Brad DeLong's Grasping Reality
Archives Highlighted Teaching RSS Twitter micro.blog Edit Sidebars On the Internet For Reference Edit Posts

Economics Teaching Master

+ + + +

BEFORE CLASS BEGINS

Technology, etc.: 2017-08-13 Introduction to Technology in Coursework....ipynb https://www.icloud.com/keynote/0yKJfOMN5SvDtK_K7tjWAstcA

  • Calculations, Problem Sets, etc...
  • Buy your iClicker2. Register it. Bring it to the first (and all subsequent) classes

Syllabus, etc.:

  • Familiarize yourself with the components of the Syllabus (link):
    • Course administration skeleton link
    • Course topics, readings, assignments, and exams (link)
    • Course communication:
      • Brad DeLong office hours: physical and virtual: Evans 691A/Blum Center 220C/César E. Chávez Student Learning Center TBD/delong@econ.berkeley.edu> | TBD
      • GSIs office hours
      • Other resources

 

 

+ + + +

INTRODUCTION

People and Logistics Introduction: Who Are You?

Wrapup:

  • Exercise: [Analyzing Growth][]
  • Q & A
  • One-Minute Paper...

Subject Introduction: BIG IDEAS: The Multi-Millennial Perspective, The Story, Big Ideas, Math of Growth, Who Are You?

Wrapup:

  • Exercise: BIG IDEAS EXERCISE
  • Q & A
  • One-Minute Paper...

Tools Introduction: Math of Growth

Wrapup: * Exercise: Analyzing Growth Exercise * Q & A * One-Minute Paper...

The Uses of a Liberal Education

+ + + +

DEEP ECONOMIC HISTORY 70000 BC-?

EUROPE SPREADS OUT 1500-2000 [4]

  • Structured Review: The long arc of human economic history (113)
  • Our destiny--Malthus banished or delayed, and where is the Great Filter? (113 115)
  • Why is there even a western European civilization in the first place? (113)
  • Integrated social power--political, maritime, commercial, religious, technological--Venice and Genoa--and seaborne empires (113)
  • Tools: supply, demand, and surplus
  • Guns, germs, and steel (113)
    • Reading: Jared Diamond

PLUNDER AND SETTLEMENT (113) [5,-]

  • Structured Review: the role of the university in a free society
  • Why not up the Mississippi?
  • New England settler colonies
  • Exercises: economic growth--filling up the Americas
  • Slavery: extractive and developmental institutions
  • Tools: economic rents
    • Reading: John Winthrop: A City Upon a Hill

POLITICAL REVOLUTION, ECONOMIC REVOLUTION, AND HAMILTON [6,-]

  • Structured Review: deep economic history
  • Why the American Revolution?
  • What kind of America afterwards?
  • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus
  • The Hamiltonian Road...
  • Tools: externalities and growth

COMMERCIAL REVOLUTION 1500-1800 [-,5]

  • Structured Review: the role of the university in a free society
  • Our destiny--Malthus banished or delayed?: Robert Allen: Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction, chapter 2
  • Seaborne empires
  • The acceleration of growth in the enlightenment
  • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus
  • Exceptional Britain
  • Tools: economic rents

INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION AND THE COMING OF MODERN ECONOMIC GROWTH 1700-1900 [-,6]

  • Structured Review: deep economic history
  • The Industrial Revolution
    • Why the British Industrial Revolution?: David Landes (2006): Why Europe and the West? Why Not China? http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210b; Robert Allen: Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction, chapter 3
  • The Coming of Modern Economic Growth
    • Other roads to Modern Economic Growth?
    • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus
    • The spread and development of British industrial technologies: Robert Allen: Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction, chapter 4
  • Tools: externalities and growth

THE MODERN STATE

MODERN ECONOMIC GROWTH 1850-2050 [-,7]

  • Structured Review: Europe spreads out
  • Measurement: William Nordhaus: Do Real-Output and Real-Wage Measures Capture Reality? http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210f
    • Growth in the North Atlantic core
    • New goods and new types of goods: a human-centered growth measure *Causes
    • Industrial research labs
    • Lack of growth outside the North Atlantic: Lant Pritchett (1997): Divergence, Bigtime http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210e
  • Exercises: externalities and growth

GLOBALIZATION AND EMPIRE 1870-1914

  • Structured Review: Industrial Revolution
  • Globalization: Guillaume Daudin et al: Globalization 1870-1914 http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/materials/working_papers/paper395.pdf
    • Trade, migration, and technology transfer: Robert Allen: Global Economic History, chapters 7 and 8
  • Exercises: economic rents (Piketty)
  • Empire: Robert Allen: Global Economic History, chapters 5 and 6
    • Old empires
    • New empires
  • Tools: national income and expenditure

GILDED AGE, ECONOMIC MANAGEMENT, AND RESISTANCE 1870-1940 [-,8]

THE KNOT OF WAR AND REVOLUTION 1898-1933 [-,9]

  • Structured Review: Modern Economic Growth *The Coming and Course of World War I: John Maynard Keynes: The Economic Consequences of the Peace, chapters 1 and 2 http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210k
    • The Boer War and Norman Angell: Norman Angell (1909): Europe's Optical Illusion, chapters 6-9 http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210i
    • "The bones of a Pomeranian grenadier"
  • "Busy giddy minds with foreign quarrels"
  • Costs and Revolutions
  • Tools: interest rates, asset prices, and spending

FAILING AT ECONOMIC MANAGEMENT 1918-1940 [-,10]

  • Structured Review: globalization
  • The Economic Consequences of the Peace
  • The return of the gold standard: The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill http://tinyurl.com/dl2016121l
    • Toward the Great Crash
  • Exercises: interest rates, asset prices, and spending

John Maynard Keynes

THE GREAT DEPRESSION

  • Structured Review: the knot of war and revolution
  • The Coming of the Great Depression
    • Political paralysis
    • The Great Contraction
  • Exercises: national income and expenditure
  • The Course of the Great Depression: Christina D. Romer: Lessons from the Great Depression for Policy Today http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210j; Barry Eichengreen: Globalizing Capital, chapter 3; John Maynard Keynes (1931): Unemployment as a World Problem http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210p

THE FAILURE OF THE CLASSICAL LIBERAL POLITICAL-ECONOMIC ORDER 1925-1945 [-,11]

THE CIVIL WAR AND JIM CROW [7,-]

  • Structured Review: Europe spreads out
  • The cotton gin, slavery, and westward expansion
  • The political economy of Jacksonian America
  • Exercises: economic rents
  • One kind of freedom
  • Tools: national income and expenditure
    • Reading:
      • Abraham Lincoln: House Divided
      • Abraham Lincoln: Inaugural Addresses
      • Frederick Douglass: Abraham Lincoln

MIGRATION AND GILDED AGE [8,-]

  • Structured Review: Hamilton
  • "Bring us your poor..."
  • Railroads and industrial research labs
  • Exercises: economic rents
  • Growth and distribution
  • Tools: interest rates, asset prices, and spending

THE PROGRESSIVE-ERA COURSE CORRECTION--AND WORLD WAR I [9,-]

  • Structured Review: migration
  • The coming of mass production and industrial research labs
  • Dilemmas of antitrust and monopoly
  • Exercises: externalities and growth
  • Populism
  • Progressivism

THE ROARING TWENTIES AND THE GREAT CRASH [10,-]

THE NEW DEAL [11,-]

  • Hoover and Roosevelt
  • Try everything--reflation and corporatism
  • Try everything--relief and deficits
  • Exercises: national income and expenditure
  • Social insurance
  • Unfinished business as WWII arrives

THE KNOT OF WAR AND REVOLUTION II 1933-1953 [12,12]

World War II

SOCIAL DEMOCRACY AND MASS PRODUCTION 1930-1980 [13,13]

  • Structured Review: the Gilded Age
  • The Marshall Plan and Thirty Glorious Years
    • The Marshall Plan and after
    • The Thirty Glorious Years
  • Exercises: externalities and growth
  • The Bretton Woods System and Decolonization: Barry Eichengreen: Globalizing Capital, chapter 3; Robert Allen: Global Economic History, chapter 9
    • The Bretton Woods system
    • Decolonization
  • Tools: social planning

CIVIL RIGHTS [14,-]

  • Structured Review: The New Deal
  • The lagging South
  • The move north--and the urban ghetto
  • Exercises: externalities and growth
  • Did the Civil Rights Movement come a generation too late?
  • Tools: inflation and unemployment
    • Reading:
      • Martin Luther King, Jr.:
      • William Julius Wilson:

THE CENTRAL PLANNING DETOUR 1918-1991 [-,14]

  • Structured Review: consumer and producer surplus
    • Soviet Economic Growth: Robert Allen: The Rise and Decline of the Soviet Economy http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210v
    • N.S. Khrushchev: "We will bury you"
    • Red Plenty
  • Exercises: the pointlessness of a planned economy
  • Soviet Economic Stagnation: Richard Ericson: The Classical Soviet-Type Economy http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210ab
    • The Brezhnev Era and the Cold War
  • Tools: inflation and unemployment

FAILURES OF "CONVERGENCE" 1870-1980 [-,15]

THE POST-WAR HIGH-PRESSURE ECONOMY [15,-]

  • Structured Review: mass production
  • The Korean War and the Cold War
  • The Age of Eisenhower
  • Exercises: national income and expenditure
  • Growing together
  • ??

SOCIAL DEMOCRACY EXHAUSTED 1970-1990 [16,16]

  • Oil Shocks and Inflation
    • "Ordoliberalism"
    • The sociology of the 1960s
    • Oil shocks and inflation expectations
  • Exercises: inflation and unemployment
  • Productivity Slowdown
    • The failure of economic management: Readings Barry Eichengreen: Globalizing Capital, chapter 5; John H. Coatsworth: Structures, Endowments, and Institutions in the Economic History of Latin America http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210y
    • The Volcker disinflation

THE NEOLIBERAL TURN IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC 1975-2015 [17,17]

  • Structured Review: deep economic history, Europe spreads out, plunder, settlement, and commercial and Industrial Revolution
  • Reagan, Thatcher, and Supply-Side Economics
    • The election of Reagan and Thatcher
    • Supply-side economics
  • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus
  • The Washington Consensus and the Great Moderation: Dani Rodrik: The Past, Present and Future of Economic Growth http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210c; Christian Dustmann et al." From Sick Man of Europe to Economic Superstar: Germany’s Resurgent Economy http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210ac
    • Deregulation: social democratic ends via market means
    • The failure of the neoliberal turn

CHINA STANDS UP; RUSSIA SITS DOWN 1975-2015 [-,18]

  • Structured Review: Modern Economic Growth, globalization, and the Gilded Age
  • China Stands Up!: Xiaodong Zhu: Understanding China’s Growth: Past, Present and Future http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210ae
    • The Great Leap Forward, the Hungry Ghosts, and the Cultural Revolution
    • "Seek truth from facts"
    • Institutions and economic growth in China
  • Exercises: externalities and growth
  • Russia Sits Down: Daniel Triesman: The Political Economy of Change After Communism http://bookstore.piie.com/book-store/6970.html; Simeon Djankov: Russia's Economy under Putin: From Crony Capitalism to State Capitalism https://www.piie.com/publications/pb/pb15-18.pdf
    • The failure of Russian privatization

WOMEN'S RIGHTS AND DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGE [18,-]

  • Structured Review: Modern Economic Growth, globalization, and the Gilded Age
  • The demographic transition
  • The feminist movement
  • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus
  • Zero population growth
  • Disparate impacts
    • Reading
      • Simone de Beauvoir:
      • Claudia Goldin:

THE FALL OF MANUFACTURING AND THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS 1970-2015 [19,19]

  • Structured Review: The knots of war, the Great Depression, and the New Deal
  • The Fall of Manufacturing
    • The high tide of unionization
    • The shift to a service economy
  • The Non-Smithian Economy: J. Bradford DeLong and A. Michael Froomkin: Speculative Microeconomics for Tomorrow's Economy http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210aq
    • Distribution in the presence of extraordinary increasing returns
  • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus

Optional Topic: Notes on Antitrust Policy and Optimal Innovation in a Model of Productive Variety http://delong.typepad.com/pdf/20070709_varieties_antitrust.pdf

THE SECOND GREAT CRASH AND THE LONGER DEPRESSION 2000-2015 [20,20]

THE SECOND GILDED AGE 1980-2015 [21,21]

  • Structured Review: social democracy exhausted and the neoliberal turn
  • The Race between Education and Technology: Claudia Goldin and Larry Katz: The Race Between Education and Technology http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210af
  • The Second Gilded Age: Paul Krugman: Why We’re in a New Gilded Age http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210ag* The Reagan tax cut
    • Financialization and the overclass
    • The political economy of the rent-seeking society
  • Exercises: economic rents

THE PRESENT THROUGH A POLANYIAN LENS 2000-2025 [22,22]

  • The Polanyian Perplex: Barry Eichengreen: Globalizing Capital, chapter 6
    • Four decades of wage stagnation
    • The illusion of rapid growth at the top
    • Populism, Polanyi, and "economic anxiety"
  • Exercises: supply, demand, and surplus
  • Where Is Our "End of History"?: Andrea Boltho and Gianni Toniolo: The Assessment: The Twentieth Century http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210ah; Robert Gordon: The Turtle’s Progress http://tinyurl.com/dl20161210ai; Robert Allen: Global Economic History: A Very Short Introduction, epilogue
    • The stability of democracies

THE FUTURE 2015-? [23,23]

  • Structured Review: the "end of history" and the world since 2000
  • The Trend
    • Convergence?
    • Divergence?
    • Stagnation?
  • Exercises: exponential, convergent, and logistic growth
  • Catastrophe?
    • Global warming?
    • Nuclear fire
    • The jumped-up East African Plains Ape
    • The Great Filter?

TOOLS

  • Tools: exponential, convergent, and logistic growth
  • Tools: supply, demand, and surplus
  • Tools: economic rents
  • Tools: externalities and growth
  • Tools: social planning
  • Tools: national income and expenditure
  • Tools: interest rates, asset prices, and spending
  • Tools: inflation and unemployment

FURTHER READING

PART I: INTRODUCTION

PART II: THE COMING OF MODERN ECONOMIC GROWTH

PART III: AN AGE OF CATASTROPHE

PART IV: THE AGE OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY

PART V: MAKING (OR IS IT UNMAKING?) OUR WORLD

PART VI: LOOKING FORWARD AND LOOKING BACKWARD

Housekeeping: