Economics 401: Intermediate Microeconomics, spring 2009
Instructor: Jeremy Sandford
Office hours: TH 3:30-4:30pm, 335L B&E
Lecture: TH 8-9:15am and TH 9:30-10:45am,
305 B&E
Midterm date: Thursday, March 12, in class
Final date: Tuesday May 5 10:30am-12:30pm (8am section); Friday May 8, 10:30am-12:30pm (9:30 section)
Quiz dates: 2/3 (rescheduled), 2/17 (rescheduled), 3/3, 4/7, 4/28
Required text: Perloff, Jeffrey Microeconomics, Pearson/Addison Wesley
Readings to date: Perloff, chapter 1 (skim), chapters 2-5, chapters 8-9, chapters 11-12, 14, 17, 19
Homework 1, Answers
Homework 2, Answers
Homework 3, Answers
Homework 4, Answers
Homework 5, Answers
Homework 6, Answers
Homework 7, Answers
Homework 8, Answers
Homework 9, Answers
Schedule
Tuesday, April 28: homework review, Quiz #5
Thursday, April 23: Moral hazard, efficiency wages
reading: Did Henry Ford pay efficiency wages?, Daniel Raff and Lawrence Summers
Tuesday, April 21: Education as a signal of ability
reading: Perloff, chapter 19
Thursday, April 16: Asymmetric information, adverse selection ``lemons'' model
"Bad grade insurance" at UC-San Diego
reading: Perloff, chapter 19
Tuesday, April 14: uncertainty, diversification, insurance
reading: Perloff, chapter 17
Thursday, April 9: uncertainty and risk aversion
An exercise in game theory
reading: Perloff, chapter 17
Tuesday, April 7: Homework review, Bertrand pricing, Quiz #4
Thursday, April 2: mixed strategies, simultaneous-move games with many strategies, sequential games, homework
2005 interview with Thomas Schelling discussed in class
reading: Perloff, chapter 14
Tuesday, March 31: simultaneous-move games, iterated removal of dominant strategies, Nash equilibrium
reading: Perloff, chapter 14
Thursday, March 26: third-degree price discrimination, bundling, prisoners' dilemma
reading: Perloff, chapters 12, 14
Tuesday, March 24: price discrimination
reading: Perloff, chapter 12
Thursday, March 19: no class (spring break)
Tuesday, March 17: no class (spring break)
Thursday, March 12: Midterm Exam
Last year's midterm
Tuesday, March 10: Pricing, advertising, price discrimination
reading: Perloff, chapter 12
Thursday, March 5: regulating monopolies, sources of monopoly power, begin chapter 12
reading: Perloff, chapters 11, 12
Tuesday, March 3: Monopoly profit-maximization, Lerner index Quiz #3, chapters 5,8,9
reading: Perloff, chapter 11
Thursday, February 26: welfare effects of taxes, price floors, and price ceilings, monopoly
reading: Perloff, chapters 9 and 11
Tuesday, February 24: problem solving in the competitive model, government interventions and welfare
Evidence on widely diverging valuations of a single good
reading: Perloff, chapters 8-9
Thursday, February 19: Competitive markets, profit maximization
reading: Perloff, chapter 8
Tuesday, February 17: tax rate and tax revenue, demand functions, Quiz #2
Thursday, February 12: food stamps, labor supply, income and substitution effects
reading: Perloff, chapter 5, skip 5.4
Tuesday, February 10: budget sets, utility maximization
reading: Perloff, chapter 4
Thursday, February 5: consumer choice, indifference curves, substitutes and complements
reading: Perloff, chapter 4
Tuesday, February 3: tax incidence and elasticity, consumer choice, Quiz #1
Colbert on the gas tax holiday
reading: Perloff, chapter 4
Thursday, January 29: class canceled (weather). Please finish reading chapter 3 on your own.
Tuesday, January 27: class canceled (weather)
Thursday, January 22: supply and demand elasticity and tax incidence
The Wire on elasticity
reading: Perloff, chapter 3
Tuesday, January 20: supply and demand functions, import quotas, price controls
reading: Perloff, chapter 2
Thursday, January 15: Introduction, markets, demand and supply functions, equilibrium
reading: Perloff, chapter 2