Economics 548 International Economic Relations
Welcome to the web page for Econ 548! This is where course documents and announcements will be posted.
Course Weblog Now active!
Announcements (New ones at the top)
July 17: Guidelines for the paper (in case anyone didn't get these in class--nothing new)
July 2: Read this article on the trade deficit for Monday, July 9. Also read section V of the King reader.
June 13: For next week read the articles in section II of the King reader. We will start with chapter 8. Labor will be the main topic for Monday. Immigration will be the main topic on Wednesday and we'll pick up the other articles as time permits. Watch these announcements (and your e-mail) for an additional article or two on immigration.
June 4: Start reading the articles in section I of the King reader. We will plan to start discussing them on the 13th. My plan is to concentrate mostly on the first four articles and the fifth one as time permits. In class, I will give you some suggestions to help you with the reading.
For those interested, here is a link to Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. The website econlib.org has a lot of other great material as well.
Homework
Homework 1 (Due: June 20)
Homework 2 (Due: June 27)
Homework 3 (Due: July 18)
Homework 4 (Due: July 25)
Course Supplements
Helpful suggestions for the first reading
As you read, stay focused on these important questions/concepts. These broad ideas will help you stay on track and will be important for our discussion, but they are just some basic starting questions. The questions on page 65 are more targeted and specific. Read for a basic understanding first. Ask yourself what broad topic is being covered in each part. Then get into the details, looking more critically at the data presented and asking, in the case of the cost of protection, how big these numbers are relative to the economy.
Background article on free trade and protection by Paul Krugman, "Is Free Trade Passé?" (1987 Journal of Economic Perspectives). This is a J-Stor article that can be accessed anywhere on the WIU campus. Students can access this article from off-campus by logging into the library before clicking on the link. This article is optional reading, meaning we will not discuss it in detail and some parts of it are beyond the scope of the course. However, you may find it interesting, and possibly useful for your papers.
OpinionJournal article on trade protection in the sugar industry.
EPI article on immigration and Cato Institute congressional testimony on immigration - reading supplements for week of June 18.
William Poole (St. Louis Fed) speech on free trade.
New Economist blog post with links on globalization.
PowerPoint slides on Heckscher-Ohlin
PowerPoint slides on views concerning free trade
McCloskey article on globalization
Lucas article on economic growth
PowerPoint slides on international financial system
Links
Roger McCain's Essential Principles of Economics (Basic review of what is covered in most principles courses)
R. Preston McAfee's Introduction to Economic Analysis (Excellent review for the more technically minded)
Harmonized Tariff Schedule for the United States
gapminder.org (Amazing tools for analyzing development statistics. Be sure to check out the interactive graph and this video. Here's another newer video.)
Note
Some notes are posted as PowerPoint files. Others are in pdf format. If you don't have the Adobe Acrobat Reader, you may download it by clicking on the link below.
