This is an accessible upper-level course that applies the analytic tools of law and economics to explore how legal and societal structures enable, constrain, and address inequality.  We will start with establishing frameworks for understanding equality, inequality, justice, and injustice.  These will be drawn from constitutional law and classical microeconomics, with an emphasis on the interconnectedness of these modes of understanding.  We will then apply these modes of analysis to a series of important loci of inequality and social policy: racial segregation in public educa

A special topics course focused on core economic theory.  Intended for students who have, in the past, received a D in a core theory course in economics and who therefore need to take a special topics course focused on that area of core theory to satisfy the major requirements.

Fall and spring semesters. The Department.

A study of the analysis of quantitative data, with special emphasis on the application of statistical methods to economic problems.  A student may not receive credit for both ECON 360 and ECON 361.

Requisite: MATH 111, or equivalent and at least a "B" grade in ECON 111/111E or a "B-" in ECON 200-290, or equivalent. Limited to 50 students.  Fall and spring semesters. Visiting Professor Knudsen.

This course develops macroeconomic models of the determinants of economic activity, inflation, unemployment, and economic growth. The models are used to analyze recent monetary and fiscal policy issues in the United States, and also to analyze the controversies separating schools of macroeconomic thought such as the New Keynesians, Monetarists and New Classicals. A student may not receive credit for both ECON 330 and ECON 331.

This course develops the tools of modern microeconomic theory and notes their applications to matters of utility and demand; production functions and cost; pricing of output under perfect competition, monopoly, oligopoly, etc.; pricing of productive services; intertemporal decision-making; the economics of uncertainty; efficiency, equity, general equilibrium; externalities and public goods. A student may not receive credit for both ECON 300 and ECON 301.

Independent Reading Course. Full course.

Fall and spring semesters. The Department.

The economic development of the United States provides an excellent starting point for an understanding of both this nation’s history and its current economic situation. We begin with the reconstruction period after the Civil War and end with the Civil Rights Era and the War on Poverty. Throughout we provide an economic reading of the events and try to explain the conflicts and resolutions in economic terms.

Requisite: ECON 111/111E. Limited to 35 students. Spring semester. Professor Barbezat.

This course uses microeconomic analysis to examine economic relationships among countries. Issues addressed include why nations trade, the distributional effects of trade, economic growth, factor mobility, and protectionism. Also included are discussions of the special trade-related problems of developing countries and of the history of the international trading system.

Requisite: ECON 111/111E. Limited to 35 students. Fall and Spring semesters.  Professor Knudsen.

This course introduces students to economic analysis of legal issues. Many familiar approaches to legal analysis focus on the justness, fairness, or legislative intent behind legal rules. By contrast, economic approaches are more apt to inquire about the incentives, outcomes and levels of efficiency that legal rules create. For example, what is the socially optimal level of care that should be expected of those who generate risk? How and to what extent should the law deter contracting parties from breaking their promises?

This course examines the determinants of and linkages between market structure, firm conduct, and industrial performance. Some of the questions that will be addressed include: Why do some markets have many sellers while others have only few? How and why do different market structures give rise to different prices and outputs? In what ways can firms behave strategically so as to prevent entry or induce exit of rival firms? Under what circumstances can collusion be successful? Why do firms price discriminate? Why do firms advertise?