Theme 1: Introduction to Markets and Market Failure
Theme 3: Business Behaviour and the Labour Market
This focuses on microeconomics, which is economics on a small scale, and concentrates on the choices people make, particularly how and why the decisions that we make have an impact on those around us. Analysis of the basic economic problem looks at the constraints of allocating resources and satisfying the infinite wants in an economy. Demand and supply within a market influence the pricing of any product in our economy and this unit will explore this relationship in more depth.
Business economics is an area of microeconomics that looks at the behaviour of firms in their competitive environment. How do they make decisions about how much to produce and what price to charge? How does this change depending on the behaviour of other competing firms? Do they ever not compete with each other?
Unfortunately, these market forces can, at times, create unfavourable outcomes for society. Some firms are happy to ignore the pollution that they have created because it may not have reduced their profits. Should the government intervene to correct this market failure? Does society benefit from green taxes designed to make the polluter pay, or would society be better off without these taxes?
Theme 2: The UK Economy Performance and Policies
Theme 4: A Global Perspective The global economy involves an in-depth study of macroeconomics from a global perspective with the examination based on some topical prerelease stimulus material. The unit picks up from Theme 2 in terms of economic growth, but then goes on to look at international trade, globalisation and the economics of developing countries. Economics is examined through three twohour exams.
This concerns the performance of the whole economy. Studying macroeconomics will help you to understand economy-wide issues such as the causes of economic growth, inflation and unemployment. You will also study the impact government economic policy has on the economy. For example, are recessions inevitable and what can (and should) politicians do to steer our economy back into a period of economic growth?
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