The authors show how the transformation loci in the specific factors model (capital specificity) and the Heckscher-Ohlin-Samuelson model (capital mobility) can be rigorously derived and easily compared by using geometric techniques on the basis of Savosnick geometry. The approach shows directly that the transformation locus with capital…

In this paper, the author expands on the idea of using up-to-date examples to teach applications of economic concepts. In the MBA Managerial Economics class, the author use profiles of two companies' decision-making strategies and their successes to show the applications of economic concepts used by the companies. This provides an even clearer…

The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago will host a conference, Financial Literacy, Financial Education, and the Federal Reserve: Strategies for Success, on September 11, 2009. This article reviews some of the financial education activities throughout the Federal Reserve System. The topics these initiatives cover include financial skill building,…

A series of studies in several countries tested the economic understanding of people, particularly students. The performance of the subjects is typically conceived as showing "deficits". These alleged deficits seem to correspond with scepticism towards market economy. Better test scores in general correlate with higher appraisal of…

For the open economy, the workhorse model in intermediate textbooks still is the Mundell-Fleming model, which basically extends the investment and savings, liquidity preference and money supply (IS-LM) model to open economy problems. The authors present a simple New Keynesian model of the open economy that introduces open economy considerations…

When highly visible lapses in ethics occur, education gets some of the blame. Principals in the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis and the Enron scandal had been educated at Harvard and other elite business schools, where professional and moral ideals had arguably been replaced by a focus on profits at the expense of ethics. A long-standing tradition…

In the course of the European Bologna process, the notion of employability becomes increasingly important for universities. Graduates are in particular employable, if they exactly possess those abilities and skills, which are required by employers. Studies show that in the context of recruiting university graduates, employers do not only pay…

This article explores the various types of domestic education, particularly cookery, available in Manchester between 1870 and 1902. The work of the two local School Boards and the Manchester School of Domestic Economy are shown as part of a complicated network of provision--a mixed economy of welfare, including enthusiastic philanthropists and…

The authors investigated whether the curricular structure of an economics course (semester, trimester, or compressed block schedule) has an effect on an undergraduate's subsequent retention of course material, while controlling for other relevant differences. They tested separately for theoretical or process comprehension and for graphical…

The authors describe an interdisciplinary course team-taught by an economist and a sociologist. Historically mindful of the less than amicable relationship between these disciplines, these colleagues developed a course that attempted to illuminate the different perspectives of economics and sociology in relation to selected health themes. Such a…

An introductory course is the discipline's handshake; it is the greeting that either seals the deal or in varying degrees convinces the learner that this discipline has little usefulness. Given the huge stakes in forming a strategy for the introductory course, how should we structure the course? The argument in this paper is that we should…

The author describes a protocol for classroom experiments for courses that introduce undergraduates to signaling games. Signaling games are conceptually difficult because, when analyzing the game, students are not naturally inclined to think in probabilistic, Bayesian terms. The experimental design explicitly presents the posterior frequencies of…

The author presents Web-based surveying as a valuable tool for achieving quality undergraduate research in upper-level economics courses. Web-based surveys can be employed in efforts to integrate undergraduate research into the curriculum without overburdening students or faculty. The author discusses the value of undergraduate research, notes…

Defined mathematically, the internal rate of return (IRR) of a cash-flow stream is the discount rate at which its net present value is 0. What is the significance or meaning of such a measure? Using simple example problems and illustrative calculations, the author explains a technically correct but, at the same time, intuitively meaningful…

The average score of economics majors on the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) exceeds those of nearly all humanities and arts, social sciences, and business undergraduate majors but not those of most science, engineering, and mathematics majors. (Contains 1 table.)