Law 108-003 Economic Foundations of Legal Studies
Class Time:1:30 pm - 2:45 pm
TR Arlington 1 221
Professor Alex Tabarrok
Office: Carow Hall, Office Hours: MWF: 10-11:30, 2-4.� I also have an office in the Mercatus Center on the 4th floor of the law school building, office number 433F.� I will be there most day�s before class.
Tel. 703-993-2314
Email: Tabarrok@gmu.edu
Web Page: http://mason.gmu.edu/~atabarro/
Office Hours:� Feel free to drop by any time or call for an appointment.� Email is the best way to contact me.� All students should periodically check their GMU email account for important information.
����� This course will introduce you to the basic tools and techniques of Microeconomics with special attention to those aspects most useful for legal research.� There are two texts in the class.� Pindyck and Rubinfeld's Microeconomics, (most recent edition) and Entrepreneurial Economics: Bright Ideas from the Dismal Science (edited by myself).� There are also a handful of readings that are available online from www.jstor.org from a university computer or home computer using GMU as a proxy.
����������� Your grade will be computed from the following work:
Midterm: 50%
Final: 50%
The grading scale is as follows:
����������������������������������������������� �����������������������
A+: 90%+
A:�� 85-89%�
A-:� 80-84%
B:�� 70-79%
C:�� 60-69%
D:�� 50-59%
F:��� 50% -
����������� Plus-Minuses for B through D grades, where allowed by university policy, will occur at the upper and lower 2.5% level.� For example, 70-72.49 will be B-, 72.5-77.49 B, 77.5-79.9 B+ and so forth.
Warning:� Attendance in this class is vital.� The book is to be used as a guide to the lectures not vice-versa.�
The final exam will be as scheduled by the university, DEC 10 - 12:00 PM.��������
|
Approximate Guide to the Course |
||
|
Lecture |
Topic |
Reference Material |
|
1 |
Review of mathematics, supply and demand, tax incidence |
PR 2 |
|
2 |
Tax incidence, elasticities, back of the envelope calculations |
PR 2 |
|
3 |
Foundations of Demand � indifference curves, budget constraints, marginal rate of substitution |
PR 3 |
|
4 |
Marginal rate of substitution, applications � cash grant versus subsidy, housing vouchers. |
PR 4 |
|
5 |
Income and substitution effect, gas tax with rebate, labor supply, guaranteed minimum income |
PR 4, 511-514 |
|
6 |
Marginal cost, profit maximization and supply curves, competitive equilibrium and minimization of total cost |
PR 8 |
|
7 |
Applications of the Competitive Model, rent controls, gasoline controls, sales tax |
PR 9 |
|
8 |
Approximate time of exam 1. |
|
|
9 |
Shortage of human organs |
PR 9, EE 6, 7 |
|
10 |
Taxation and Product Characteristics, minimum wage |
Barzel |
|
11 |
Airline regulation and deregulation, price supports, acreage restrictions |
PR 9 |
|
12 |
Import Quotas and Tariffs |
PR 9, handout |
|
13 |
How is Paris Fed? |
|
|
14 |
Monopoly |
PR 10 |
|
15 |
Patents and patent reform |
EE 13 |
|
16 |
Price Discrimination |
PR 11, Ayres & Siegelman |
|
17 |
Price Discrimination |
PR 11 |
|
18 |
Property Rights |
Libecap, Anderson & Tollison |
|
19 |
Property Rights |
Anderson & Hill, Frey & Buhofer |
|
20 |
Externalities, Coase Theorem |
PR 18.1, 18.2 Coase |
|
21 |
Coase Theorem and Marriage |
Landsburg, Peters |
|
22 |
Asymmetric Information |
PR 17, Akerlof |
|
23 |
Signaling. Principal-Agent Model |
PR 17, Lindsay |
|
24 |
Na�ve and sophisticated voting |
Notes |
|
25 |
Genetic Insurance,� Time-Consistent Insurance |
EE 3,4 |
|
26 |
Property Rights applied to urban transit |
EE 14 |
Ayres, I., and P. Siegelman. 1995. Race and Gender Discrimination in Bargaining for a New Car. American Economic Review 85 (3):304-21.
Libecap, G. D. 1989. Contracting for the unitization of oil fields. In Contracting for Property Rights, 93-114. Cambridge, MA.: Cambridge University Press.
Anderson, G. M., and R. D. Tollison. 1985. Life in the Gulag: A Property Rights Perspective. Cato Journal 5 (1):295-304.
Anderson, T. L., and P. J. Hill. 1990. The Race for Property Rights. Journal of Law and Economics 33 (1):177-97.
Frey, B. S., and H. Buhofer. 1988. Prisoners and Property Rights. Journal of Law and Economics XXXI:19-46.
Coase, R. 1960. The Problem of Social Cost. Journal of Law and Economics 3 (1): 1-44. (shorter online version here)
Landsburg, S. E. 1997. The marriage contract. Slate (www.slate.com). Sept. 11, 1997.
Peters, E.H. 1986. Marriage and Divorce: Informational Constraints and Private Contracting. American Economic Review 76 (3): 437-454.
Akerlof, George A. 1970. The Market for �Lemons�: Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism. The Quarterly Journal of Economics 84 (3): 488-500.
Barzel, Yoram. 1976. An Alternative Approach to the Analysis of Taxation. Journal of Political Economy 84(6): 1177-1197.
Lindsay, Cotton M. 1976. A Theory of Government Enterprise. Journal of Political Economy 84(5):1061-1077.