Courses

Reviews lecture material presented in ECON 1110 lectures; provides problem-solving techniques, study tips, and additional problems to prepare for exams and problem sets; provides additional time for questions and discussion of concepts. Provides additional instruction for students who need reinforcement.

Full details for ECON 1001 - Principles of Micro-Economics Supplement

Reviews lecture material presented in ECON 1120 lectures; provides problem-solving techniques, study tips, and additional problems to prepare for exams and problem sets; provides additional time for questions and discussion of concepts. Provides additional instruction for students who need reinforcement.

Full details for ECON 1002 - Principles of Macro-Economics Supplement

Explanation and evaluation of how the price system operates in determining what goods are produced, how goods are produced, who receives income, and how the price system is modified and influenced by private organizations and government policy.

Full details for ECON 1110 - Introductory Microeconomics

Analysis of aggregate economic activity in relation to the level, stability, and growth of national income. Topics may include the determination and effects of unemployment, inflation, balance of payments, deficits, and economic development, and how these may be influenced by monetary, fiscal, and other policies.

Full details for ECON 1120 - Introductory Macroeconomics

This interdisciplinary course examines network structures and how they matter in everyday life. The course examines how each of the computing, economic, sociological and natural worlds are connected and how the structure of these connections affects each of these worlds. Tools of graph theory and game theory are taught and then used to analyze networks. Topics covered include the web, the small world phenomenon, markets, neural networks, contagion, search and the evolution of networks.

Full details for ECON 2040 - Networks

The pricing processes in a private enterprise economy are analyzed under varying competitive conditions, and their role in the allocation of resources and the functional distribution of national income is considered.

Full details for ECON 3030 - Intermediate Microeconomic Theory

Introduces the theory of national income and determination and economic growth in alternative models of the national economy. Examines the interaction and relation of these models to empirical aggregate economic data. Reviews national accounts, output and employment determination, price stability and economic growth, in the context of alternative government policy programs and the impact of globalization.

Full details for ECON 3040 - Intermediate Macroeconomic Theory

This course provides an introduction to probability and parametric inference. Topics include: random variables, standard distributions, the law of large numbers, the central limit theorem, likelihood-based estimation, sampling distributions and hypothesis testing.

Full details for ECON 3110 - Probability Models and Inference for the Social Sciences

Introduction to the theory and application of econometric techniques. Emphasis is on both development of techniques and applications of econometrics to economic questions. Topics include estimation and inference in bivariate and multiple regression models, instrumental variables, regression with qualitative information, heteroskedasticity, and serial correlation. Students are expected to apply techniques through regular empirical exercises with economic data.

Full details for ECON 3120 - Applied Econometrics

Provides an introduction to statistical inference and to principles of probability. It includes descriptive statistics, principles of probability, discrete and continuous distributions, and hypothesis testing (of sample means, proportions, variance). Regression analysis and correlation are introduced.

Full details for ECON 3130 - Statistics and Probability

Building on prior coursework (multivariate regression), students learn the econometric tools used by policy and business analysts to quantitatively evaluate the causal impact of various policies, business decisions, and other actions on outcomes of interest. For example, how does Head Start affect the educational attainment of children? How do minimum wages affect employment and firm profitability? Hands-on applications using real data illustrate the core tools of program evaluation econometrics.

Full details for ECON 3171 - Causal Reasoning and Policy Evaluation 1

This course provides an overview of the major programs that make up the social safety net in the United States. We will review the economic rationale behind social programs, identify the economic consequences of these programs, and assess the empirical research on these topics. A major emphasis of the course will be on understanding the strengths and limitations of the core methodologies used in the existing economics literature.

Full details for ECON 3250 - Economics of the U.S. Social Safety Net

This course will focus on economic models of crime and punishment, and on empirical evidence that evaluates the models. The first part of the course will introduce economic models of crime and study what factors motivate and deter criminal behavior. Then we will turn to empirical evidence and will discuss the role of higher fines, imprisonment, death penalty, abortion, drugs, guns and other factors in deterring crime. In the end of the course we will discuss corruption and whether it is harmful or beneficial to society. Special focus of this class is on cost and benefits of various policies related to crime. Each class we will discuss policy implications.

Full details for ECON 3255 - Economics of Crime

Seeks to illustrate the complexity of decision making in a nonprofit organization and to show how microeconomic analysis in general, and labor-market analysis in particular, can usefully be applied to analyze resource allocation decisions at universities. Topics include financial aid, tuition, admissions policies, endowment policies, faculty salary determination, the tenure system, mandatory retirement policies, merit pay, affirmative action, comparable worth, collective bargaining, resource allocation across and within departments, undergraduate versus graduate education, research costs, libraries, athletics, and "socially responsible" policies. Lectures and discussions of the extensive readings are supplemented by presentations by Cornell administrators and outside speakers who have been engaged in university resource-allocation decisions or have done research on the subject.

Full details for ECON 3410 - Economic Analysis of the University

Examines the changing economic roles of women and men in the labor market and in the family. Topics include a historical overview of changing gender roles, the determinants of the gender division of labor in the family, trends in female and male labor-force participation, gender differences in occupations and earnings, the consequences of women's employment for the family, and a consideration of women's status in other countries.

Full details for ECON 3440 - Women in the Economy

Surveys economic and industrial issues in the sports industry. Topics include salary determination, including free agency, salary caps, salary arbitration; competitive balance and financial health of sports leagues; antitrust issues in sports; labor disputes, union history, and contract administration issues in sports leagues; discrimination in sports; and performance incentives.

Full details for ECON 3460 - The Economics of Collective Bargaining in Sports

This course will examine the determinants of international capital flows and their consequences for growth and volatility. Basic analytical models in international finance, including those related to exchange rate dynamics, will be covered. Emerging market perspectives on these issues will be emphasized, with a particular focus on the economies of China and India. The course will also analyze the challenges created by rising global financial integration and new financial technologies (Fintech, digital currencies) for monetary policy, financial regulation, and other policies. Students will be required to write an independent research paper.

Full details for ECON 3545 - International Finance and Macroeconomics

Standard economic theory assumes that individuals are rational decision-makers; however, that is often not the case in the real world. Behavioral economics uses findings from psychology to determine ways in which individuals are systematically irrational to improve upon existing models. The first part of this course reviews these theories, while the second part of the course focuses on how these findings have been used to design better education, health, and tax policies as well as many others.

Full details for ECON 3670 - Behavioral Economics and Public Policy

Risky health behaviors such as cigarette smoking, alcohol abuse, risky sex, drug use, poor diet and physical inactivity (leading to obesity), and self-harm are responsible for hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths and impose billions of dollars in medical care costs each year in the United States. This course teaches the economic approach to studying risky health behaviors. The research literature on the economic causes and correlates of risky health behaviors will be studied in detail. Numerous policies to modify risky health behaviors, such as the minimum legal drinking age and recreational marijuana use laws, will be debated in class. A policy wargame is conducted, with students creating advertisements, giving oral presentations, and lobbying policymakers to advocate a specific policy position. In the Fall of 2020, this class will be taught in a hybrid format. Students can sign up for either the partially in-person version or the purely online version. No matter which version you sign up for, each week you will watch recorded lectures and complete accompanying quizzes (the asynchronous component) and I will meet with you live, whether you chose online or in-person (the synchronous component). During those synchronous meetings, we will discuss the lecture material and evaluate real-world policies to modify risky health behaviors. Students will then write brief essays evaluating those policies. After Thanksgiving, the course (like all others at Cornell) will be entirely online and we will conduct policy wargames. Students will then write an essay interpreting the events of the wargame.

Full details for ECON 3710 - The Economics of Risky Health Behaviors

A modicum of game-theoretic knowledge is essential in today's age of complex diplomacy and corporate strategizing. This introductory course is meant to familiarize students with the basic principles of game theory and rational choice in strategic environments. Important ideas and concepts, with real-life illustrations, will be discussed. The course is designed for students with an interest in economics, political strategy, policymaking, and the social sciences, in general.

Full details for ECON 3801 - Introduction to Game Theory and Strategic Thinking

The course will focus on how legal rules and regulations impact consumers in the marketplace. A significant portion of this course will focus on how developments in tort law, contract law, property law, and regulatory law influence social welfare and serve to protect consumers in their interactions with the marketplace. The course will also focus on how the federal regulatory agencies function and analyze the effectiveness of these agencies in protecting consumers. The course will focus specifically on the Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Trade Commission. In addition to students interested in public policy and economics, the course can be helpful to students who are interested in attending law school as students will get exposed to many of the concepts they will address in a first year law school curriculum.

Full details for ECON 3830 - Economics of Consumer Protection and the Law

Introduction to the use of economics as a tool in forming and evaluating environmental policy, with a focus on how economists measure effects of environmental quality and regulation. Topics include: externalities in an environmental context; regulation methods such as command and control, Pigouvian taxation, and cap and trade; methods for measuring the costs and benefits of environmental policy; overview of current environmental legislation; environmental quality and health; regulation and environmental justice.

Full details for ECON 3850 - Economics and Environmental Policy

Course focuses on global health challenges, and how they are related to poverty and inequality.

Full details for ECON 3910 - Health, Poverty, and Inequality: A Global Perspective

Focuses on the unique features of agricultural commodity markets. Emphasizes government and private institutions that affect these markets, as well as on models of price behavior including marketing margins and imperfect competition. Also covers empirical tools to evaluate market characteristics.

Full details for ECON 3920 - Analysis of Agricultural Markets

Analyzes the role of government in a free market economy. Topics include public goods, market failures, allocation mechanisms, optimal taxation, effects of taxation, and benefit-cost analysis. Current topics of an applied nature vary from semester to semester.

Full details for ECON 4260 - Public Finance: The Microeconomics of Government

Surveys the sources of comparative advantage. Studies commercial policy and analyzes the welfare economics of trade between countries. Some attention is paid to the institutional aspects of the world trading system.

Full details for ECON 4510 - International Trade Theory and Policy

Introduces students to behavioral economics, an emerging subfield of economics that incorporates insights from psychology and other social sciences into economics. Examines evidence on how human behavior systematically departs from the standard assumptions of economics, and also investigates attempts by behavioral economists to improve economic analyses.

Full details for ECON 4660 - Behavioral Economics

Covers bank management and supervision, with special reference to international supervisory agreements (Basel II) and U.S. Federal guidance. Sources of risk are considered-market, credit, operational, and others. Quantitative methods for modeling and measuring risk are covered.

Full details for ECON 4902 - Banks

Industrial organization economists study firm behavior in imperfectly competitive markets, which are far more common than the perfectly competitive markets that were the focus of your introductory microeconomics course.  Econ 4906 analyzes the acquisition and use of market power by firms, strategic interactions among firms, and the role of government competition policy.  We will approach this subject from both theoretical and applied perspectives.

Full details for ECON 4906 - Industrial Organization and Competitive Strategy

This course provides an introduction to the economics of asymmetric information, contracts and mechanism design. Topics covered include: bilateral contracting problems with moral hazard and/or adverse selection, bargaining with asymmetric information, the design of optimal auctions and other multilateral mechanisms, signaling and incomplete contacts. Prerequisites include intermediate microeconomics and statistics. The student is expected to be comfortable with basic probability (random variables, expectation, independence, and conditional probability) and calculus.

Full details for ECON 4907 - The Economics of Asymmetric Information and Contracts

Students should consult the director of undergraduate studies for details. Admission is competitive. Interested students should apply to the program in the spring semester of their junior year.

Full details for ECON 4990 - Honors Program

Full details for ECON 4998 - Cross-Cultural Work Experiences

Independent study.

Full details for ECON 4999 - Independent Study in Economics

Topics in consumer and producer theory.

Full details for ECON 6090 - Microeconomic Theory I

Covers the following topics: static general equilibrium; intertemporal general equilibrium: infinitely lived agents models and overlapping generations models; welfare theorems; equivalence between sequential markets and Arrow-Debreu Markets; Ricardian proposition; Modigliani-Miller theorem; asset pricing; recursive competitive equilibrium; the Neoclassical Growth Model; calibration; and introduction to dynamic programming.

Full details for ECON 6130 - Macroeconomics I

Covers selected topics in matrix algebra (vector spaces, matrices, simultaneous linear equations, characteristic value problem), calculus of several variables (elementary real analysis, partial differentiation) convex analysis (convex sets, concave functions, quasi-concave functions), classical optimization theory (unconstrained maximization, constrained maximization), Kuhn-Tucker optimization theory (concave programming, quasi-concave programming).

Full details for ECON 6170 - Intermediate Mathematical Economics I

Gives the probabilistic and statistical background for meaningful application of econometric techniques. Topics include probability theory probability spaces, random variables, distributions, moments, transformations, conditional distributions, distribution theory and the multivariate normal distribution, convergence concepts, laws of large numbers, central limit theorems, Monte Carlo simulation; statistics: sample statistics, sufficiency, exponential families of distributions. Further topics in statistics are considered in ECON 6200.

Full details for ECON 6190 - Econometrics I

This course teaches the economic approach to studying risky health behaviors such as cigarette smoking, drug use, alcohol abuse, risky sex, and poor diet and physical inactivity (leading to obesity), and suicide. We will examine in detail the research literature on the demand for health, economic models of addiction, the economic causes and correlates of risky health behaviors (e.g. education, prices, peers), and policies for modifying risky behaviors (e.g. taxes and other financial incentives, and providing information).

Full details for ECON 6410 - Health Economics I

Focuses on empirical strategies to identify the causal effects of public policies and programs. The course uses problem sets based on real-world examples and data to examine techniques for analyzing nonexperimental data including control function approaches, matching methods, panel-data methods, selection models, instrumental variables, and regression-discontinuity methods. The emphasis throughout, however, is on the critical role of research design in facilitating credible causal inference. The course aids students in both learning to implement a variety of statistical tools using large data sets, and in learning to select which tools are best suited to a given research project.

Full details for ECON 6590 - Empirical Strategies for Policy Analysis

Independent study.

Full details for ECON 6990 - Readings in Economics

Covers advanced topics in econometrics, such as asymptotic estimation and test theory, robust estimation, Bayesian inference, advanced topics in time-series analysis, errors in variable and latent variable models, qualitative and limited dependent variables, aggregation, panel data, and duration models.

Full details for ECON 7190 - Advanced Topics in Econometrics I

This course provides an introduction to the field of public economics.  The field is large, with significant theoretical and empirical components.  The emphasis of this course is on the theory.  It covers core ideas in the area of static and dynamic optimal taxation, public goods and externalities, social insurance and welfare, and state and local public finance.

Full details for ECON 7360 - Public Finance

Focused on analytical models of political institutions, this course is organized around canonical models and their applications. These include voting models, menu auctions, models of reputation, and cheap talk games. These models are used to explain patterns of participation in elections, institutions of congress, lobbying, payments to special interest groups and other observed phenomena.

Full details for ECON 7385 - Economics and Politics

The purpose of this course is to familiarize students with canonical models of search and study their application in macroeconomics and labor economics. Our primary objective will be to study the most relevant frameworks for reading papers in the field - e.g., random search, directed search, wage posting, and island models. Particular emphasis will be placed on the application and quantitative evaluation of these frameworks.  Our secondary objective will be to study new papers and topics at the research frontier.

Full details for ECON 7440 - Macro Labor

Explores the ways in which insights from psychology can be integrated into economic theory. Presents evidence on how human behavior systematically departs from the standard assumptions of Economics and how this can be incorporated into modeling techniques.

Full details for ECON 7580 - Behavioral Economics I

Graduate students and the instructor present draft research proposals, papers, and preliminary thesis results for group review and discussion. Students who actively participate by offering written and oral comments on others' work receive 1 credit. Students who also present their own proposal or paper receive 2 credits. Presentations last 75 minutes and thus represent a substantial investment of time. Students who present a second proposal or paper receive 3 credits.

Full details for ECON 7650 - Development Microeconomics Graduate Research Seminar

This course will provide a selective overview of topics at the cutting-edge of academic research and policy debates about the international financial system. Main areas will include the effects of financial globalization on growth, volatility, and the transmission of business cycles. The course will also examine the determinants of the direction and composition of capital flows. It will then cover the causes and effects of the financial crisis and what implications it has for the research agenda in international finance and macroeconomics, with particular emphasis on the implications for monetary policy and financial regulation. This course is intended for advanced Ph.D. students, especially those in search of thesis topics, and will require extensive student involvement in preparing research proposals and critiques of existing literature. Students will develop their own research ideas during the course and are required to write a substantive research paper.

Full details for ECON 7670 - Topics in International Finance

Analytical approaches to the economics of developing nations and development processes. Topics include: introduction to development economics; distribution analysis: theory and evidence; modeling employment, unemployment, wages, and labor markets; and policy analysis for economic development.

Full details for ECON 7720 - Economics of Development

This course introduces graduate students to the main concepts and ideas of law and economics, founded on elementary game theory. These ideas are then applied to contemporary policy concerns, from promoting economic development and designing welfare interventions in developing countries, to controlling corruption and financial fraud. The defining feature of the course is the structuring of these topics within a common conceptual framework, and training students to develop these ideas further and apply them to new research questions.

Full details for ECON 7740 - Law and Economic Development: Game-Theoretic Analysis

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7841 - Econometrics Workshop

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7842 - Microeconomic Theory Workshop

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7843 - Industrial Organization Workshop

Presentations of completed papers and work in progress by faculty members, advanced graduate students, and speakers from other universities. Focuses on the formulation, design, and execution of dissertations.

Full details for ECON 7845 - Workshop in Labor Economics

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7846 - S.C. Tsiang Macroeconomics Workshop

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7847 - Development Workshop

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7848 - Public Economics Workshop

Research workshop featuring guest lecturers.

Full details for ECON 7849 - Behavioral Economics Workshop

Ph.D. students in the Field of Economics are required to take this year-long research seminar, and receive a grade of Satisfactory, in order to remain in good standing in the Ph.D. program. Students present and discuss each second-year paper, which must be completed before the semester opens and Economics 7850 meets for the first time. Students also present at least two additional papers or paper plans. These are intended to be part of the core of the student's thesis proposal, which must be given as part of the student's A Exam prior to the start of the fourth year of graduate study in the economics Ph.D. program. Economics 7851 ends with a mini-conference, attended by faculty and other Ph.D. students, in which each student makes a formal presentation in standard economics conference format, and each student discusses one of these presentations. Professional writing and presentation coaching is also provided.

Full details for ECON 7850 - Third Year Research Seminar