Intermediate Microeconomics

Catalog description

This course introduces the major concepts and tools of modern microeconomic analysis. Students will study the manner in which consumers, producers and resource owners, acting through markets, determine the prices and output of goods and the allocation of productive resources. Consumers and producers are viewed as agents with well-defined objectives, choosing optimally under constraints on their resources. The price mechanism is viewed as an institution that disseminates information to decision makers - firms and consumers - and coordinates their behavior. Students will study circumstances under which markets promote an efficient allocation of resources, as well as sources of market failure where the price mechanism can lead to inefficient outcomes.