Economics 100B Honors

Winter 2009-2010

Monday 4:00pm-5:00pm in HSS 2321.

Course website: http://econ.ucsd.edu/~snali/ECO100BH.htm

Nageeb Ali    Office: ECON 214    Email: snali "@" ucsd.edu           

Course Content

This honors component is meant to accompany ECON 100B. My goal in teaching this course is to give you a sense of the power and beauty of economic reasoning. To that end, I will focus on an important issue that emerges in public policy and everyday life, namely discrimination and race. We will see through a series of papers that economics provides a unique lens to understand these issues, and suggests numerous ways to test, assess, and cope with discrimination.

You need to have taken the prerequisite courses listed in the UCSD catalog, and should be comfortable with microeconomics and calculus.  Let me emphasize this point: if you have trouble with basic calculus and statistics, this course may be inappropriate for you.  Talk to me at the beginning of the quarter if you are unsure about your preparation.

Structure of the Course

Since this course is an honors component, I intend to run it partly as a seminar, partly as an advanced elective. You will see that some of the lectures are marked simply with a paper, and others as being discussion. On the non-discussion days, I will present an hour long lecture based on that paper. Prior to my lecture, I expect that each of you will have read the paper carefully, and have come prepared with questions about it. I will then expect you to re-read the paper (several times if necessary) prior to the discussion, and then to play an active role in the discussion of each paper. Class participation generally will count for 50% of your grade.

The other 50% of your grade will come from a 3-5 page paper that you have to write on one of the two "topics," due on 1/24 or 2/21. You will have to submit that by 5pm on the day listed in the schedule below. Please submit it to me electronically in .pdf or Microsoft Word with a file name that corresponds to {Your last name_first name}. If your paper needs re-writing, I will return it to you with suggestions for you to re-write it. All final versions are due on 3/8.

I want you to think carefully about the issues we will study and to be an active participant in this course. Apart from the inherent importance of this topic, your ability to discuss complex issues in speech and writing will affect your life after UCSD. I recognize that the papers we will cover in class are not straightforward, and so being on top of this material will be hard work. I encourage you to make a list of questions that each paper raises in your mind, and to come to class with your questions. Given the advanced nature of this course, I would be delighted to write a letter of recommendation for you based on your performance here.

Since a large part of your grade is based on class participation, my expectation is that you do not miss classes.  If you need to miss a class meeting for any reason, please email me with your explanation as to why you will not be attending class.

Schedule of Topics and Lectures