Economics

In developed countries, social security expenditures, such as public pension, health care and long-term care, account for a substantial part of the total expenditures of the public sector. The design of the social security system is an important policy issue in Japan, which is facing a rapidly aging population with a declining birthrate, as well as skyrocketing public debt. This course provides an overview of Japan's social security system and the economic theories behind the system.

This course examines how individuals or firms make decisions about the demand for or supply of a product, how we can determine the efficiency of a market, and how we evaluate the costs and benefits of trade or government interventions in the society. 

This course examines the prominent sources of labor precarity and how workers – across different institutional settings – respond to these threats. The course covers phenomena such as workplace technological change/automation, international trade, green transition, as well as their consequences, including growing inequality, the revival of the radical right, protectionism, and demand for redistributive policies.

This course provides an analysis of multi-sided platform businesses like those run by Alibaba, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Tencent that dominate the current economy. Students will examine the economic and strategic questions these business raise that that policymakers and market participants are grappling with and the unique economic issues pertaining to these businesses. Topics include (i) the economic features of multi-sided platforms (e.g.., definitions of platforms, network externalities, pricing and competition between platforms); (ii) strategic issues faced by platforms (e.g., launching, platform design, leakage, revenue model); (iii) emerging policy issues (e.g., platform mergers, self-preferencing, abuse of dominance). This course has pre-requisites in microeconomics. 

This course aims to provide students with a comprehensive and accurate understanding of the fundamental theories of tourism investment through lectures, and to establish a systematic knowledge base. 

This course provides students with an in-depth understanding of innovation and its dynamics. It explores the determinants of innovation, drawing on theories to examine how and why innovation occurs, and the types of innovation that may emerge from different political economy perspectives and institutional frameworks. Part of the course involves examining policy evaluation and design, specifically discussing how to provide policy advice that considers the complex societal ecosystem, including societal hopes and fears.

This course provides an overview of the applications of big data for decision making from a capital market perspective. As the data storing costs decrease and processing capabilities increase, capital market participants have started to look beyond the traditional financial statements (the balance sheet and income statement etc) to assist their decision making. This has important implications for both reporting firms (i.e., the information producer) and their investors (i.e., the information consumer). The course is to cover the most recent and most important developments in this field.

This course discusses the main instruments of management accounting. Topics include: income statement types; CVP analysis; pricing decisions; budgets; job and process costing; ABC and department costing. Pre-requisites: Introduction to Accounting.

The course covers a wide range of themes representative of contemporary issues in development economics. It considers what are the developing worlds and what are the major development strategies. It also covers development policies: the roles of the market, the state and civil society; agricultural transformation and specific problems in rural areas; population growth and development; work and informality; urbanization: dynamics, issues, problems; environment and development; poverty and inequality; human capital, human development and growth; development aid; natural resources; violence and crime: dynamics, issues, and explanatory models; democracy and development.

This course develops students' knowledge of the key microeconomic issues facing developing economies, and deepens their familiarity with modern analytical and empirical approaches to development economics with an emphasis on the most recent advances in the field. Students also learn about the use of formal microeconomic modelling in development, the links between formal models and empirics, and the seminal debates in development. Students must have taken a microeconomics course prior to enrollment.