Course Catalogue

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This course aims to give students a thorough grounding in undergraduate microeconomic theory, which focuses on understanding the role of price system in resource allocation and its limitations. It covers consumer theory, producer theory, general equilibrium, partial equilibrium, monopoly, public goods, externalities and market failure, efficiency and fairness.

Lectures: Monday 2.00 - 4.00pm

Tutorials are held at various times and can be selected on MyCampus

Students who are permitted to take Honours level courses in Economics and also meet the following criteria:

■ Studying in Glasgow during semester 1 only as part of an exchange programme

■ Junior Honours students who are studying abroad in semester 2

■ Senior Honours students enrolled on an assessment-only basis, following completion of course in previous session

ECON4020 Microeconomic Analysis: General Equilibrium, Public Decision and Information

1 in course exam (30%), 1 degree exam (70%)

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. For non-Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below. 

The main aims of this course are

■ To provide students with a thorough grounding in advanced undergraduate microeconomic theory.

■ To expose students to modern debates in economic theory in its central issues on the role of price system in resource allocation.

■ To provide students with the background in economic theory to enable them to take advanced courses in the theory of economic policy and contemporary economic policy

■ To allow students to develop skills in manipulating basic economic models for policy applications

By the end of this course students should be able to:

■ Apply the economic theory models in the course to address contemporary questions in the theory of economic policy

■ Be able to manipulate formal models as simplified representations of reality to generate policy predictions

■ Present logical and well-argued written outlines of economic models

■ Explain, in non-technical language, key implications of theoretical models for modern debates in economic policy

■ Explain key results in advanced modern microeconomic theory

■ Demonstrate how game theory can be used to generate predictions of particular economic outcomes

■ Demonstrate how economic models are used to develop and understand competition policy

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