This course will be held in rotation mode, subject to the following specifications:

Course organization
The course consists of 3 parts, microeconomics, macroeconomics and mathematics; each of them starts on October 1st. Students will be assigned to working groups of about 6 students. Based on the assumption that distancing will still be required on Campus, working groups will be collected into 3 classroom groups. Each classroom group meets on campus according to a fixed schedule three times a week. Classroom groups not present in the classroom follow the course via MS Teams in remote mode.

Please, see the course schedule in the file storage section in the toolbar on the left.

Please note that the course is an intensive course, involving 12 ECTS, ie roughly 40-45 working hours per week.
If you are not subject to official travel restrictions, in each subject participation in one classroom meeting per week (2.5 hours) is mandatory. In addition, we expect 11-12 hours of (guided) self-study (on the basis of selected textbook chapters, on-line course attendance via MS-Teams, problem sets etc.). In total (i.e. for all 3 parts), the course involves 7.5 hours mandatory classroom presence per week and about 35 hours of self-study per week.
If you are subject to travel restriction, we offer the course in full distance mode. In this case, you will be also member of a working group and a classroom group and you will participate in the classroom meetings via MS-Teams at the dates specified in the table above.

Assessment in each of the three parts:  
Assignments (e.g. homeworks, in-class assignments, solution of problem sets, short presentations)    40 points
Final exam    60 points
Total    100 points

In total, a maximum of 300 points can be achieved. In order to pass you will need to achieve at least 50%.

The final exam will be organized as an on-campus exam; for students, who are subject to official travel restrictions issued by their governments, we offer an online exam.

Note also, should a new lockdown occur, the same mode will be applied in a full distance mode (DM), where the classroom meetings are replace by MS Teams meetings and where the final exam will be held as a distance exam for all students.

A) Microeconomics (Bellak)

• Participants gain or deepen their knowledge in microeconomics, understood essentially as a science of choice.

• Participants understand microeconomics as a way of looking at the world, rather than a collection of unrelated models.

• Participants know how to analyse consumer and production decisions in neoclassical economics.

• Participants are able to analyse individual decisions of firms and consumers.

• To a limited extent, participants gain knowledge about the relation of the neoclassical approach in comparison to the behavioral approach in particular.

• The knowledge gained should enable the participants to study and critically evaluate contemporary microeconomic models and theories.

B) Macroeconomics (Kubin)

Upon completion of the macroeconomics part of this course, students are able

• to explain and analyse macroeconomic models (in the New-Keynesian Tradition) with imperfectly competitive goods markets;

• to provide an overview of various possibilities to include imperfectly competitive labour markets in macroeconomic models;

• to explain and analyse one central macroeconomic model with imperfectly competitive goods and labour markets;

• to provide an overview of the role of money and money supply in macroeconomics models;

• to evaluate strengths and weaknesses of the above mentioned models (including their fit with empirical evidence);

• to derive and evaluate policy implications;

• to review contributions in journals of general interest (e.g. the Journal of Economic Perspectives; the Journal of Economic Literature) as well as core macroeconomics journals (e.g. the Journal of Macroeeconomics).

C) Mathematical Methods (Leydold)

Participants gain or deepen their knowledge of mathematical methods that are obligatory to the understanding of economic literature. They are able to understand and apply the formal methods required in microeconomics and macroeconomics.

These includes

• linear algebra (matrix algebra, determinants, Cramer's rule, vector space, eigenvalues)

• calculus (derivatives and integrals, implicit and inverse function theorem, Taylor series, Hessian matrix, big Oh notation)

• static optimization (convex and quasi-convex functions, stationary points, extrema, Lagrange multiplicator, Kuhn-Tucker condition, envelope theorem)

• linear systems (first order linear difference equation,  cobweb diagram, first order differential equations, stability of solutions)

Attendance is mandatory. The details and extent of attendance are described in the Box

"Procedure for the course when limited activity on campus".

Economic theories and models (as well as their mathematical structure) will be presented and explained by the lecturers.

Participants should prepare by studying the respective chapters for each meeting (see section Unit details below) as well as by submitting solutions to homework examples, if any.

Feedback on selected homework examples will be provided by the lecturers.

- Three final exams (micro, macro and mathematics)

- Each exam contributes a maximum of 60 points.

- A limited number of points (up to 40 in each field) of the final exam may be acquired from assignments (e.g. homework examples, presentations).

- Hence, the maximum number of points in total is 300.

In order to pass the exam,

- in each of the three final exams, a minimum of 40% (including the points from assignments)

AND

- a minimum of 150 points in total

needs to be achieved.

More details will be presented in the first session and will be uploaded thereafter.

A) Microeconomics: Theory: Knowledge at the level of basic textbooks (e.g. Pindyck - Rubinfeld: Microeconomics) in consumer theory and  production theory. Methodology: optimization; basics in mathematical economics.

B) Macroeconomics:

1. Solid knowledge and routine handling of intermediate macroeconomics at the level of basic text books (keywords: IS-LM model and its extension to a model with aggregate supply and aggregate demand; bibliographical reference e.g. Blanchard: Macroeconomics, 7th edition, Pearson, chapters 1-9)

2. Routine handling of basic microeconomic concepts (keywords: household optimum and the derivation of consumption demand and labour supply derivation; properties of Cobb-Douglas utility or production functions, monopoly price formation)

C) Mathematical Methods: Basic concepts and techniques as discussed in the "Brigding Course Mathematics". These include handling and transformation of terms, equalities and inequalties, functions ans maps, drawing and interpretation of function graphs, derivatives and integration, matrix algebra.

Please, see Information about prior knowledge at https://www.wu.ac.at/studium/master/masters-program-economics/structure-content/.

Macroeconomics: The course is closely based on the literature indicated above. Students are expected to prepare the relevant sections before the course meetings. The course meetings will include a lecture focusing on difficult parts in the reading assignments; in-class exercises (possibly including very short quizzes - "clicker tests" - involving multiple or single choice questions); feedback on homeworks, and possibly also short presentations by students. More details will be published in the Learning Center after September 15th, 2020.

Mathematics: All units are organized as following. (1) We discuss homework problems. From each working group a student (chosen at random) is asked to present his or her solutions for a selected problem. Additional problems are discussed on students request. (There are solutions to all homework problems. So there is probably no necessity to look at all of them.) (2) For each unit students are asked to work through  a chapter in the manuscript. Some of these may be quite challenging and are discussed by the instructor. (3) There will be a very short quiz ("clicker test") based on the homework problems.

Microeconomics: The first unit presents mathematical concepts we use troughout units 2-10. Units 2-10 will include feedback on homeworks, short presentations, written assignments, discussion of microeconomic problems based on the textbook. For detailed course structure see below.