Ec 11
Introduction to Economics
9 units (3-2-4)
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first, second terms
An introduction to economic methodology, models, and institutions. Includes both basic microeconomics and an introduction to modern approaches to macroeconomic issues. Students are required to participate in economics experiments.
Instructors:
Plott, Rangel
BEM/Ec/SS 20
Scientific Writing and Oral Presentation in the Social Sciences
6 units (2-0-4)
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second term
This class provides the opportunity for students to improve their written and oral presentation skills in the social sciences. Students should come prepared with complete drafts of papers from another course or a SURF project, which they will substantially revise and improve in a style typical of peer-reviewed journals in their discipline. These papers must be the students' original work and must be papers with social science content. An initial introduction to the art of scientific writing will be provided by the staff of the Hixon Writing Center. In addition, each student will work closely with an HSS mentor whose own research is close to the student's paper topic. Fulfills the Institute scientific writing requirement and the option oral presentation requirement for HSS majors.
Instructors:
Yariv, Daley
Ec 97
Undergraduate Research
Units to be arranged
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any term
Prerequisites: Advanced economics and instructor's permission.
This course offers advanced undergraduates the opportunity to pursue research in Economics individually or in a small group. Graded pass/fail.
Ec 98 abc
Senior Research and Thesis
Prerequisites: instructor's permission.
Senior economics majors wishing to undertake research may elect a variable number of units, not to exceed 12 in any one term, for such work under the direction of a member of the economics faculty.
Ec 101
Selected Topics in Economics
Units to be determined by arrangement with the instructor
|
offered by announcement
Topics to be determined by instructor.
Instructors:
Staff, visiting lecturers
Ec 105
Industrial Organization
9 units (3-0-6)
|
first term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or equivalent.
A study of how technology affects issues of market structure and how market structure affects observable economic outcomes, such as prices, profits, advertising, and research and development expenditures. Emphasis will be on how the analytic tools developed in the course can be used to examine particular industries-especially those related to internet commerce-in detail. Each student is expected to write one substantial paper. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec 106
Topics in Applied Industrial Organization
9 units (3-0-6)
|
first term
Prerequisites: Ec 11; Ec 116 recommended.
Topics include simulation of mergers in oligopolistic industries, valuation of intellectual property, price setting and concentration in the pharmaceutical market, and statistical analysis of combined tobacco and asbestos exposure. A term paper will be required. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec/Psy 109
Frontiers in Behavioral Economics
9 units (3-0-6)
Prerequisites: Ec 11.
Behavioral economics studies agents who are biologically limited in computational ability, willpower and pure self-interest. An important focus is how those limits interact with economic institutions and firm behavior. This reading-driven course will cover new papers that are interesting and draw attention to a topic of importance to economics. Readings will cover lab and field experiments, axiomatic models of behavioral phenomena, and welfare. Each weekly discussion will begin with a 10-minute overview, then an inspection of the paper's scientific machinery, judge whether its conclusions are justified, and speculate about the scope of its generalizability. It should help students as referees and as writers. Assignments are two 1000-word summary-critiques. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec 116
Contemporary Socioeconomic Problems
9 units (3-0-6)
Prerequisites: Ec 11 and PS 12 or equivalents.
An analytical investigation of the economic aspects of certain current social issues. Topics: the economics of education, medical-care systems, urban affairs, and the welfare system. Not offered 2014-15.
BEM/Ec 118
Environmental Economics
9 units (3-0-6)
|
first term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or equivalent.
This course provides a survey from the perspective of economics of public policy issues regarding the management of natural resources and the protection of environmental quality. The course covers both conceptual topics and recent and current applications. Included are principles of environmental and resource economics, management of nonrenewable and renewable resources, and environmental policy with the focus on air pollution problems, both local problems (smog) and global problems (climate change).
Instructor:
Ledyard
Ec 121 ab
Theory of Value
9 units (3-0-6)
|
first, second terms
Prerequisites: Ec 11 and Ma 2 (may be taken concurrently).
A study of consumer preference, the structure and conduct of markets, factor pricing, measures of economic efficiency, and the interdependence of markets in reaching a general equilibrium.
Instructors:
Saito, Border
Ec 122
Econometrics
9 units (3-0-6)
|
first term
Prerequisites: Ma 112 a.
The application of statistical techniques to the analysis of economic data.
Instructor:
Sherman
Ec 123
Macroeconomics
9 units (3-0-6)
|
third term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 and modest ability to program in Matlab or Mathematica.
The role of time and uncertainty in understanding the behavior of economic aggregates such as investment, employment, and price levels. Emphasis is on representative-agent recursive equilibrium models. Topics include practical dynamic programming; job search, matching, and unemployment; asset pricing; monetary and fiscal policy; and taxation and insurance. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec/SS 124
Identification Problems in the Social Sciences
9 units (3-0-6)
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second term
Prerequisites: Ec 122.
Standard estimators (e.g., maximum likelihood estimators) of parameters in econometric models optimize smooth criterion functions. Inference is typically based on asymptotic approximations which exploit smoothness. New estimators have been developed that optimize non-smooth criterion functions, and for which standard analysis does not apply. This course develops tools needed to do asymptotic inference with such estimators-moment maximal inequalities for empirical processes (standardized averages). We show how to apply these methods to analyze various recent estimators.
Instructor:
Sherman
Ec/SS 129
Economic History of the United States
9 units (3-0-6)
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second term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or SS 13.
An examination of certain analytical and quantitative tools and their application to American economic development. Each student is expected to write two substantial papers - drafts will be read by instructor and revised by students. Not offered 2014-15.
Instructor:
Rosenthal
Ec/SS 130
Economic History of Europe from the Middle Ages to the Industrial Revolution
9 units (3-0-6)
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third term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or SS 13.
Employs the theoretical and quantitative techniques of economics to help explore and explain the development of the European cultural area between 1000 and 1850. Topics include the rise of commerce, the demographic transition, the industrial revolution, and changes in property rights and capital markets. Each student is expected to write nine weekly essays and a term paper.
Instructor:
Hoffman
Ec 131
Market Design
9 units (3-0-6)
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first term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or equivalent.
This course studies the design of markets, focusing on efficient organization, and the incentives created, both for the parties involved in the exchange and the agent providing the exchange platform. Applications include single-sided auctions, quote- and order-driven double auctions, combinatorial auctions, private markets such as dark pools. Students will be asked to identify a resource allocation and information extraction problem that could efficiently be solved with markets. They will be given access to double auction software facilitating implementation. Work in teams of two will be allowed. The project should lead to a 3000 word report. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec 132
Auctions
9 units (3-0-6)
Prerequisites: Ec 11.
The course covers basic topics in auction theory (private and common value auctions, revenue equivalence, reserve prices, budget constraints, risk aversion, etc.) and discusses more advanced theory such as mechanism design, multi-unit auctions, and interdependent valuations. Experimental studies of auctions will be reviewed where appropriate. The course will also discuss practical considerations that arise when designing auctions to sell licenses in a particular industry. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec/CS 133
Electricity Markets
9 units (3-0-6)
|
first term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or Ec 172.
This in depth introductory course provides an overview of the industry focusing on the linkages between power system engineering, markets, and regulatory policy. We will analyze the fundamentals of various electricity markets including locational marginal pricing, bilateral, day-ahead, real-time, capacity, emissions markets and risk markets. We will identify the basic components, design, and operation of electric power systems. We will examine how markets should be designed to be consistent with the engineering fundamentals of electric power systems. We will discuss sensors, metering devices, communication, and computation required to enable markets to functions. Not offered 2014-15.
BEM/Ec/CS 134
Robust Mechanism Design
9 units (3-0-6)
|
third term
This course develops the theory of mechanism design that doesn't depend on the fine detail of the application like distributions of values and utility functions. While the emphasis of the class is on rigorous mathematical proofs of guaranteed performance, this class focuses on practical, rather than theoretically optimal, mechanisms, and in particular mechanisms that don't vary much with changes in the underlying environment. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec 135
Economics of Uncertainty and Information
9 units (3-0-6)
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first term
Prerequisites: Ec 11, Ma 2b.
An analysis of the effects of uncertainty and information on economic decisions. Included among the topics are individual and group decision making under uncertainty, expected utility maximization, insurance, financial markets and speculation, product quality and advertisement, and the value of information.
Instructor:
Agranov
Ec 140
Economic Progress
9 units (3-0-6)
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second term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 and Ma 2; Ec 122 recommended.
This course examines the contemporary literature on economic growth and development from both a theoretical and historical/empirical perspective. Topics include a historical overview of economic progress and the lack thereof; simple capital accumulation models; equilibrium/planning models of accumulation; endogenous growth models; empirical tests of convergence; the measurement and role of technological advancement; and the role of trade, institutions, property rights, human capital, and culture. Not offered 2014-15
Ec 145
Public Finance
9 units (3-0-6)
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or equivalent.
An intermediate-level course on the economics of the public sector. Material is chosen from welfare economics, public expenditure theory and practice, taxation theory and practice, federalism, and public choice theory. Not offered 2014-15.
BEM/Ec 146
Organization Design
9 units (3-0-6)
|
third term
Prerequisites: Ec 11.
An introduction to the analysis, design, and management of organizations with an emphasis on incentives and information. Principles from economics, political science, and game theory will be applied to problems in project and team management, in organizational computing, and in allocating and pricing shared facilities. Not offered 2014-15.
BEM/Ec 150
Business Analytics
9 units (3-0-6)
|
third term
Prerequisites: GE/ESE 118 or Ec 122, and knowledge of R.
This class teaches how to use very large, cross-media datasets to infer what variables influence choices and trends of economic and business interest. Topics include database management, cleaning and visualization of data, statistical and machine learning methods, natural language processing, social and conventional media, personal sensors and devices, sentiment analysis, and controlled collection of data (including experiments). Grades are based on hands-on data analysis homework assignments and detailed analysis of one dataset. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec/PS 160 abc
Laboratory Experiments in the Social Sciences
9 units (3-3-3)
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first, second, third terms
Prerequisites: Section a required for sections b and c.
An examination of recent work in laboratory testing in the social sciences with particular reference to work done in social psychology, economics, and political science. Students are required to design and conduct experiments.
Instructor:
Plott
PS/Ec 172
Game Theory
9 units (3-0-6)
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second term
Prerequisites: Ec 11 or PS 12.
This course is an introduction to non-cooperative game theory, with applications to political science and economics. It covers the theories of normal-form games and extensive-form games, and introduces solutions concepts that are relevant for situations of complete and incomplete information. The basic theory of repeated games is introduced. Applications are to auction theory and asymmetric information in trading models, cheap talk and voting rules in congress, among many others.
Instructor:
Elliot
PS/Ec 173
Cooperation and Social Behavior
9 units (3-0-6)
Prerequisites: PS/Ec 172 or instructor's permission.
Game theoretic and evolutionary approaches to modeling various types of cooperative, altruistic, and social behavior. Emphasis on economic and political applications. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec 181
Convex Analysis and Economic Theory
9 units (3-0-6)
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first term
Prerequisites: Ma 2 ab, Ec 121 a.
Introduction to the use of convex analysis in economic theory. Includes a rigorous discussion of separating hyperplane theorems, continuity and differentiability properties of convex and concave functions, support functions, subdifferentials, Fenchel conjugacy, saddle-point theory, theorem of the alternative, and linear programming. Emphasis is on the finite-dimensional case, but infinite-dimensional spaces will be discussed. Applications to the theory of cost and production functions, decision theory, and game theory.
Instructor:
Border
BEM/Ec 185
Political Economy of Corporate Governance
9 units (3-0-6)
Prerequisites: PS/Ec 172.
The course covers issues of how firms are organized. Topics include the distribution of power and returns among shareholders, managers, and other stakeholders; the role of law, public policy, and financial markets in constraining or enabling firms to solve problems they face; the interaction between history, financial market structure, and the ownership of very large firms. Each student is expected to write two substantial papers-drafts will be read by instructor and revised by students. Not offered 2014-15.
Ec 190
Undergraduate Research
Units to be arranged
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any term
Prerequisites: advanced economics course and instructor's permission.
This course offers advanced undergraduates the opportunity to pursue research in economics. Graded pass/fail.
Instructor:
Staff
Published Date:
July 28, 2022