Teaching Plan Information

Presentation

Advanced Macroeconomics I (20.851) 

Degree/study: ADE/ECO
Course: Third and fourth year
Term: Second
Number of ECTS credits: 5
Hours of student’s dedication: 125
Language or languages of instruction: English
Professor: Andrea Caggese (andrea.caggese@upf.edu – office 20.159)

Office hour: Fridays at 15.30 (during the teaching period):

My office hour starts at 15.30 and ends at 16.30. You can show up without an appointment any time between 15.30 and 16. If you plan to pass by after 16, please let me know in advance with an email.

Associated skills

1. Presentation of the subject.

The course focuses on models of medium and long run macroeconomic dynamics and their empirical implications.

Learning outcomes

3. Contents

The structure of the course is based on two main parts and some selected topics

Part 1: The Solow Model

Part 2: Economic Growth with Endogenous Savings

Part 3: Topics

      i) Externalities and Endogenous Growth

      ii) R&D and Innovation

      iii) Inequality

Sustainable Development Goals

SDG 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth

SDG 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure

SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities

Prerequisites

2. Prerequisites

It is strongly recommended to pass Macroeconomics 1 before taking this course.

Contents

3. Contents

The structure of the course is based on two main parts and some selected topics

Part 1: The Solow Model

Part 2: Economic Growth with Endogenous Savings

Part 3: Topics

      i) Externalities and Endogenous Growth

      ii) R&D and Innovation

      iii) Inequality

4. Bibliography and teaching resources

4.1. Basic bibliography

Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer (AM), 4th edition, 2012.

Economic Growth, by David Weil (EG), 2012 edition

4.2. Additional bibliography

Lectures on Macroeconomics, Olivier Jean Blanchard and Stanley Fischer, MIT press (1989)

Macroeconomics, Gregory Mankiw, 7th edition (2010)

4.3. Compulsory readings

A series of compulsory reading will be provided in MOODLE. Selected questions in the final exam and/or in online quizzes can be based on these readings.

4.4. Teaching resources

My lectures are based on slides, which will be made available on Moodle.

5. Detailed outline

INTRODUCTION

Lecture notes; EG, chapter 1

PART 1: THE SOLOW MODEL

A.        WHY THE SOLOW MODEL?
Lecture notes

B.        STATIC AND DYNAMIC GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM MODELS
Lecture notes

C.        THE SOLOW MODEL AT A MOMENT IN TIME
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 2 and 3;  AM, chapter 1

D.        SAVINGS, INVESTMENT AND THE CREDIT MARKET EQUILIBRIUM--OR FROM THE RENTAL PRICE OF CAPITAL TO THE REAL INTEREST RATE
Lecture notes

E.        THE DYNAMICS OF THE SOLOW MODEL
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 3;  AM, chapter 1

F.        THE EFFECTS OF AN INCREASE IN SAVINGS ON INCOME
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 3;  AM, chapter 1

G.        QUANTITATIVE IMPLICATIONS OF THE SOLOW MODEL
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 3;  AM, chapter 1

H.        EMPIRICAL APPLICATIONS
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 7;  AM, chapter 1

PART II: ECONOMIC GROWTH WITH ENDOGENOUS SAVINGS

A.        HOUSEHOLD SAVINGS BEHAVIOR
Lecture notes, AM chapter 8 (only the very beginning)

B.        THE RAMSEY-CASS-KOOPMANS MODEL
Lecture notes, AM chapter 2

PART III: TOPICS

Topic 1: Externalities and Endogenous Growth
Lecture notes, EG  chapter 8 , AM chapter 3,

Topic 2: R&D and Innovation
Lecture notes, EG  chapter 9 , AM chapter 3,

Topic 3: Economic Growth and Inequality (possibly subject to change)

Lecture notes, compulsory readings

Topic 4: Robots, automation, and jobs (possibly subject to change)

Lecture notes, compulsory readings

Teaching Methods

7. Methodology

The course will last for 10 weeks.

The professor will teach 20 theory classes. In addition, there will be 6 seminars, which will take place physically on campus in smaller subgroups, dedicated to deepening the understanding of the class material and to discuss solutions to sample problems.

8. Activities Planning

Evaluation

6. Assessment

Please note that all students registered for this course must follow the rules described in this PDA, especially the assessment rules described in this section. No exceptions are allowed in general, and in particular no exceptions are allowed for UPF students doing an Erasmus or another visiting program in another university. 

If you think you are in an exceptional situation and have the right to an exception (for example, you are an athlete competing for an UPF team), do not contact me, but please contact directly the faculty of economics secretary office explaining your problem. I will allow the exception only if the authorization comes directly from the dean.

Course evaluation will be based on:

A) Continuous Evaluation

B) Final Exam

A. Continuous evaluation (January-March 2022): max 25 points

1) Volunteer to solve a problem at the blackboard (max 10 points) 

There will be 6 seminars during the quarter. Before each seminar, a set of exercises will be posted online. These exercises provide excellent opportunities to apply concepts from the lectures and the corresponding material is likely to appear in the exams. The exercises will be solved in the practice classes.

Students can volunteer during the seminars to solve problems at the blackboard. In case more than one student volunteers, the professor will choose randomly among those that did not do it yet.

Solutions will be evaluated on a 0 to 10 scale. A good evaluation is given to the student who i) derives the correct answer; ii) explains correctly and with sufficient details the solution.   

If a student volunteers more than once, her/his grade will be the highest among the grades received for the solutions. A grade of 10 corresponds to 10 points.

2) Active participation in seminars (max 5 points)

While the problem sets are solved at the blackboard, the other students in the seminar need to actively participate to class, for example by helping to correct the solution at the blackboard, or by suggesting alternative useful solution methods, or simply by asking relevant clarification questions.  This active participation is evaluated by the class teacher. Each student will be awarded, for the overall participations in the 6 seminars, from a minimum of 0 to a maximum of 5 points.

Important note: to obtain points for active participation, you need to actively participate. Passive participation (meaning attending the seminars but without any active intervention) will award you zero points.  

Important note 2: Even though you are not required to hand in written solutions to the problem sets, you are strongly encouraged to try to solve the problems before each seminar class. Notice that I will not publish written solutions. Therefore, the best way to prepare for the seminars is: i) try to answer the questions at home, before each seminar, so you find out what are the problems and the things you do not understand. ii) ask questions in the seminar class. The job of the seminar teacher is to solve all your doubts and correct the solution at the blackboard if there is any mistake

3) Active participation related to the theory classes (max 2 points):

During theory classes, there will be the opportunity to participate to online questionnaires that can be answered using an electronic device (cell phone, laptop, tablet). To be awarded 2 points you need to answer (no matter whether correctly or not) at least 60% of all these questionnaires

Note: you need to attend the class in which you are registered to be able to access these questionnaires.

4) 3 online quizzes (max 2 points each): 

3 Online quizzes (multiple choices tests) will be given during the course. Each quiz has 5 multiple choice questions, drawn randomly from a question bank. Each student can only attempt the quiz once. Each quiz will be open for 24h (from 00.00 to 24.00).

1^st quiz will be on Wednesday 8^th February

2^nd quiz will be on Wednesday 1^st March

3^rd quiz will be on Wednesday 15^th  March

5) Open ended online test (max 2 point):

You can also take a further test, which will include random multiple-choice questions, to be answered in a limited amount of time. The difference with the quizzes at point 3 is that students can take this test an unlimited number of times before the Final Exam, and only the highest score will be recorded.

B. Final Exam (March 2022): 75 points.

The final exam at the end of the quarter will cover all the contents of the course: the material presented in class, the problem sets, and the compulsory readings.

• Part I will be a series of short questions, which can be either yes/no questions (plus a very brief explanation), or a series of multiple choice questions.
• Part II will be 2 or 3 long questions which require derivation.

To pass the course, a student must satisfy both following conditions: 

1. Answer correctly to at least 35% of the final exam
2. Obtain an overall final mark of the course greater than 4.9. 

C. Recovery Exam.

Students who took the final exam, but did not pass the course, will have a second chance during the next term. The recovery exam will cover the entire material of the course.  Only students who followed the activities of the continuous assessment will be allowed to take the recovery examination.  For this course, this means that are allowed to take the recovery exam students who performed at least 2 of the 3 following activities:

1. Volunteered to solve at least one problem in the seminars (See point A.1 above)
2. Participated to at least 5 online questionnaires (See point A.2 above. Notice that there will be a total of around 25 questionnaires during the course)
3. Participated to at least 2 online quizzes (See point A.3 above)

Structure of the recovery exam: a set of multiple choice questions.

For students who take the recovery exam, the final mark is 80% the mark of the recovery exam, and 20% the final mark of the course.

Bibliography and information resources

4. Bibliography and teaching resources

4.1. Basic bibliography

Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer (AM), 4th edition, 2012.

Economic Growth, by David Weil (EG), 2012 edition

These are the two main textbooks for this course. Below, in Section 5, I refer to the relevant chapters for each topic. Economic Growth, by David Weil is an undergraduate level textbook, and at a good level to understand the lectures (even though sometimes the analytical level in the slides is a bit higher). Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer is a good references for the modelling and derivations.

Please note that pre-recorded video-lectures, covering the most important derivations in this course, will be available in Aula Global.

4.2. Additional bibliography

Lectures on Macroeconomics, Olivier Jean Blanchard and Stanley Fischer, MIT press (1989)

Macroeconomics, Gregory Mankiw, 7th edition (2010)

4.3. Compulsory readings

For each class, I might indicate the compulsory readings. These can be additional readings (which I will upload in Aula Global) or chapters of the textbook (Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer).  

Compulsory readings are compulsory because they are important. They should be read in advance, before the class they refer to, in order to arrive properly prepared for the class.  Moreover, they are part of the material that can be asked in the final exam and in the online quizzes.

4.4. Teaching resources

My lectures are based on slides, which will be made available on Aula Global. Pre-recorded video-lectures, covering some of the material of the course, will also be available in Aula Global.

.

Teaching Plan Information

Presentation

Advanced Macroeconomics I (20.851) 

Degree/study: ADE/ECO
Course: Third and fourth year
Term: Second
Number of ECTS credits: 5
Hours of student’s dedication: 125
Language or languages of instruction: English
Professor: Andrea Caggese (andrea.caggese@upf.edu – office 20.159)

Office hour: Fridays at 15.30 (during the teaching period):

My office hour starts at 15.30 and ends at 16.30. You can show up without an appointment any time between 15.30 and 16. If you plan to pass by after 16, please let me know in advance with an email.

Associated skills

1. Presentation of the subject.

The course focuses on models of medium and long run macroeconomic dynamics and their empirical implications.

Learning outcomes

3. Contents

The structure of the course is based on two main parts and some selected topics

Part 1: The Solow Model

Part 2: Economic Growth with Endogenous Savings

Part 3: Topics

      i) Externalities and Endogenous Growth

      ii) R&D and Innovation

      iii) Inequality

Sustainable Development Goals

SDG 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth

SDG 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure

SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities

Prerequisites

2. Prerequisites

It is strongly recommended to pass Macroeconomics 1 before taking this course.

Contents

3. Contents

The structure of the course is based on two main parts and some selected topics

Part 1: The Solow Model

Part 2: Economic Growth with Endogenous Savings

Part 3: Topics

      i) Externalities and Endogenous Growth

      ii) R&D and Innovation

      iii) Inequality

4. Bibliography and teaching resources

4.1. Basic bibliography

Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer (AM), 4th edition, 2012.

Economic Growth, by David Weil (EG), 2012 edition

4.2. Additional bibliography

Lectures on Macroeconomics, Olivier Jean Blanchard and Stanley Fischer, MIT press (1989)

Macroeconomics, Gregory Mankiw, 7th edition (2010)

4.3. Compulsory readings

A series of compulsory reading will be provided in MOODLE. Selected questions in the final exam and/or in online quizzes can be based on these readings.

4.4. Teaching resources

My lectures are based on slides, which will be made available on Moodle.

5. Detailed outline

INTRODUCTION

Lecture notes; EG, chapter 1

PART 1: THE SOLOW MODEL

A.        WHY THE SOLOW MODEL?
Lecture notes

B.        STATIC AND DYNAMIC GENERAL EQUILIBRIUM MODELS
Lecture notes

C.        THE SOLOW MODEL AT A MOMENT IN TIME
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 2 and 3;  AM, chapter 1

D.        SAVINGS, INVESTMENT AND THE CREDIT MARKET EQUILIBRIUM--OR FROM THE RENTAL PRICE OF CAPITAL TO THE REAL INTEREST RATE
Lecture notes

E.        THE DYNAMICS OF THE SOLOW MODEL
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 3;  AM, chapter 1

F.        THE EFFECTS OF AN INCREASE IN SAVINGS ON INCOME
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 3;  AM, chapter 1

G.        QUANTITATIVE IMPLICATIONS OF THE SOLOW MODEL
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 3;  AM, chapter 1

H.        EMPIRICAL APPLICATIONS
Lecture notes; EG, chapter 7;  AM, chapter 1

PART II: ECONOMIC GROWTH WITH ENDOGENOUS SAVINGS

A.        HOUSEHOLD SAVINGS BEHAVIOR
Lecture notes, AM chapter 8 (only the very beginning)

B.        THE RAMSEY-CASS-KOOPMANS MODEL
Lecture notes, AM chapter 2

PART III: TOPICS

Topic 1: Externalities and Endogenous Growth
Lecture notes, EG  chapter 8 , AM chapter 3,

Topic 2: R&D and Innovation
Lecture notes, EG  chapter 9 , AM chapter 3,

Topic 3: Economic Growth and Inequality (possibly subject to change)

Lecture notes, compulsory readings

Topic 4: Robots, automation, and jobs (possibly subject to change)

Lecture notes, compulsory readings

Teaching Methods

7. Methodology

The course will last for 10 weeks.

The professor will teach 20 theory classes. In addition, there will be 6 seminars, which will take place physically on campus in smaller subgroups, dedicated to deepening the understanding of the class material and to discuss solutions to sample problems.

8. Activities Planning

Evaluation

6. Assessment

Please note that all students registered for this course must follow the rules described in this PDA, especially the assessment rules described in this section. No exceptions are allowed in general, and in particular no exceptions are allowed for UPF students doing an Erasmus or another visiting program in another university. 

If you think you are in an exceptional situation and have the right to an exception (for example, you are an athlete competing for an UPF team), do not contact me, but please contact directly the faculty of economics secretary office explaining your problem. I will allow the exception only if the authorization comes directly from the dean.

Course evaluation will be based on:

A) Continuous Evaluation

B) Final Exam

A. Continuous evaluation (January-March 2022): max 25 points

1) Volunteer to solve a problem at the blackboard (max 10 points) 

There will be 6 seminars during the quarter. Before each seminar, a set of exercises will be posted online. These exercises provide excellent opportunities to apply concepts from the lectures and the corresponding material is likely to appear in the exams. The exercises will be solved in the practice classes.

Students can volunteer during the seminars to solve problems at the blackboard. In case more than one student volunteers, the professor will choose randomly among those that did not do it yet.

Solutions will be evaluated on a 0 to 10 scale. A good evaluation is given to the student who i) derives the correct answer; ii) explains correctly and with sufficient details the solution.   

If a student volunteers more than once, her/his grade will be the highest among the grades received for the solutions. A grade of 10 corresponds to 10 points.

2) Active participation in seminars (max 5 points)

While the problem sets are solved at the blackboard, the other students in the seminar need to actively participate to class, for example by helping to correct the solution at the blackboard, or by suggesting alternative useful solution methods, or simply by asking relevant clarification questions.  This active participation is evaluated by the class teacher. Each student will be awarded, for the overall participations in the 6 seminars, from a minimum of 0 to a maximum of 5 points.

Important note: to obtain points for active participation, you need to actively participate. Passive participation (meaning attending the seminars but without any active intervention) will award you zero points.  

Important note 2: Even though you are not required to hand in written solutions to the problem sets, you are strongly encouraged to try to solve the problems before each seminar class. Notice that I will not publish written solutions. Therefore, the best way to prepare for the seminars is: i) try to answer the questions at home, before each seminar, so you find out what are the problems and the things you do not understand. ii) ask questions in the seminar class. The job of the seminar teacher is to solve all your doubts and correct the solution at the blackboard if there is any mistake

3) Active participation related to the theory classes (max 2 points):

During theory classes, there will be the opportunity to participate to online questionnaires that can be answered using an electronic device (cell phone, laptop, tablet). To be awarded 2 points you need to answer (no matter whether correctly or not) at least 60% of all these questionnaires

Note: you need to attend the class in which you are registered to be able to access these questionnaires.

4) 3 online quizzes (max 2 points each): 

3 Online quizzes (multiple choices tests) will be given during the course. Each quiz has 5 multiple choice questions, drawn randomly from a question bank. Each student can only attempt the quiz once. Each quiz will be open for 24h (from 00.00 to 24.00).

1^st quiz will be on Wednesday 8^th February

2^nd quiz will be on Wednesday 1^st March

3^rd quiz will be on Wednesday 15^th  March

5) Open ended online test (max 2 point):

You can also take a further test, which will include random multiple-choice questions, to be answered in a limited amount of time. The difference with the quizzes at point 3 is that students can take this test an unlimited number of times before the Final Exam, and only the highest score will be recorded.

B. Final Exam (March 2022): 75 points.

The final exam at the end of the quarter will cover all the contents of the course: the material presented in class, the problem sets, and the compulsory readings.

• Part I will be a series of short questions, which can be either yes/no questions (plus a very brief explanation), or a series of multiple choice questions.
• Part II will be 2 or 3 long questions which require derivation.

To pass the course, a student must satisfy both following conditions: 

1. Answer correctly to at least 35% of the final exam
2. Obtain an overall final mark of the course greater than 4.9. 

C. Recovery Exam.

Students who took the final exam, but did not pass the course, will have a second chance during the next term. The recovery exam will cover the entire material of the course.  Only students who followed the activities of the continuous assessment will be allowed to take the recovery examination.  For this course, this means that are allowed to take the recovery exam students who performed at least 2 of the 3 following activities:

1. Volunteered to solve at least one problem in the seminars (See point A.1 above)
2. Participated to at least 5 online questionnaires (See point A.2 above. Notice that there will be a total of around 25 questionnaires during the course)
3. Participated to at least 2 online quizzes (See point A.3 above)

Structure of the recovery exam: a set of multiple choice questions.

For students who take the recovery exam, the final mark is 80% the mark of the recovery exam, and 20% the final mark of the course.

Bibliography and information resources

4. Bibliography and teaching resources

4.1. Basic bibliography

Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer (AM), 4th edition, 2012.

Economic Growth, by David Weil (EG), 2012 edition

These are the two main textbooks for this course. Below, in Section 5, I refer to the relevant chapters for each topic. Economic Growth, by David Weil is an undergraduate level textbook, and at a good level to understand the lectures (even though sometimes the analytical level in the slides is a bit higher). Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer is a good references for the modelling and derivations.

Please note that pre-recorded video-lectures, covering the most important derivations in this course, will be available in Aula Global.

4.2. Additional bibliography

Lectures on Macroeconomics, Olivier Jean Blanchard and Stanley Fischer, MIT press (1989)

Macroeconomics, Gregory Mankiw, 7th edition (2010)

4.3. Compulsory readings

For each class, I might indicate the compulsory readings. These can be additional readings (which I will upload in Aula Global) or chapters of the textbook (Advanced Macroeconomics, by David Romer).  

Compulsory readings are compulsory because they are important. They should be read in advance, before the class they refer to, in order to arrive properly prepared for the class.  Moreover, they are part of the material that can be asked in the final exam and in the online quizzes.

4.4. Teaching resources

My lectures are based on slides, which will be made available on Aula Global. Pre-recorded video-lectures, covering some of the material of the course, will also be available in Aula Global.

.