Economics elective courses, Fall 2024
The Department of Economics offers the following ECON elective courses during the Fall 2024. For information about delivery mode, location, instructor names, and prerequisites, please refer to the course schedule accessible via the Student Hub.
The prerequisites for the following 300-level courses are ECON 201 and 203.
ECON 318 Canadian Economic Policy and Institutions
This course focuses on economic policies and institutions related to contemporary issues in the domestic economy. It is guided by the application of economic principles to such issues as regional disparities, income distribution and inequality, intra‑provincial trade, social security policies, welfare programs, foreign ownership and control, competition policy, government regulation of business, unemployment, inflation, and environmental policy.
ECON 319 International Economic Policy and Institutions
This course focuses on economic policies and institutions related to issues such as protectionism, regionalism, and globalization. Selected topics in exchange rate and currency convertibility, liberalization of economic systems, and international economic development are also covered.
ECON 330 Economics in Practice
This course relies on concepts used in managerial economics, applied microeconomics, public economics, applied statistics, and industrial organization to examine how economists approach and think about real‑world problems. The course is organized around the setting that students are employees of a consulting firm hired to provide timely advice on pressing issues.
ECON 331 Money and Banking
Overview of a monetary economy: nature, forms, and the economic role of money. Monetary standards: markets, prices, and the value of money; the payments system; financial markets. Determinants of size and distribution of wealth portfolios. Supply of money: measure, composition, and size determination. The economic role of commercial banks and non‑bank financial intermediaries. Central banking and monetary policy. The international monetary system. (Topics covered within the Canadian banking institutional framework.)
ECON 398 Selected Topics in Economics: Economics of Fiscal & Monetary Union
This course provides an overview of monetary unions with an emphasis on the Eurozone. It examines the costs and benefits of a common currency, and monetary and fiscal policies, including austerity, within the union. It analyzes the European sovereign debt crisis – the possibility of “Grexit” and/or “Exitaly”. It also discusses whether countries in Latin America, West Africa and East Asia should form a monetary union and whether Quebec should have its own currency.
Please consult the Concordia Class schedule for each course's prerequisites, course delivery, and class notes. Kindly note that restrictions apply for access to ECON classes for non-program students.
ECON 414 Economic Development: Policy Analysis
This course offers an advanced treatment of selected topics related to issues in economic development. Particular emphasis is placed on models of growth and structural change, such as the two‑gap model, input‑output analysis, and computable general equilibrium models. Trade and industrial policies, fiscal and financial policies, as well as public‑sector policies including taxation, spending, and cost‑benefit analysis are also discussed.
ECON 432 Monetary Theory
This course examines the nature of the Monetarist-Keynesian controversy and gives a critical appraisal of the IS-LM-AS model. Topics covered may include the term structure of interest rates, post-Keynesian theories of money supply and demand as well as issues in macroeconomic policy theory such as transmission mechanisms, policy coordination and implementation lags, and international constraints.
ECON 461 Industrial Organization
This course examines departures from the perfect competition paradigm to analyze economic behaviour in an industrial setting. An industry consists of a number of firms which interact strategically to maximize their profits. Topics addressed include measures of market structure, theories of oligopoly, effects of potential entry, product differentiation and advertising, technological change, vertical integration, and monopoly and merger issues.
ECON 463 Economics of Regulation
This course is devoted to an examination of the economic aspects of governmental regulations. Besides a critical review of the economic theories of regulation, the spectrum of the existing regulatory network, and empirical investigations aimed at discerning cost‑benefits, the course focuses on the process of regulatory reforms in all aspects of the Canadian economy.
ECON 465 The Economics of Professional Sport
This is a course in applied microeconomic theory. Various observations on the state of professional sports are explained using economic theory. Evidence of the statistical relevance of such explanations is also investigated. Issues addressed include the magnitude of the earnings of professional sports stars; the impact of free agency on competitive balance in sports leagues; the value of professional sports teams to cities, and whether such valuation justifies public subsidization of franchises or arenas.
ECON 481 Labour Economics
The course deals with topics in labour economics using microeconomic concepts such as inter‑temporal decision‑making, uncertainty, moral hazard, adverse selection and market signalling. The following topics are covered: labour supply and demand, wage differentials, human capital theory, efficiency wages and implicit contracts.
ECON 492 Advanced Urban Economics
This course examines geographic aspects of economies through the application of microeconomic theories. The objective of the course is to understand why, how and where cities are created and organized (or disorganized), and what types of remedies urban economics has to offer when market failure is present at a city level. Topics may include location choice, suburbanization, New Economic Geography, city-size distribution, geographic mobility, spatial sorting, and quality-of-life index.
Please consult the Concordia Class schedule for each course's prerequisites, course delivery, and class notes. Kindly note that restrictions apply for access to ECON classes for non-program students.
ECON 514 Economic Development: Policy Analysis
This course offers an advanced treatment of selected topics related to issues in economic development. Particular emphasis is placed on models of growth and structural change, such as the two‑gap model, input‑output analysis, and computable general equilibrium models. Trade and industrial policies, fiscal and financial policies, as well as public‑sector policies including taxation, spending, and cost‑benefit analysis are also discussed.
ECON 532 Monetary Theory
This course examines the nature of the Monetarist-Keynesian controversy and gives a critical appraisal of the IS-LM-AS model. Topics covered may include the term structure of interest rates, post-Keynesian theories of money supply and demand as well as issues in macroeconomic policy theory such as transmission mechanisms, policy coordination and implementation lags, and international constraints.
ECON 561 Industrial Organization
This course examines departures from the perfect competition paradigm to analyze economic behaviour in an industrial setting. An industry consists of a number of firms which interact strategically to maximize their profits. Topics addressed include measures of market structure, theories of oligopoly, effects of potential entry, product differentiation and advertising, technological change, vertical integration, and monopoly and merger issues.
ECON 563 Economics of Regulation
This course is devoted to an examination of the economic aspects of governmental regulations. Besides a critical review of the economic theories of regulation, the spectrum of the existing regulatory network, and empirical investigations aimed at discerning cost‑benefits, the course focuses on the process of regulatory reforms in all aspects of the Canadian economy.
ECON 565 The Economics of Professional Sport
This is a course in applied microeconomic theory. Various observations on the state of professional sports are explained using economic theory. Evidence of the statistical relevance of such explanations is also investigated. Issues addressed include the magnitude of the earnings of professional sports stars; the impact of free agency on competitive balance in sports leagues; the value of professional sports teams to cities, and whether such valuation justifies public subsidization of franchises or arenas.
ECON 581 Labour Economics
The course deals with topics in labour economics using microeconomic concepts such as inter‑temporal decision‑making, uncertainty, moral hazard, adverse selection and market signalling. The following topics are covered: labour supply and demand, wage differentials, human capital theory, efficiency wages and implicit contracts.
ECON 592 Advanced Urban Economics
This course examines geographic aspects of economies through the application of microeconomic theories. The objective of the course is to understand why, how and where cities are created and organized (or disorganized), and what types of remedies urban economics has to offer when market failure is present at a city level. Topics may include location choice, suburbanization, New Economic Geography, city-size distribution, geographic mobility, spatial sorting, and quality-of-life index.
Please consult the Concordia Class schedule for each course's prerequisites, course delivery, and class notes. An ECON 695 course may be taken more than one time for credit, provided the subject matter is different each time.
ECON 618 Monetary Economics
This course includes the theory of money, monetary policy, payment systems, and banking. Among the available models, there will be a particular focus on the New Keynesian model as a framework to analyze monetary policy. Alternative models of money, such as search-theoretic models, are also studied.
ECON 642 Financial Economics I
This course is the first of a two course sequence in financial economics, and is intended to provide an introduction to contemporary theoretical and empirical modeling in financial markets. The course provides a foundation for more advanced work in financial economics while allowing students without an exceptionally strong mathematical background to become familiar with the discipline. Theoretical topics include measures of risk aversion, stochastic dominance, individual portfolio choice under uncertainty, the capital asset pricing model (CAPM), and the arbitrage pricing theory (APT). Empirical topics include tests of CAPM and the APT, the efficient markets hypothesis, performance evaluation, and event test methodology.
ECON 683 Applied Econometrics: Microeconometrics
This course provides an introduction to statistical techniques and practical aspects of microeconometric analysis. Topics include binary response models, censored and truncated regression models, analysis of categorical survey data, instrumental variables, treatment effects, panel data models with fixed and random effects, analysis of transition data, estimation by simulation, and estimation of dynamic programming models.
ECON 695 A Seminar in a Special Topic: Economics of Conflict
This course focuses on the application of economic principles and methodologies to the study of violent phenomena, such as war, mass atrocities, and arms races. Topics may include strategic behaviour in situations of potential conflict, violent appropriation of wealth versus peaceful production and exchange, and the economic determinants and consequences of terrorism.
ECON 695 B Seminar in a Special Topic: Empirical Industrial Organization
This course emphasizes the importance of combining economic theory and econometric techniques to answer empirical questions in Industrial Organization. It studies the specification and estimation of models of consumer and firm behaviour in oligopoly industries with the aim of understanding and quantifying firms’ market power and its sources, the determinants of market structure, or the implications of exogenous technological and institutional factors on consumer and social welfare in a particular industry. Recent studies that have applied these models and techniques in the context of specific industries are examined in details.
ECON 695 C Seminar in a Special Topic: Applied Machine Learning
Description available soon.