ECONOMICS
I -- Introduction to Economics,
Microeconomics
-- BIM 2nd semester Summer
Term 2015
|
Basic Material:
Literature: The course is based
on the textbook of Sloman:
Economics. (8th edition, February 2012 - Links to Pearson-bookshop
and catalogue).
+ you are invited
to consult other (literature) sources - for your presentation (at least
three additional sources) as well as for the general work in class, preparation,
homework ... (the best might be to take some time in the library starting
at the very shelf where our book is located and look around - books about
general Economics as well as specific books about Microeconomics can both
be helpful. Some first examples: In this module, we use the AULIS, the E-Learning-Platform of the Hochschule Bremen. The group is Repository (=Magazin) » Faculty 1: Business Sciences (School of Int. Business - SIB) » Business Studies / Int. Management (BIM BA) » BIM 2 - Microeconomics - summer term 2015. We are going to use this group for our internal communication and the uploads of the students. -> please kindly upload a picture to your AULIS profile, thank you. Assessment: CASE STUDY:
Presentations should be
delivered by groups of 3 - 4 students and take between 20 and 30 minutes.
The groups are formed by registering in AULIS !
It is expected that you provide a handout. No additional paper has to
be delivered. See here for the Marking
Criteria for Presentations and an example result for our
discussion in class "What
makes a good presentation". If you did not enrol for
a presentation up to now please do so as soon as possible - using the
AULIS forum mentioned above. It is required that you organize your sources
in RefWorks
and "share" the folder with
me (link via email) or the class (link in ppt/handout). |
Tentative
Schedule (There will be no classes in the
last two weeks => in
weeks 3-7 the regular class will take place during the ME slot, see dates indicated
below.
Also the presentation dates may
be subject to changes!
No | week | date (week starts ...) | present. | Unit - topics (Preliminary Schedule) | Material |
1 | 1 | 18 March 2015 | Introduction: Basic problems - Objectives (of Economics / economic policy) Teamwork about Mankiws "Ten Principles of Economics" and a short excerpt from B. Obama "The Audacity of Hope" (p. 176-184) -> (p. 178-185 for the teamwork) -> Homework for next MONday (see table below) |
Organisational issues: schedule, assessments, online-learning |
|
2 | 1 | 19 March 2015 | Introduction: Basic problems; economic systems Introduction: economic
systems |
- Hierarchy
of goals in market economies Please use the online resources, tests and case studies on the Sloman webpage (see above) |
|
3 | 2 | 23 March 2015 | PART
A: INTRODUCTION
|
Please check whether the registrations
to the presentations are correct - and let me know any
changes as well as further registration. - Marking
Criteria for Presentations |
|
4 | 2 | 25 March 2015 | (no pres. 1) |
PART B: FOUNDATIONS
OF MICROECONOMICS 2: Supply and demand |
(just a reminder: there are many textbook-resources available online) Don't forget to uploaded your expectations
in time! |
- | EASTER BREAK March 30 - April 10 | ||||
5 | 3 | 13 April 2015 | 2: Supply and demand |
External links:
|
|
6 | 3 | 15 April 2015 | Please bring a laptop or tablet so that at least two of you have access to a computer! | Presentation of the possibilities of the University Library: Econmics & Business Studies, Selected Resources - Faculty 1: International Business, Data Bases and RefWorks by Ms. Ilka Gaulke / Peter Schmidt RefWorks: -> http://www.refworks.com
(Gruppencode: RWUBremen) |
- EconLit Additional tools Example from another class: Corrected Version of a Reference List |
7 | 3 | 16 April 2015 | - no class due to the open day (Studieninfotag) - | Joint Economic Forecast Spring 2015 |
|
8 | 4 | 20 April 2015 | Pres. 2 | 2: Supply and demand 3: Markets in Action (6th ed: Government intervention in the market) |
|
9 | 4 | 22 April 2015 | 3: Markets in Action
(6th ed: Government intervention in the market) -> Elasticity |
||
10 | 4 | 23 April 2015 | - no class - | - no class due to an external seminar - | |
11 | 5 | 27 April 2015 | Pres. 3 | PART C: MICROECONOMICS 4: Background to demand |
|
12 | 5 | 29 April 2015 | Pres. 4 | 4: Background to
demand |
|
13 | 5 | 30 April 2015 | Review / Repetition and questions - chapters 1-4 (and Mankiw) | The
production process Functions of Competition |
|
14 | 6 | 4 May 2015 | 5: Background to supply -> Profit Maximisation |
||
15 | 6 | 6 May 2015 | Pres. 5 |
5: Background
to supply |
|
excursus | Thinking about "rational" decision making ... in Bremen: | "The best result will come if everyone does what is best for himself ... and the group" Indifference
will be the downfall of mankind! |
|||
16 | 6 | 7 May 2015 | 6: Profit maximising under perfect competition and monopoly |
|
|
17 | 7 | 11 May 2015 | 6: Profit maximising under perfect competition and monopoly |
||
18 | 7 | 13 May 2015 | Pres. 6 | 6: Profit maximising under perfect competition and monopoly |
Movie "A
beautiful Mind" about John
F. Nash - "Split or Steal" and "From Stealing to Trust" |
19 | 7 | 14 May 2015 | (no class, national holiday) | ||
20 | 8 | 18 May 2015 | Pres. 7 | 7:
Profit maximising under imperfect competition |
|
21 | 8 | 20 May 2015 | Pres. 8 | 7:
Profit maximising under imperfect competition -> Game Theory |
- "Split or Steal" and "From Stealing to Trust" |
22 | 8 | 21 May 2015 | 9:
The theory of distribution of income 10: Inequality, poverty and policies to redistribute incomes |
(Contents_of7th_edition.doc - 2014) | |
(Mo 25) | (no class, Whitsun) | ||||
23 | 9 | 27 May 2015 |
Pres. 9 |
10: Inequality, poverty and policies to redistribute incomes |
In memoriam
of John F.
Nash - 'Beautiful Mind' mathematician John Nash killed in crash - Famed 'A Beautiful Mind' mathematician John Nash, wife, killed in N.J. Turnpike crash |
24 | 9 | 28 May 2015 | Warm-up
questions ;-) 11: Markets, efficiency and the public interest |
(Istanbul excursion) | |
25 | 10 | Mo 1 June 2015 | 11: Markets, efficiency and the public interest |
(Istanbul excursion) | |
26 | 10 | We 3 June 2015 | Pres. 10 |
12: Environmental Policy | Preview Economics
II Please register for the presentations |
27 | 11 | Mo 8 June 2015 | Pres. 11 |
YOUR questions 12: Environmental Policy |
|
28 | 11 | We, 10 June 2015 | YOUR
questions Evaluation |
title page of the test 2014: please select 45 out of 55 points |
|
29 | 12 | Mo 15 June 2015 | Pres. 12 |
13: Governmental Policy towards Business please kindly participate
in a survey: |
please kindly participate in a survey: |
30 | 12 | We 17 June 2015 | Pres. 13 | 13: Governmental Policy towards Business Feedback Discussion |
Please remember:
last BLOG is due 4. July ! This should be a reflection of the class |
The "Module
Exercise" takes place every week.We
formed 6 teams and every team / group is assigned tasks for the next session
and is expected to present the results.
The module exercise is part of your individual workload, the lecturer won't
deliver new information there; he will only moderate the sessions. The tasks of
the module exercise normally refer to the topics discussed in the last week(s).
The numbers in the table below normally refer to the chapter in the textbook
(Sloman: "End of chapter questions" = EoC).
The exercises discussed in the module exercise show
the topics of the test. If the students deliver results or approaches
to the solution, we'll discuss the correct solution in class. If no approaches
are presented, the task will not be discussed in class but nevertheless
stay relevant for the test.
|
Alpha
|
Beta
|
Gamma
|
Delta
|
Epsilon
|
Zeta
|
|
names of students / pictures |
|||||||
18 March | Mankiws
"Principles" & Obama
text - presentation in class: |
1-2 |
3-4 |
5-6 |
7-8 |
9-10 |
Obama |
(Mo!) 23 March | Mankiw: "Problems and Applications" |
Sloman
p 29 (End of chapter 1 questions) 5 and 6 |
13-15 |
10-12 |
7-9 |
4-6 |
1-3 |
15 April | Mankiw:
"Problems and Applications" |
No. 17 ONE example ! | + No. 17 ONE example ! | + No. 17 ONE example ! | + No. 17 ONE example ! | + No. 17 ONE example ! | + No. 17 ONE example ! |
22 April | EoC Chapter 2 we might do tasks
from: |
1 (recommended to ALL students) |
2 |
4 |
3 and 5 |
6- and 8 |
7 (recommended to ALL students) |
29 April | EoC Chapter 3 + task
4 from: |
1; 2-a |
3; 2-b |
3; 2-c |
4; 2-d |
5; 2-e |
6; 2-f |
06 May | EoC Chapter 4 |
8 |
7 |
6 |
2, 4 - use (own) illustrations for your answer | 1 |
Describe the income and the substitution effect using figures like 4-16 to 4-18 |
13 May | no homework, we'll
do exercises in class -> VWL1-MicroExamWS11-12.doc
(test of last semester) Additionally we might discuss some tasks from the Microeconomics WS 05/07 EFA 3 (English) (90 min) |
all teams should please look at the whole exam - we'll roll the dice which team presents which task ;-) | all teams should please look at the whole exam - we'll roll the dice which team presents which task ;-) | all teams should please look at the whole exam - we'll roll the dice which team presents which task ;-) | all teams should please look at the whole exam - we'll roll the dice which team presents which task ;-) | all teams should please look at the whole exam - we'll roll the dice which team presents which task ;-) | all teams should please look at the whole exam - we'll roll the dice which team presents which task ;-) |
20 May | EoC Chapter 5 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
27 May | EoC Chapter 6 ALL students: question 1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
03 June | Your questions and old exam tasks | ||||||
10 June | Your questions and old exam tasks |
||||||
17 June | YOUR
questions |
You find some older exam papers here,
i.e.:
- Macroeconomics SoSe 06
EFA 4 (English) (60 ! min)
- Microeconomics
WS 05/06 EFA 3 (English) (90 min) und the
corresponding resit exam
- ISGM combined module "Micro- and Macroeconomics"(parts
of 45 Minutes each)
- exam of 27.01.05: Microeconomics,
Macroeconomics
- resit exam of 08.04.05: Microeconomics,
Macroeconomics
please remember that these were all courses based on different books, partly
of different intensity, so they are not directly comparable.
Links:
Links:
- WIKIPEDIA,
the free Encyclopedia (english)
- Leo -
Online Dictionary
- odge.de: Online-German-English-Dictionary
Learning / Improving your English:
- See the tips on the web page of the "Fremdsprachenzentrum",
especially "Internet
Quellen", "Medien",
and "Englisch
in Bremen"
- English
Language Resources (ELR) web site of Hochschule Bremen (Bremen
university of applied sciences)
with many useful tips, among other things: "How
can I improve my English outside class?" (with tips for going out:
English Club ... and more).
- also useful a list of English radio stations: http://www.surfmusik.de/land/england.html
Quotations
form the book of Thomas
Friedman: "The World is flat":
- For some, particularly among the older generations, this was
an unwelcome transformation. Communism was a great system for making
everyone equally poor. In fact, there was no better system in the world
for that than Communism. Capitalism made people unequally rich,
and for some who were used to the plodding, limited, but secure Socialist lifestyle--where
a job, a house, an education, and a pension were all guaranteed, even if they
were meager--the fall of the Berlin wall was deeply unsettling. (p. 51/52)
- ... to some degree Mikhail Gorbachev's hapless efforts to reform something
that was unreformable brought communism to an end. But if I had to point to
one factor as first among equals, it was the information revolution that began
in the early- to mid-1980s. Totalitarian systems depend on a monopoly
of information and force, and too much information started to slip
through the Iron Curtain, thanks to the spread of fax machines, telephones,
and other modern tools of communication. (p 54)
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