Core courses
Credits

Description:
The intention of the course is to familiarize students with the standard tool of modern economic theory and to train them in applying these tools to actual economic problems. It is particularly devoted to market failures and welfare economics. The first part (Part III in MWG) outlines properties of competetive markets and welfare analysis in a partial equilibrium context. It then focuses on the three classical contidions under which market outcomes lead to an inefficient allocation of resources: externalities,
imperfect competition and asymmetric information. The second part (Part V in MWG) addresses fundamental issues of welfare economics from the perspective of a policy maker who desingns and implements collective decisions. It focuses in particular on social choice theory, the foundations of bargaining and welfare economics, and mechanism design. The course addresses these issue both from a positive and normative perspective.

Literature:
Mas-Colell, Whinston, and Green (1995), Microeconomic Theory (MWG), Part III and Part V

Time & venue:
Lectures: Mondays, 12:00-16:00; different locations: April to May 2023 = ESMT Berlin, Schloßplatz 1, room tba; May to July 2023 = HU Berlin, Spandauer Str. 1, room 203
Tutorials: Thursdays, 12:00-14:00; HU Berlin, Spandauer Str. 1, room 21b

Exam:
Written exam (90 min)

More information can be found on Moodle.