution as a consequence of externality and market failure is developed, general conditions for efficient resource use and waste disposal are derived, and rationales for public management of environmental resources are examined. Conventional policy solutions are evaluated with particular focus on United States environmental policy. Orthodox analyses of environmental problems are contrasted with alternative interpretations, including those of ecological economics, steady-state economics, and geoclassical economics. Of special interest are the questions of land tenure and entitlement-of individual and collective rights to nature.

Prerequisite: ECON 102.

CRN	90347	Distribution	A
Course No.	ECON 254
Title	Feminist Economics
Professor	Rania Antonopoulos
Schedule	Mon Wed 1:30 pm -2:50 pm OLIN 307

Cross-listed: American Studies, Gender Studies

This course reexamines economics by looking at traditional theories through a feminist lens. Emerging feminist approaches challenge the currently used framework of economic analysis, at both the micro and macro levels, for omitting a crucial analytical category, that of gender. In introducing this centrally important category, feminist economics seeks to correct the mainstream vision of how contemporary societies organize the activities of production and distribution. From a scientific point of view, a gender-based schema makes the complexity of economic interactions among institutions and people more transparent, and is thus better suited to address issues of public policy and ultimately societal transformation. Topics that will be covered, include: feminist critiques of economic theories :"en-gendering" the economic question per se; the importance of re-conceptualizing the economy as a three sector model: household sector, market sector and government sector; household production versus market oriented production: a gendered system; social division of labor by gender: structures of gender occupation and segregation; contemporary labor market issues and policies: wage gap, comparable worth, discrimination and affirmative action; economic growth, poverty trends and government policy: gendered impact; "efficient" versus "equitable" growth: how do we evaluate economic prosperity?

CRN	90339	Distribution	A
Course No.	ECON 301
Title	Topics in Macroeconomics
Professor	Dimitri Papadimitriou
Schedule	Mon Wed 11:30 am - 12:50 pm OLIN 310

This course is an examination of advanced topics in macroeconomics and a critical review of contemporary macroeconomic theory and models with regard to their historical development. The foundations of macroeconomic theory will be studied and alternative approaches to economic growth, distribution, increasing returns, and endogenous change will be analyzed. The monetary and financial aspects in macro foundations will be discussed, focusing on the work of Minsky, Tobin, Sargent, Lucas, post-Keynesians, neo-Keynesians, new Keynesians, and Sraffians. Readings will be mainly from the primary journal literature. Prerequisite: Economics 101 and 201.

CRN	90451
Course No.	ECON CONF
Title	Senior Conference
Professor	Core Faculty
Schedule	To be arranged

Beginning in Fall 2001 semester, students writing Senior Projects in Economics will be required to attend the Senior Conference, which will meet not more than one evening every two weeks throughout the fall and spring terms. Not for credit.