Microeconomics (2020/2021)

Learning outcomes

The aim of this unit is to provide students with appropriate tools for understanding how firms and consumers take their decisions and how markets are organized, with particular emphasis on the concepts of optimization and equilibrium. Upon completing the course, the student must demonstrate to know the organization of the markets and the behavior of firms and consumers within such markets. The student will also be able to express judgments on the implications deriving from the economic agents’ choices and to compare the different market structures.

Textbook (recommended) "Microeconomia" by Hal R. Varian, Cafoscarina, 2011.
Additional material is available on the e-learning website.

Consumer Theory:
• Budget constraint (Varian, Chapter 2).
• Preferences and indifference curves (Varian, Chapter 3).
• Utility (Varian, Chapter 4).
• Choice (Varian, Chapter 5).
• Demand (Varian, Chapter 6).
• Slutsky equation (Varian, Chapter 8).
• Buying and selling (Varian, Chapter 9).
• Intertemporal Choice (Varian, Chapter 10).
• Choice under uncertainty (Varian, Chapter 12).
• Consumer's Surplus (Varian, Chapter 14).
• Market demand and elasticity (Varian, Chapter 15).
• Equilibrium (Varian, Chapter 16).

Production Theory:
• Technology (Varian, Chapter 18).
• Profit maximization (Varian, Chapter 19).
• Cost minimization (Varian, Chapter 20).
• Cost Curves (Varian, Chapter 21).

Market structure:
• Perfect competition in the short and the long term (Varian, Chapters 22 and 23).
• Monopoly (Varian, Chapter 24).
• Oligopoly (Varian, Chapter 27).

Interaction:
• Nash equilibrium and Game Theory (Varian, Chapter 28).
• Exchange (Varian, Chapter 31).

Students' preparation will be assessed through an online exam, which is composed by a written and oral part. Only if the written part is evaluated not less than 18/30, a student can have access to the oral part.

The written part will be implemented via a Moodle quiz and performed in streaming via Zoom. It will assess the students' accurate and thorough understanding of the topics explained during the course. It will consist of a test of 10 multiple-choice questions. Some questions will be about theory, others will require to solve exercises to verify the students' ability to use theoretical tools for solving empirical questions. The multiple-choice questions will be graded as follows: +3 for each correct answer, −1/3 for each wrong answer, 0 for each question left unanswered.

The oral part will be conducted online via Zoom. It will cover the entire program and aims at verifying the students' analytical abilities and their use of appropriate language.

The exam is considered as “failed” if the student does not score at least 18/30 at the written part.
If the score is at least 18/30, the final grade will be the weighted average of the grades of the written and oral parts, with the following weights:
- 50% written part
- 50% oral part
Hence, each part will have the same weight in the calculation of the final grade.