Microeconomics studies how individuals, firms and governments make choices when faced with scarcity of resources.

Free online textbook: Microeconomics from OpenStax

Grades:  HWs (+course participation for group study students)  80%, 1 final project 20%.

Modules, readings, homeworks

1.   First principles, tradeoffs and choices    Ch. 1, 2

• Introduction to Microeconomics
• Scarcity & Choice – youtube 
• Resources-youtube
• Opportunity Cost – video
• Cost-benefit decision with Paul Solman – video
• Graph review – youtube
• Models & Theories -video
• The Hockey Stick of Human Prosperity
• Division of Labor: Burgers and Ships
• How the Division of Knowledge Saved My Son’s Life
• Intro to economics -educator.com
• Homework 1  – doc file

2.   Supply and demand  Ch.3

• Market in simple terms
• Demand – youtube
• Change in Demand vs Change in Quantity Demanded – youtube
• Supply – youtube
• Market Equilibrium – youtube
• The Demand Curve
• The Supply Curve
• The Equilibrium Price
• A Deeper Look at the Demand Curve
• The Demand Curve Shifts
• A Deeper Look at the Supply Curve
• The Supply Curve Shifts
• Exploring Equilibrium
• Does the Equilibrium Model Work?
• Supply and Demand Terminology
• Markets in Kidneys: A Moral Case
• I, Rose
• A Price Is a Signal Wrapped up in an Incentive 
• Markets Link the World
• The Great Economic Problem
• Information and Incentives
• Speculation
• Prediction Markets
• Homework 2 – doc file

3.  Price controls, taxes, consumer/producer surplus  Ch. 4   

• Price Ceilings
• Price Ceilings: Shortages and Quality Reduction
• Price Ceilings: Lines and Search Costs
• Price Ceilings: Deadweight Loss
• Price Ceilings: Misallocation of Resources
• Price Ceilings: Rent Controls
• Price Floors: The Minimum Wage
• Price Floors: Airline Fares
• Why Do Governments Enact Price Controls?
• Price Controls and Communism
• Consumer & producer surplus – Khan academy
• Price Floors and Price Ceilings – youtube
• Valuation – consumer surplus, willingness to pay
• Commodity Taxes
• Who Pays the Tax?
• Tax Revenue and Deadweight Loss
• Subsidies
• Wage Subsidies
• Deadweight loss – Khan academy
• Deadweight loss of a tax on a graph – video
• Is Santa a deadweight loss? – economist
• Price controls – crash course
• Homework 3 – doc

4.   Elasticity  Ch. 5

• Elasticity of Demand
• Calculating the Elasticity of Demand
• Elasticity of Supply
• Elasticity and Slave Redemption
• Applications Using Elasticity
• Price elasticity – youtube
• What determines elasticity – youtube
• Elasticity with Paul Solman – video
• How to calculate elasticity of demand – video
• Elastic Demand: Definition, Formula & Examples
• Inelastic Demand: Definition, Examples & Quiz
• Homework 4 – doc file

5.  Consumer choices  Ch. 10

• Diminishing Marginal Utility – video
• Consumer equilibrium – video
• Budget constraint – mru.org
• Introduction to Consumer Choice -mru.org
• Marginal utility and budget lines – Khan, watch entire module
• Thinking at the margin – learn liberty
• The science of persuasion – our behavior influenced by others
• Altruism– are we selfish creatures? vsauce
• Dan Ariely asks, Are we in control of our own decisions?  – TED

• 12 Cognitive Biases Explained – our biased decisions, 10min

• The Endowment Effect – one more bias

• Network externalities – affect our choices

• Homework 5  – doc file

6.  Cost and industry structure  Ch. 11

• Accounting Costs vs. Economic Costs – youtube
• Short Run vs. Long Run Production – youtube
• Producer Theory, profits – youtube
• Fixed and Variable Costs – youtube
• Cost Curves – youtube

• Production decisions and economic profit – khan module

• Diminishing returns – youtube
• Do we really need all those diagrams? -youtube
• Pizzanomics – NYTimes on costs of production of pizza
• Economies of scale and watermelons -video
• McDonald’s game – example of a production process
• Homework 6 

7.     Perfect Competition  Ch. 12    

• Market Structures  -video
• Revenue, profits, price – crash course
• Perfect Competition – youtube
• Maximizing Profits – youtube
• Introduction to the Competitive Firm
• Maximizing Profit Under Competition
• Maximizing Profit and the Average Cost Curve

• Entry, Exit, and Supply Curves: Increasing Costs
• Entry, Exit, and Supply Curves: Constant Costs
• Entry, Exit, and Supply Curves: Decreasing Costs
• Perfect competition at Khan Academy -khan
• Minimization of Total Industry Costs of Production -mr
• The Balance of Industries and Creative Destruction -mr
• Homework 7

8.  Monopolistic competition, monopoly, pricing   Ch. 13,15,16

• Monopoly -youtube
• Deadweight Loss from Monopoly -youtube
• Maximizing Profit Under Monopoly -mr
• The Monopoly Markup -mr
• The Costs and Benefits of Monopoly -mr
• Monopoly module – Khan Academy
• Double monopoly – mr, example, applications
• New products often die – example of Google
• Monopolistic Competition   -youtube
• Introduction to Price Discrimination -mr
• The Social Welfare of Price Discrimination -mr
• Tying -mr
• Bundling -mr
• Levmore: Monopolies as an Intro to Economics -44min film
• Homework 8   

9.  Oligopoly, market concentration Ch. 14,15

• Oligopolies and monopolistic competition – khan module
• Oligopoly – video
• Collusion -video
• Office Hours: Game Theory – mr, Nash equilibrium
• Game theory and Nash equilibrium  – Khan
• Why parties in a cartel will cheat – Khan
• The Individual and The Group – Prisoner’s dilemma explained
• Youtube : Clip from  “A Beautiful Mind”
• David Levine’s What is Game Theory? – UCLA
• Why do competitors open their stores next to one another? video
• Mergers  -youtube
• Antitrust -youtube
• Regulation and monopoly –  video
• Natural Monopoly – need Government Regulation– youtube
• Homework 9

10. Externalities and public goods  

• Public goods – youtube
• Public vs. Private Goods – video
• Market failure, takes, subsidies – crash course
• Tragedy of the commons – youtube
• Externalities: When a Potato Chip Not Just a Potato Chip?-liberty
• Negative Externalities  – with graph
• Externalities – youtube
• Market Failures – youtube
• An Introduction to Externalities – mru
• External Benefits – mru
• Command and Control Solutions – mru
• The Coase Theorem – mru
• Trading Pollution – mru
• A Deeper Look at Tradable Allowances – mru
• Externalities and Incentives: The Economics of COVID – mru
• Public Goods and Asteroid Defense – mru
• Deeper Look at Public Goods -mru
• Club Goods -mru
• The Tragedy of the Commons – mru
• Homework 10 – doc

11.  Final project .

• Final project – doc

************************************************************************** Other resources

• 10 principles of economics translated by a standup economist
• Context-rich problems
• Economic thoughts of the day – Hamermesh
• Freakonomics reading – doc file
• http://www.perfectcompetition.net/ – online game
• Marginal Revolution – many videos and questions with answers
• The Atlantic – business section
• Bloomberg news – free news source
• WSJ Real Time Economics blog
• Freakonomics -podcasts
• We the economy – short films