Microeconomics
Objectives
Microeconomics (*) analyses the behaviour of economic agents
(people and firms) about how to allocate scarce resources (time, money,
production factors) to satisfy each individual's or firm's objectives, taking
into account the possibilities that they have. The focus is on the agents'
decisions (what to do and to consume, how many workers to hire, pricing
strategies and so on). We also discuss how economic agents interact in markets.
The course's main purpose is to endow the students with the necessary tools to
analyse the world like an economist. With that purpose, real world examples,
pieces from specialised newspapers (such as the Financial Times) and from
websites dedicated to the dissemination of research (such as VoxEu.org) will be
used in class to foster the discussion around the course topics. The course
relies on a combination of economic modelling and applied work.
(*Spring Semester 2024. The updated course’s syllabus will be available to students at the beginning of each academic term)
General characterization
Code
1119
Credits
7
Responsible teacher
Pedro Martins
Hours
Weekly - Available soon
Total - Available soon
Teaching language
English
Prerequisites
n/a
Bibliography
The course is based on selected chapters of the textbook Microeconomics (Goolsbee, Levitt and Syverson), 3rd ed. (chapters 4-10 and 18), and from Microeconomics: Theory and Applications with Calculus (Jeffrey Perloff), 4th ed., 2018, (chapters 3-9,11) (or previous edition).
Altough we only do a very short introduction to behavioural economics, interested students may refer to the book A Course in Behavioural
Economics, by Erik Angner.
Teaching method
The class meets twice a week for 80 minutes. The lectures are devoted to the presentation of the material by the instructor, using a combination of slides and board notes. The slides are made available before the lecture on Moodle. Most topics are illustrated by real-life examples taken from appropriate empirical research, newspapers like the Financial Times, and websites with dissemination of research such as VoxEu.org and ProjectSyndicate.
This is meant to motivate the concepts and foster
in-class discussion. All Nova SBE students are entitled to a free Financial
Times subscription. Please make sure you have your FT access sorted out before
the classes begin.
Tutorial sessions with the TAs take place once a week.
The assigned problems will be made available on moodle before discussion sessions. You are expected to try and solve all the problems in advance. You are encouraged to do so in groups: collective problem solving is a very efficient learning tool. The problem sets are meant to help the students learn the material. Struggling a bit to solve them is part of the learning process.
Evaluation method
1. Regular Exam Period
First mid-term (M1) 15%
Second mid-term (M2) 15%
Maximum between M1 and M2 10%
Final Exam 35%
Essays (in groups of 5 students) 25%, of which 5% for the
intermediate pitch in TA session, 5% for final presentation in lecture, 15% for
the written essay
PASSING THRESHOLD IS 9.45, WITH A MINIMUM OF 8 IN THE
FINAL EXAM
No-shows to mid-terms:
When justified via the special requests office, the
mid-term is waved and the exam weight increases to 50%
If not justified via the special requests office, the
student gets a grade of zero in the mid-term (which weighs **only** 15% in the
final grade while, by construction, the other mid-term weighs 25%).
Bear in mind that you may take the resit exam and be
fully graded on its basis.
Please do not try to obtain a waiver by directly
communicating with the teaching team, as only official requests by the special request’s
office are accepted.
2. Resit Exam Period
Resit Exam 100%
3. Grade Improvement in Regular Period
Students opt for the (I) regular assessment spelled out
in 1. above, or for (II) 100% of the grade from the exam and communicate it to
teaching team (via designated Moodle tool) by Sept 7
4. Grade Improvement in Resit Period
Resit Exam 100%
Subject matter
Short run production costs (refreshment); Production
technologies; (Long run) Cost minimisation; Firm behaviour and market
equilibrium in perfectly competitive markets in the short and in the long run;
Market power and pricing; Consumer theory: preferences, choice, demand, price and
income effects, deviations from rationality (introduction to behavioural
economics)