Economics Department

Department of Economics Handbook: An Explanation of the Curriculum

The curriculum is designed to give students both depth and breadth in economics. Students first see economics in one of the Principles of Economics courses. These courses are broad surveys and cater to a wide audience. They introduce students to the basic topics in economics. One of these courses will also be the only economics course a majority of William and Mary students take. Their level of analytical rigor is therefore designed to challenge but not overwhelm the average William & Mary student.

There are many 300-level courses that have as a prerequisite only Principles of Economics as a prerequisite. These courses use the tools introduced in the 100-level courses while focusing on a particular sector of the economy or method of analysis. They include, among others, Money and Banking, the Public Sector, Environmental Economics, Mathematical Economics, Economic History, Economic Development, Government Regulation, Comparative Economics, International Economics, Urban Economics, and occasional courses taught by visiting faculty such as Global Warming and Law and Economics. These courses are designed to be accessible to students who have succeeded in Principles and who want to study a particular part of the economy in more depth, and for those students who would like more insight into the nature of the discipline in determining a major or minor.

Three of the 300-level courses Economics 303 (Intermediate Microeconomic Theory), Economics 304 (Intermediate Macroeconomic Theory), Economics 307 (Principles and Methods of Statistics) are different. The two Intermediate economic theory courses cover the same basic topics introduced in the corresponding Principles courses. The difference in these courses is the rigor of the analysis. The intermediate economic theory courses are the place where the distinction between economics majors and students who have taken some economics is most obvious. In these courses we teach the kind of thinking that is required to perform economic analysis. The statistics course introduces students to the process by which economic data are collected and analyzed and how these data are used to test hypotheses generated by economic models. These three courses, 303, 304 and 307, are essential to understanding economics in depth and are therefore required.

The 400-level courses in economics are designed to give students opportunities to apply the tools learned in the intermediate theory courses to specific areas or topics (Advanced Microeconomics and Macroeconomics, Advanced Econometrics, Labor Market Analysis, Law and Economics, Industrial Organization, International Trade and Development, and others). These courses differ from the 300 level courses, essentially in the analytical level of the discussion.

To summarize, the economics major is exposed to the basic overview of economics in Principles, sees it again in a more rigorous and analytical way in the Intermediate Theory courses, and then, depending on the major's particular interests, will see many of the same concepts in greater detail in specialized 300 or 400 level courses. This repetition is intentional. Most economics topics (e.g. inflation, discrimination in labor markets, pollution, and barriers to free trade) are complex and can be discussed at several levels. It is important for citizens, i.e. Principles students who will not concentrate, to understand economic thinking behind these topics. This gets us through the topics once. Economics majors need to understand more completely the structure and rationale for models that can be used to analyze economic phenomena. This process will take us through several topics again in more depth. Somewhere along the way the economics concentrator should have developed an interest in particular topics. In the specialized courses students will see some topics for the third time. Finally, we hope that a particular aspect of some problem will fascinate a student enough that she or he will choose to pursue an honors project or independent study project.

Mathematics and Economics
Economic theories are often expressed most effectively using formal mathematics, and graduate school in economics requires a considerable investment in formal mathematics training. Undergraduate Economics training can be presented with varying amounts of mathematical sophistication. The undergraduate curriculum at William & Mary is designed to accommodate both students who are comfortable with formal mathematics and those who are not. It is impossible to teach economics without using algebra, and we will assume that all students at William & Mary know basic algebra. Beyond that, exposure to formal mathematics, particularly calculus, is at the discretion of the student.

We strongly encourage students, particularly those potentially interested in graduate training in economics, but including those who might want to go on to graduate programs in Public Policy, Business, or Urban Planning, to consider taking more mathematics as undergraduates. For graduate school in economics, Mathematics 111 and 112 (Calculus), Mathematics 211 (Linear Algebra), and Mathematics 212 (Multivariate Calculus) are strongly recommended. Mathematics is essentially a language, a very precise language, and many advanced economic theories are best expressed using this language.

Finally, Economics 307 (Statistics) is essentially an applied mathematics course designed specifically for the economics major. Understanding the way data are used to test economic theories requires one to understand basic probability theory and to know the details of some commonly encountered probability distributions. Some of the topics are covered in courses in the mathematics department, but they are not covered with a view toward their application to economics. The Statistics course is taught by the economics department in a way that algebra is the only requirement, but more mathematics generally aids the understanding of the material.

In sum, we recommend, but do not require, that economics majors take mathematics at least through basic calculus.