Department of Economics & International Development, Unit Catalogue 2008/09 |
EC10160 Introductory economics |
| Credits: 12 |
| Level: Certificate |
| Academic Year |
| Assessment: CW 50%, EX 50% |
| Requisites: |
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Aims: This 12 credit unit is designed to provide an introduction to the methods of microeconomic and macroeconomic analysis, including the use of simple economic models and their application. The aims of the unit are to enable students to derive conclusions from simple economic models and evaluate their realism and usefulness.
Learning Outcomes: The learning objectives are that, on completion of the first semester unit, students should be able to understand and apply basic microeconomic principles to the economic decisions of households and firms under a variety of market conditions. By the completion of the second semester students should be able to understand and apply basic macroeconomic principles to the economic decisions of the policy-maker. Students should be able to use micro and macroeconomic analysis both to describe and to appraise decisions, and have acquired competency in the verbal, diagrammatic and basic mathematical concepts and techniques used in introductory economics. Skills: Basic grounding in introductory micro and macroeconomics. Students will acquire skills in problem solving through work completed in class and assessment. They will undertake pieces of applied research work with respect to current topics in micro and macroeconomics. Content: Introduction to markets; household behaviour; production and costs; perfect competition and monopoly; imperfect competition; factor markets - labour; risk and uncertainty; welfare economics. The circular flow of income and expenditure; national income accounting; aggregate demand and supply; the components and determinants of private and public sector aggregate expenditure in closed and open economies; output and the price level in the short- and long-run; monetary and fiscal policy; inflation and unemployment; the balance of payments and exchange rates; economic growth, economic cycles; macroeconomic modelling. Key Texts: * Begg, D., R. Dornbusch and S. Fischer (BDF). Economics. Seventh Edition, McGraw Hill, 2003. * Parkin, M., M. Powell and K. Mathews (PPM). Economics. Fifth Edition, Addsion Wesley, 2003. * Lipsey, R. G. and K. A. Chrystal (LC). Principles of Economics. Tenth Edition, Oxford University Press, 2004. Supplementary texts: * M.J. Artis (ed) The UK Economy: a Manual of Applied Economics. * Alan Griffiths and Stuart Wall Applied Economics: An Introductory Course. |