2016-17 Academic Catalog

In this topics-based seminar, we explore the economics and business of professional sports, mostly (but by no means necessarily entirely) in the United States. We will examine a variety of topics, including the institutions that govern pro sports and its main interested parties, especially owners, professional athletes, fans, media, and local municipalities. To better understand these institutions, we apply models from various traditional fields in economics including industrial organization, labor economics, public finance, and behavioral economics. The ultimate objective is to achieve an advanced understanding of the sports industry, and to understand how economists use economic models to develop hypotheses testable with sports data.

Prerequisite: Economics 330, 331; Concurrent or previous enrollment in Economics 329

This seminar-style course focuses on the empirical analysis of topics in housing economics. Specific areas of study depend on student interest, but may include: determinants of housing supply and demand, hedonic analysis, land use regulation, rent control, spatial segregation, housing policy, housing as an investment, and the recent subprime mortgage crisis. Class time is primarily devoted to student-led presentation and discussion of peer-reviewed journal articles. Prerequisite: Economics 329, 330, and 331, or instructor permission

This course will introduce students to vector autoregression (VAR) techniques to analyze macroeconomic time-series data. Possible applications of VAR analysis include  (but are not limited to): the time series dynamics of GDP, interest rates, carbon emissions, and energy prices. Prerequisite: Economics 330, 331; Concurrent or previous enrollment in Economics 329