11 - 20 of 173 results for: ECON

Progress is humanity's defining achievement: the cumulative process of each generation building on the knowledge of the last. It came slowly at first - millennia from foraging to settled agriculture, centuries from agriculture to industry - then astonishingly fast. But progress has not been shared equally. Every great leap forward created winners and losers. In this course, we explore what drives progress, what determines who gets to benefit from it, and what we can do to promote broadly shared progress. We trace the tension between progress and inequality from forager societies to Artificial Intelligence, using tools from economic history, applied microeconomics, and data analysis. Students read frontier research and popular writing. They will work with historical and contemporary datasets. The centerpiece is a storytelling project: using AI tools, you will build an interactive visual essay that brings one aspect of progress to life for a broad audience. You pick the topic. Make it worth reading. Coding skills, experience with empirical analysis, and a willingness to engage with AI tools like Cursor are required. Enrollment is by application only (See https://economics.stanford.edu/undergraduate/forms).

This multidisciplinary class is an exploration of the background of today's bestselling medicines, their huge commercial impact, and the companies that created them. It focuses on the most compelling aspects of drug development and company formation in the context of topical issues like cancer treatment, gene editing, stem cell therapy, the obesity and opioid epidemics and Covid-19.Special focus will be given to valuing assets and companies in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. We will read everything from scientific papers to business school cases as we explore these interesting issues. We will have occasional guests from industry, the investment community, and related fields to aid us in our study. Prerequisites: ECON 102A or any equivalent stats course. Enrollment in this course is by application only. Interested students should apply through the Undergraduate Forms page on the Economics Department Website: https://economics.stanford.edu/undergraduate/forms.

This course covers the foundations of experimental methodology in economics. The course stresses the interaction of theory and experiment, seeking to relate questions in the theory of markets, games, and decision making to aspects in experimental design, analysis and interpretation of results. After an initial overview devoted to experimental methodology, these broad themes are developed by discussing a series of established economics experiments. The course uses a combination of hands-on learning through classroom activities as well as roundtable discussions of assigned readings and current issues. It covers behavioral economics topics such as trust,  reciprocity, risk taking, bargaining, public goods, market design, auctions, theories of fairness and learning, social issues like discrimination and behavioral gender differences, voting, and neuroeconomics. Prerequisites: ECON 1 or Instructor Permission.

This course will provide an introduction to applied microeconomics and data analysis. The course material will derive from academic journal articles on a variety of fun topics, such as penalty kicks in soccer, copyright law for opera, and the economic costs of the Mafia. Students will learn to interpret regression equations, tables, figures, and other results from academic papers. The course will teach very basic regression tools and skills for implementing these tools in R. Students will be required to complete three problem sets involving coding in R, along with weekly write-ups about the topics covered. Prerequisite: Econ 1

The success and fate of democracies around the world rely on citizens' engagement and participation during elections of government officials: presidents, members of parliaments or councils, governors, attorneys general, judges, sheriffs, etc.  Since direct democracies where everyone gathers to discuss and make decisions are costly, inefficient and often simply impossible, representative democracies that pass laws and grant executive authority to elected representatives depend on the wisdom of the electorate to choose effective leaders.  This course will focus on one of the most critical duties of citizens in a democracy - a duty of voting. It will cover principles of voter behavior, common electoral systems, election campaigns and finance, election logistics, referenda, role of media and disinformation, citizenship in the Digital Age, and other election-related topics. The course will use an economic lens to explain observed behavior and election outcomes. The course will also explore various approaches to enact desired change in status quo through voting and elected leaders at local, national and global levels. Taking this course should prepare students to be more effective as citizens, critical thinkers and change makers.

The purpose of this course is for you to obtain both a broad overview of the role of finance in society and your role in it, and a degree of greater comfort that you know how to approach the major financial decisions you will confront. Your journey through life will require many financial decisions, some easily predictable now, that will heavily influence the quality of your life, your financial security, your ability to withstand unanticipated burdens arising from the vagaries of your and your family's lives, and to keep open desirable options on how you lead your life. The course will use a variety of approaches to illustrate and analyze archetypical situations, emphasizing both sound decisions and financial mistakes that are all too common and can have major damaging results. From illustrative examples and case studies, to historical and statistical evidence and some simple analytical tools, the course is designed to help you develop some straightforward understanding of basic financial concepts, the people and institutions you will interact with in making such decisions, and advantages and disadvantages of alternative approaches for individuals and society. Topics include making a financial plan and budget, managing money, obtaining and using credit and loans, saving, investing in stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs, and other assets, venture capital and private equity, purchasing insurance, purchasing vs. renting a home, getting a mortgage, taxes, inflation and inflation protection, financial markets and more. This course must be taken for a minimum of 3 units to be eligible for Ways credit.

The purpose of the class is to introduce you to the modern financial system. What are the major financial instruments -- bonds, bank loans and also equity - and how are their prices determined. What are the key financial institutions that lend, provide liquidity and make markets. What role does the government play through regulation, monetary policy and special intervention in crisis time. We'll devote particular attention to the payments system: how do households and firms make payments, how do financial institutions organize these payments, and how could this business change with potential entry of new digital currencies, provided by central banks or the private sector. This course is intended for freshmen and sophomores. Prerequisites: Econ 1 is recommended.

Two threads are interwoven: why social and economic networks have special features, and how those features shape power, opinions, opportunities, and behaviors. Some of the topics included are: the different ways in which a person's position in a network determines their influence; which systematic errors people make when forming opinions based on what they learn from others; how financial contagions work and why are they different from the spread of a flu; the role of splits in our social networks in inequality, immobility, and polarization; and how network patterns of trade and globalization have changed international conflict and wars. The course requires analyzing network data, which will be provided. Knowledge of matrix algebra will be assumed as well as knowledge of statistics at a level of at least Econ 102A or equivalent.

This class will apply tools from economics and related social sciences to study the functioning of digital and traditional media markets and their impact on society. The guiding question will be: when and how do media best serve the social good? Topics will include the economics of two-sided markets, advertising, tech regulation, media bias, polarization, misinformation, social media, digital addiction, propaganda, race, gender, and the role of media in autocracy, corruption, protests and censorship. The course will give students a non-technical introduction to social science empirical methods, including regression analysis, experimental and quasi-experimental methods, and machine learning. Prerequisites: Introductory economics (e.g., AP economics or ECON 1), introductory statistics/econometrics (e.g., AP statistics, ECON 102a, or STATS 60), and some prior exposure to programming.