ECON 7530

Industry Dynamics

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2016-2017.

This is an advanced study course in Industry Dynamics. Much improvement has been made in the study of aggregate productivity, investment, and aggregate output dynamics by understanding the micro structure of the economy. This course introduces the main tools exploited in the literature to study these macroeconomic problems and discusses the research frontier. The course opens up with a theory of entrepreneurship and occupational choice. Then it describes firms growth and its impact on industry equilibrium. It introduces techniques for computation of productivity and marginal products at the firm level and its implications for cross-country disparities in income per capital and the life cycle of firms. Next, we analyze economies consistent with industry equilibrium and endogenous long-run growth. For that, we build basic notions on stochastic calculus which are used at the frontier of research. Finally, we study industry equilibrium in open economies and in economies with incomplete markets. The course closes with a normative analysis of industry equilibrium allocations. Due to the brevity of the course, there is only a limited number of papers that can be covered in detail. The course, however, should endow students with the tools necessary to approach the literature and highlight the questions that remain to be answered. The course is designed to encourage avenues for novel research.

When Offered Fall (weeks 8-14).

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