Course 2019-2020 a.y.

• Consumer theory.
• Theory of the firm: technology and production.
• Competitive equilibrium.
• Market power: monopoly.
• Oligopoly and strategic behavior.
• Choice under uncertainty.
• Asymmetric information.
• Externalities.

• Describe how consumers and firms interact in different market structures.
• Explain how the interaction between consumers and firms determines price and quantity of goods.
• Identify the relevant characteristics of the different market structures.
• Explain how the firms' behavior depends on the market structure.
• Illustrate the role of uncertainty and informational asymmetries in the market allocation.
• Describe the implications in terms of efficiency and equity of external interventions such as public regulations.

• Apply economic reasoning to consumers' and firms' behaviour.
• Apply marginal analysis and opportunity cost to assess economic decisions.
• Use the concepts of demand and supply to compute changes in market equilibrium and variations of welfare.
• Analyze the impact of public policies.

• Face-to-face lectures
• Exercises (exercises, database, software etc.)
• Interactive class activities (role playing, business game, simulation, online forum, instant polls)

The learning experience of the course includes, in addition to face-to-face lectures, the solution in class of exercises that allow students to apply and better assimilate the tools presented in the course. Students are encouraged to bring their own views and share their insights. 

The general exam in the July and August session will be held online through the Respondus browser. It will last one hour. A mock exam is available in each class of the course in blackboard.

With the purpose of measuring the acquisition of the above-mentioned learning outcomes, the students’ assessment is based on a written exam asking substantiated answers to specific questions and solutions to exercises. Questions aim to assess the ability to describe and explain consumers' and firms' behavior in markets using economic reasoning. Exercises are used to verify the ability to apply the concepts and analytical tools illustrated in the course to economic models.

• Students can take a partial written exam and complete the written exam at the end of the course. In this case the weight is 50% for the partial exam and 50% for the end of term exam.
• Alternatively, students can take a final written exam that accounts for 100% of the final grade.
• In addition, there are three or four quiz tests with multiple choice questions during class hours. The quiz tests are aimed mainly to assess the students' knowledge and understanding of the key notions illustrated in the course. The maximum total score over all quiz tests is equal to 1. The total score in the quiz tests is added to the rounded average grade obtained in the partial and final exams or to the final grade obtained in the general exam.

• B. DOUGLAS BERMHEI, D. WHINSTON, Microeconomics, ISBN : 9781307298048
• Microeconomics, Exercises, Egea, 2019.