Location:   ECON 117
Time:        Monday, Wednesday, Friday  1:00-1:50 p.m.

Anna Rubinchik-Pessach 
Assistant Professor

Office location: Econ 121
Office hours: Monday and Friday 2:00-3:00 p.m. or by appointment
e-mail: Anna.Rubinchik@spot.colorado.edu

Course description.
We will focus on the way people make decisions. Developing appropriate language and tools to tackle this question will enable us to analyze consumer and producer behavior. Understanding their interaction on the market is the main objective of the course. We will concentrate on  purely competitive markets. Imperfect competition environments with a few producers or consumers will be introduced briefly. The role of institutions in allocation of resources will be emphasized.

Prerequisites: ECON 1000 OR 2010 AND EITHER ECON 1078-1088 OR MATH 1300 OR EQUIVALENT
Students not meeting the pre-requisites will be administratively dropped from the course.

Texts

Grading

Homework assignments 10%
Quizzes 10%
Midterm 30%
Final exam 50%

You are welcome to form study groups and discuss homework assignments, but you should write and submit your own (original) work.
As for the exams and the quizzes, any form of collaboration is prohibited.

You are strongly encouraged to read the relevant chapter before we discuss it in class. This will help you  to master the concepts you will encounter in class. Besides, it will ease your preparation for the quizzes. Quizzes are short (15 minute) multiple choice tests given once in three or four weeks on Fridays, in class. They are mainly devoted to checking your understanding of core definitions.
It is important to practice solving problems in this course. Homework assignments will be given out every Wednesday, (unless announced otherwise) and will be due Friday, class time,  the week after, i.e., in 10 days. On the Friday the assignment is due we will solve it  in class. This is why any late submission will receive no credit.
Exams (midterm and final) will have both multiple choice and essay questions. The format of the questions will be similar to quizzes and homework assignments correspondingly.

Students with documented disabilities who may need academic accommodations should speak with the professor during first two weeks of the class (no later than September 10). Please, see also the Coordinator of Services to students with disabilities in the Disability Services Office, Willard 322 (phone 303-492-8671), so that such accommodations may be arranged.

Course Outline

Part 1. CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND PRODUCTION

Weeks 1,2	Preferences and Utility	Chapters 3, 4
Weeks 3,4	The Theory of Demand	Chapter 5
Week 5	Production and Technology	Chapter 6
Week 6, 7	Costs Minimization, Cost Curves	Chapters 7, 8
Weeks 8	Perfectly Competitive Markets	Chapter 9

MIDTERM EXAM is on Friday, October 15 at the regular class time. The exam covers chapters 3-8.

Part 2. FIRMS AND MARKET STRUCTURE

Week 9	Perfectly Competitive Markets: Applications	Chapter 10
Week 10	Monopoly	Chapter 11
Weeks 12,13	Elements of Game Theory and Strategic Behavior with Applications to Market Structure and Composition	Chapters 14, 13

Part 3. GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM AND WELFARE

Weeks 14-16

General Equilibrium, Welfare and Equity.

Chapter 16

FINAL EXAM is on Wednesday, December 15, 10:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. The exam covers chapters 10,11,14,13,16.