Graduate Course Offerings for Economics

2007-2008 Graduate Catalog

Economics Graduate Course Offerings from Online Catalog

402. COMPARATIVE LABOR RELATIONS (3). Patterns of industrial relations systems in European and selected emerging economies. Scope of collective bargaining and social welfare legislation. Cooperation between the various national labor movements. PRQ: ECON 300; ECON 360 or ECON 361; or consent of department.

403. ECONOMICS OF HUMAN RESOURCES (3). Analysis of factors affecting demand for and supply of labor. Human capital analysis, discrimination, labor market operations, and public policy. PRQ: ECON 360 or consent of department.

420. ANTITRUST ECONOMICS (3). Detailed analysis of monopoly, near monopoly, and various business practices. Examination of legal and economic foundations of current and past public policies toward monopoly. PRQ: ECON 360 or consent of department.

423. PUBLIC UTILITIES (3). General economic characteristics of an governmental policy toward public utilities. Problems such as pricing, finance, and private, cooperative, and public ownership. PRQ: Econ 360 or consent of department.

425. ECONOMIC EDUCATION (1-3). Exploration of selected economic concepts, topics, and classroom materials/applications to assist elementary or secondary teachers in developing K-12 economics curricula and instructional activities that meet the State of Illinois Standards. Not open for credit toward the M.A. or Ph.D. in economics. May be repeated to a maximum of 3 semester hours when topic varies. PRQ: Consent of department.

443. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT (3). Analysis of major problems and issues of a theoretical and a policy nature concerning developing economies. PRQ: ECON 360 or ECON 361, or consent of department.

450. PUBLIC ECONOMICS (3). Analysis of the structure and effects of the national, state, and local revenue and outlay systems. PRQ: ECON 360 or consent of department.

452. FISCAL POLICY (3). Examination of the role of the federal budget in fiscal policy. Public expenditures, taxes, and debt management are evaluated as tools of economic stabilization since World War II. PRQ: ECON 361 or consent of department.

454. STATE AND LOCAL FINANCE (3). Analysis of the expenditure-revenue process in state and local governments. The effect of intergovernmental grants and the future of fiscal federalism. PRQ: ECON 360 or consent of department.

466. BUSINESS CYCLES (3). History of business fluctuations; theories and techniques of analysis; countercyclical monetary and fiscal policies; and survey of selected forecasting techniques. PRQ: ECON 361 or consent of department.

470. HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT (3). Development of economic thought to the mid-19th century. Emphasis on Adam Smith, Ricardo, Malthus, Mill, and Marx. PRQ: ECON 260 and ECON 261, or consent of department.

471. MODERN ECONOMIC THOUGHT (3). Evolution of neoclassical and modern theories of value, distribution, and income. Emphasis on Walras, Menger, Jevons, Marshall, Chamberlain, Robinson, and Keynes. PRQ: ECON 260 and ECON 261 or consent of department.

474. ECONOMIC HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES (3). Evolution and development of American economic institutions and processes from colonial times to the 20th century. Modern economic approach developed and applied to various topics. PRQ: ECON 260 and ECON 261, or consent of department.

485. URBAN ECONOMIC PROBLEMS AND POLICIES (3). Economic analysis of urban growth and land use and selected urban problems such as urban transportation, public finance, housing, poverty, and environmental quality. PRQ: ECON 360 and ECON 385; or consent of department.

489. SEMINAR IN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS (3). Economic analysis of a topic beyond the level usually reached in undergraduate courses. Examples of topics include aspects of economic growth and development, industrial organization, international economics, labor economics, health economics, monetary economics, public finance, agricultural economics, quantitative economics, financial economics, and economic theory. May be repeated to a maximum of 6 semester hours when topics change. PRQ: ECON 360, ECON 361, and MATH 211 or MATH 229 or consent of department.

490. ECONOMIC STATISTICS AND ECONOMETRICS (3). Topics include descriptive statistics, probability, estimation, hypothesis testing, correlation, and regression analysis, as applied to economic models. PRQ: MATH 230 or consent of department.

491. MATHEMATICAL METHODS FOR ECONOMICS (3). Mathematical methods used in economics with applications. PRQ: ECON 360, ECON 361, and MATH 229, or consent of department.

493. SEMINAR IN POLITICAL ECONOMY (3). Crosslisted as POLS 493X.
A. Decision Making in the Public Sector
B. International Relations
C. Metropolitan Studies
D. Human Resources and Training Policy
Selected topics in political economy, offered jointly by the Departments of Political Science and Economics. Topics announced. Each lettered topic may be taken once. PRQ: Consent of department.

495. SEMINAR IN CURRENT PROBLEMS (3). Issues and policies in government, politics, and economics. Course may be repeated without limit for each new topic, but each topic may be repeated only once. PRQ: Consent of department.

496X. HISTORY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE INSTRUCTION IN GRADES 6-12 (3). Crosslisted as HIST 496. The organization and presentation of materials for history and social science courses at the middle school, junior high, and senior high school levels. PRQ: Admission to the history or social science teacher certification program and permission of Department of History’s office of teacher certification.

497. INDEPENDENT STUDY IN ECONOMICS (3). Individually arranged study within the various fields of economics. Not open to economics graduate students. PRQ: ECON 360 and ECON 361, or consent of department.

500. LABOR MARKET ANALYSIS I (3). Wage, employment, and human resource theory, empirical findings, and policy implications. Emphasis on human capital, household production, discrimination, and other sources of wage and employment difference. PRQ: ECON 360 and consent of department.

501. LABOR MARKET ANALYSIS II (3). Various theories of unemployment. Collective bargaining analysis. The economic impact of unions on prices, productivity, wages, and resource allocation. Collective bargaining and wage theory. The economic impact of unions. PRQ: ECON 360 and consent of department.

512. MONETARY THEORY (3). Theoretical and empirical analysis of supply of and demand for money; interrelationships between money and interest, prices, and output, with particular attention to monetary aspects of macroeconomic theory. PRQ: Consent of department.

513. MONETARY POLICY (3). Objectives and instruments of monetary policy and the supply of money, alternative monetary models, and the effectiveness and incidence of monetary policy. PRQ: Consent of department.

521. STRUCTURE OF INDUSTRY (3). Analysis of the determinants of the number of sellers in an industry, and whether industries with few sellers are less competitive, more profitable, or more innovative than those with a large number of sellers. PRQ: ECON 490 and ECON 560, or consent of department.

522. INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION (3). Analysis of contracts between traders, including vertical integration, price discrimination, tying contracts, requirements contracts, resale price maintenance, market division, and exclusive dealing. Additional topics include antitrust policy, patents, and other issues in law and economics. PRQ: ECON 490 and ECON 560, or consent of department.

525. TOPICS IN ECONOMIC EDUCATION (1-3). Designed to assist elementary or secondary teachers with the integration of economics into the K-12 classroom curricula, focusing on the economic concepts in the State of Illinois Learning Standards. Not open for credit toward the M.A. or Ph.D. in economics. May be repeated to a maximum of 12 semester hours when topic varies. PRQ: Econ 425 or consent of department.

530. INTERNATIONAL TRADE THEORY (3). PRQ: ECON 560 or consent of department.

532. INTERNATIONAL MONETARY ECONOMICS (3). PRQ: ECON 561 or consent of department.

540. THEORIES OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT (3). Analytical approach to problems and obstacles to economic development in emerging societies: population problems, capital formation, investment criteria, structural and technical change, sectoral analysis, foreign trade, and others. PRQ: ECON 560 or consent of department.

548. INTRODUCTION TO GAME THEORY (3). An introduction to the tools and application of game theory. Topics considered include concepts of equilibrium; information; dynamic games; evolutionary games; reputation and repeated games; the folk theorem; perfect Bayesian equilibria; common knowledge; moral hazard; adverse selection; signaling in education; bargaining games. PRQ: ECON 560 or consent of department.

550. ECONOMICS OF THE PUBLIC SECTOR (3). Economic nature of government services, public sector decision making, welfare and efficiency criteria in financing these services, and interrelationships of the public and private sectors. PRQ: ECON 360 or consent of department.

551. FINANCING GOVERNMENT ACTIVITIES (3). Budgetary policy, evaluation of different forms of taxation, pricing of government services, public borrowing and debt management, and programs of tax reform. PRQ: ECON 360 or consent of department.

560. MICROECONOMIC ANALYSIS I (3). Domestic and international price systems with regard to resource allocation, welfare, and income distribution. Brief introduction to concepts involved in input-output analysis and linear programming. PRQ: ECON 360 and ECON 491T, or consent of department.

561. MACROECONOMIC ANALYSIS I (3). Factors determining levels of aggregate income, employment, and prices. PRQ: ECON 360, ECON 361, and ECON 491T, or consent of department.

564. SURVEY OF MARKET ECONOMICS (3). Prices, output, distribution, and industrial efficiency in alternative input and output markets; structural maladjustments, employment, and inflation; government-business relations and government-labor relations; international prices; alternative economic systems. Not open to students who are economics majors or students who have taken ECON 360 or its equivalent. PRQ: Consent of department.

565. SURVEY OF INCOME ECONOMICS (3). Income, employment, prices and their determinants, theories of consumption, investment, taxation, fiscal, monetary and financial institutions and practices. Government debt, exchange rates, and balance of payments as influences on levels of economic activity. Not open to students who are economics
majors or students who have taken ECON 361 or its equivalent. PRQ: Consent of department.

570. HISTORY OF ECONOMIC ANALYSIS I (3). Detailed treatment of the development of tools and concepts of theoretical economics up to the decline of the classical school. PRQ: Consent of department.

571. HISTORY OF ECONOMIC ANALYSIS II (3). Continuation of ECON 570 beyond the classical school to the analytics of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. PRQ: ECON 570 or consent of department.

585. REGIONAL ECONOMICS (3). Interregional trade and factor mobility, regional economic growth, economic analysis of industrial location, and quantitative methods useful in urban and regional planning with some computer applications. PRQ: Consent of department.

586. URBAN ECONOMICS (3). Economic analysis of urban location and land use, urban economic growth, and problems of urban transportation, public finance, and housing. Quantitative methods of urban analysis useful in urban planning, with some computer applications. PRQ: Consent of department.

590. ECONOMETRICS I (3). Specification and estimation of economic models with emphasis on single equation models. PRQ: ECON 360, ECON 361 and ECON 490, or consent of department. CRQ: ECON 590A.

590A. ECONOMETRICS LABORATORY (1). Use of various statistical and matrix language computer packages pertaining to econometrics. Topics include the use of such packages to perform regression, GLS, nonlinear regression, simultaneous equations, and a wide variety of other econometric techniques. CRQ: ECON 590 or consent of department.

595. SPECIAL TOPICS IN ECONOMICS (3). Topics not dealt with in other courses. May be repeated to a maximum of 6 semester hours as topic varies. PRQ: ECON 560 and ECON 561, or consent of department.

597. ECONOMIC RESEARCH PRACTICUM (3). Use of empirical data, statistical techniques (and computer software programs), and economic theory to do research needed by a business firm, government agency, or other economic organization, especially in the labor, public finance, and financial economics areas. Technical and non-technical report writing. PRQ: Consent of department. Recommended: ECON 590.

598. INDEPENDENT STUDY IN ECONOMICS (3).
A. Economic Growth and Development
B. Economic History
C. History of Economic Analysis
D. Industrial Organization
E. International Economics
G. Labor Economics
J. Monetary Economics
K. Public Finance
M. Quantitative Economics
N. Urban and Regional Economics
Q. Financial Economics
Each topic may be repeated to a maximum of 6 semester hours. PRQ: Consent of department.

599A. MASTER’S RESEARCH COMPONENT: MASTER’S THESIS (1-6). May be repeated to a maximum of 6 semester hours.

599B. MASTER’S RESEARCH COMPONENT: MASTER’S RESEARCH PAPER (3).

600. SEMINAR IN APPLIED LABOR ECONOMICS AND LABOR RELATIONS (3). The economics of labor and of labor-management relations. Emphasis on individual research. With consent of department, may be repeated once for credit. PRQ: Consent of department.

640. FINANCIAL ECONOMICS (3). Introduction to and survey of theoretical and empirical research in modern financial markets with focus on infinite horizon models of capital accumulation, risk sharing, and asset pricing in the context of complete and incomplete markets. Principal-agency problems, signaling and financial intermediation issues. Additional topics may include market microstructure, the roles of taxes, and optimal security design. PRQ: ECON 560 and ECON 590.

642. THE ECONOMICS OF CONTINGENT CLAIMS (3). Advanced analysis of markets for contingent claims, the derivative markets. Introduction to elements of stochastic calculus, dynamic portfolio choice, the Black-Scholes Model and extensions, the term structure of interest rates, American and European option pricing, and, if time permits, the Heath-Jarrow-Morton Model and exotic options. Advanced mathematical and computational techniques applied to the study of derivative markets. PRQ: ECON 560, ECON 590, and FINA 455, or consent of department.

650. SEMINAR IN APPLIED PUBLIC ECONOMICS (3). Theory and institutional aspects of public finance. Emphasis on microeconomic problems as they relate to public finance. With consent of department, may be repeated once for credit. PRQ: Consent of department.

660. MICROECONOMIC ANALYSIS II (3). Continuation of ECON 560 including new and advanced topics. PRQ: Consent of department. Recommended: ECON 560.

661. MACROECONOMIC ANALYSIS II (3). Continuation of ECON 561 including new and advanced topics. PRQ: Consent of department. Recommended: ECON 561.

685. SEMINAR IN APPLIED URBAN AND REGIONAL ECONOMICS (3). Selected topics in urban and regional economics. May be repeated once for credit, with consent of department. PRQ: Consent of department.

690. ECONOMETRICS II (3). Specification and estimation of simultaneous economic models. PRQ: Consent of department. Recommended: ECON 590.

693. SEMINAR IN QUANTITATIVE ECONOMICS (3). Application of mathematical and statistical techniques to the analysis of economic problems. May be repeated once for credit. PRQ: Consent of department.

695. INTERNSHIP IN ECONOMICS (2-15). May be repeated to a maximum of 15 semester hours. PRQ: Written consent of department Graduate Committee.

698. CURRENT RESEARCH COLLOQUIUM (1). Discussion by faculty and graduate students of their current research. Doctoral students must satisfactorily complete at least 6 semester hours, at least 2 of which must be taken after passing the candidacy examinations. A maximum of 6 semester hours can be applied towards the doctoral degree. S/U grading. PRQ: Consent of department.

699. DOCTORAL RESEARCH AND DISSERTATION (1-15). May be
repeated to a maximum of 32 semester hours.