Economics

The class first covers the historical-social process of capitalism through a geographic perspective by explaining the different theories of political economy and its critics, mainly Marx.  The course begins with the physiocrats, then to the mercantiles, and classical political economic theories.  The course covers feudal societies, class antagonisms, creation of port cities, and centralization of markets and power within cities.  It also addresses the hierarchical dynamics of capitalism on a global scale and changes in use value and exchange value as a result of higher quality of life.  

This course examines advanced macroeconomics and its application to real-world issues. The emphasis will be on the microeconomic foundations and decisions that underlie the behavior of aggregate variables. 

This course studies the issues in international trade, or any trade in general. It begins with the two concepts that underlie trades between any individuals or groups of individuals, not just international trade: Division of labor and comparative advantage from Adam Smith and David Ricardo. Trade enables the division of labor, which leads to productivity increase and prosperity. The course then proceeds with the empirics and theories that are more specific to trade between countries. Empirically, the course introduces gravity equations and teaches where to obtain important international trade data. The class will be expected to perform simple exercises of using these data either in class or as homework.  Finally, the course also reviews empirical international trade literature. Theoretically, the course introduces simple versions of key models in the modern trade literature. For each theoretical model, empirical motivations are provided. 

This course introduces the basic concepts, analysis methods and related economic issues of individual economics. The scope of individual economics is mainly the consumption and production behavior of consumers and manufacturers in the market. In other words, it discusses the operation of demand and supply in the market and the determination of market prices. This course also explores the role of government departments in the market. For example, in the face of rising international crude oil prices, does the government need to control the rising prices of domestic oil products? Does the government charge tuition fees for college students, or regulate or subsidize it?

Through the analysis tools of individual economics, the course explores many issues of concern to the public, including public health, public health, poverty, unemployment, crime, education, marriage, childbearing, population aging, regulation, environmental protection, and international trade. 

Labor economists study labor supply, labor demand, minimum wages, taxes and transfers, immigration, human capital, education production, inequality, discrimination, unions and strikes, and unemployment. We will focus on applying applied microeconomics theory to the empirical data analysis.

This course teaches students the fundamental principles and methods of modern macroeconomic theory, and to illustrate the usefulness of these principles and methods for studying economic problems in practice. The objective is to help the students develop their own ways of thinking about real life economic issues. For that, both economic intuitions and scientific treatments will be emphasized.

This course aims to explore the components of dissertations and academic papers in economics, guiding students in transitioning from coursework to independent paper writing. Through lectures and discussions, we will cover the basic requirements and examine specific examples of research papers to understand the general rules and best practices for writing. Active participation in on-site discussions is strongly encouraged. Students are encouraged to identify topics of interest and draft several chapters or paragraphs for their potential dissertations.

This course focuses on the application of principles of actuarial science in survival models and life insurance products for undergraduate students. The purpose of this course is to introduce some typical life insurance products and the calculation of the premium and reserve of some life insurance products. This course alse teaches operational models in the life insurance company. The non-life insurance section of this course focuses on principles and presentation, which will provide students a preliminary understanding of non-life insurance companies.

Digitization and the internet lower the cost to collect, disseminate and analyze data. This course explores how digitization affects interactions between people, firms and governments.  It examines how institutions and regulations can and do respond. Topics include privacy, social networks, network effects, online platforms, recommendation algorithms, reputation mechanisms, search, matching and digital payment systems. Advanced economic theory, especially tools from information economics, are used to explain features of the digital economy and suggest policy recommendations. 

The goal of this course is to give students an introduction to econometrics with applications to empirical problems in economics and policy research. While some mathematical derivations will be presented, the emphasis will be on gaining an intuitive understanding of the principles of econometrics analysis.

The course covers a total of 10 sections, which are 

1) Introduction; 

2) Simple regression model; 

3) Multiple regression model – Estimation; 

4) Multiple regression model – Inference; 

5) Asymptotic properties; 

6) Heteroskedasticity; 

7)Further specification issues; 

8) Limited dependent variable models; 

9) Panel data analysis; 

10) IV and 2SLS estimation.