Economics

This course provides an understanding of the key determinants of economic development, inequality, and trade. It combines economic theories with empirical studies. It is divided into two halves. In the first half, students study how the economic development of different regions is interconnected through trade. Students begin by examining the patterns of international trade. They then define and use the principle of comparative advantage. They formalize the reasons why countries trade using classical theories and general equilibrium models of trade. These models highlight that trade can generate both gains and inequalities. In the second half, students begin by defining economic development and measuring the gap between poor and rich countries. They define and make use of concepts like poverty, inequality, and economic growth. They then review the classic theories of economic growth, which attempt to explain why some countries are rich and others are poor and contrast those with the contemporary models of development. Students also consider the role of political institutions and human capital in generating economic development.

This course introduces the broad questions of development economics, such as why some countries are poorer than others and why some people in some countries are poorer than others. It covers a broad range of issues, including education, health, gender, and environment. The course discusses different markets and their imperfections; for example, credit, insurance, labor, and land markets. It also discusses important policy responses to poverty and their effectiveness; for example, micro-credit, social protection, environmental regulation, transportation infrastructure provision. Course prerequisites include microeconomics (covering utility maximization models and market equilibrium) and a course in statistics or econometrics (covering hypothesis testing and regression models).

This course explores the microeconomics of banking theory to understand the operation, regulation, and challenges of the banking sector. Topics include: financial intermediation; demand deposit contract; banking crises; bank regulation; credit risk analysis; interest rate risk; liquidity risk.

This course is about the role played by the public sector in the economy. Students learn how the government should design tax and transfer policies given that agents will likely change their behavior in response. For example, if the government wants to tax workers with high labor incomes to redistribute resources to poorer workers, they should anticipate that workers will reduce hours of work to avoid taxation. So, the more resources are redistributed to pursue an equitable allocation of resources, the lower is the incentive for productive workers to produce resources for redistribution! Students also learn about policies that aim at fixing market failures, such as those preventing markets for health insurance to work efficiently.

A continuation Labor Economics I, this course delves further into the subject by combining theoretical concepts with empirical methods to gain a comprehensive understanding of the field.
 

This course begins with a review of dynamic models and the techniques used for their estimation and offers the opportunity to write, solve, and estimate a dynamic model using these techniques. Then, the course shifts exploring family formation through matching models, as well as delving into family decision models, which include unitary and collective models. Additionally, the course covers various topics, such as the gender gap, retirement, and dynamic family decisions, using these models.

The primary objective of this course is to offer students a wide-ranging knowledge of the field and familiarize them with essential discoveries and advancements in the literature, thereby aiding them in their future research endeavors.

This course offers an intermediate (and a bit advanced) level of the study of welfare economics.   

Welfare economics is a particular branch of microeconomics with an intensive focus on equity issues of resource allocation problems. The course starts by reviewing and examining general equilibrium analysis using the model called exchange economy then onto the two fundamental theorems of welfare economics, which are concerned with the efficiency and equity of a Walrasian equilibrium. Then, it moves on to studying two basic concepts of equity: envy-freeness and egalitarian equivalence, in the context of exchange economy. Theoretical analysis of inequality and poverty measurement is also covered. Empirical data of income inequality and poverty will be shown to familiarize students with standard inequality and poverty measures. 

This course discusses the theory of market design, its most advanced tools, and their current applications. Topics include: auction theory and matching theory; study of real markets from an allocative and strategic perspective; application of market design tools to the redesign of specific markets.

This course introduces students to public management, i.e., the decisions and actions of public officials in managerial roles. At the end of the course, students understand how a public manager achieves, in an effective way, at all levels of government, the goals of public policies. Course topics include an introduction to management; private versus public management; performance management in the public sector; the new public management and the public governance; citizen engagement; the creation and co-creation of public value; collaborative governance in times of uncertainty; strategic planning in the public sector: processes and tools; the strategic thinking: meaning and underlying variables; how to create an effective strategic plan; and a comparative study on international strategic plans.

This course in public economics analyzes the design of taxes and transfers. The first part of the course introduces key concepts in public economics. The second part is dedicated to the analysis of particular policies covering the environment and climate change, social insurance, redistribution, and capital and firms taxation. Course sessions include student presentations on actual policies in particular countries; for example, carbon taxes in Sweden, unemployment insurance in the United States, housing benefits in France, or corporate taxation in Germany.

This course explores how labor markets work and analyzes a wide range of labor issues within Japanese and US economies. Each class begins with the theoretical background of labor economics, then students analyze a related research article to understand how and whether the standard, neo-classical model is applied to real economic life. It is strongly recommended to enroll in this course together with the course, LABOR ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY B.