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Economists Exam Questions Suggested Reading Syllabus Williams

Williams College. Joan Robinson’s (last) course reading list, 1982

After a glorious three week archive/library tour that has taken me from the Library of Congress in Washington to the Harvard Archives to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library to the Johns Hopkins Archives and back to the Library of Congress, I have time before my flight back to Berlin for a post.

Less than a year before her death, Joan Robinson taught at Williams College in the Autumn/Winter of 1982. Her lectures at Williams were attended by a former colleague of mine from the University of Houston, Dr. D. Andrew Austin, now at the Library of Congress. Andrew shared with me the reading list for her lectures “Problems in Economic Analysis” along with a list of questions for a paper/take-home (exam).

Robinson’s chosen readings are taken from her books:

  • Economic Heresies: Some Old-fashioned Questions in Economic Theory. London: Macmillan, 1971.
  • Contributions to Modern Economics. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1978.
  • Aspects of Development and Underdevelopment. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1979.
  • Collected Economic Papers (5 vols.). Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1951-79; reprinted by MIT Press in 1980.
  • What are the Questions? An Other Essays: Further Contributions to Modern Economics. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1981.

_________________________

 

Professor Joan Robinson

PROBLEMS IN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
[Williams College, 1982]

OUTLINE OF TOPICS AND REFERENCES

  1. Economics: Ideas and Ideology
    “Marx, Marshall, and Keynes” (Contributions to Modern Economics, Ch. 7)
    “Economics Today” (Collected Economic Papers, Vol. 4, p. 122-127)
    “The Second Crisis of Economic Theory” (Collected Papers, 4, Ch. 10)
  2. What are the Questions?
    “What are the Questions?” (Further Contributions, Ch. 1)
    “The Age of Growth” (Further Contributions, Ch. 2)
    “Stagflation” (Further Contributions, Ch. 3)
  3. and 4. Effective Demand and Employment
    “Prices and Money” (Economic Heresies, Ch. 6)
    “Obstacles to Full Employment” (Contributions, Ch. 3)
    “The Rate of Interest” (Contributions, Ch. 5)
  4. Prices
    “The Philosophy of Prices” (Contributions, Ch. 14)
    “Imperfect Competition Revisited” (Contributions, Ch. 15)
    “The Theory of Value Reconsidered” (Contributions, Ch. 16)
    “The Theory of the Firm” (Economic Heresies, Ch. 7)
  5. Capital, Distribution, and Growth
    “The Meaning of Capital” (Contributions, Ch. 11)
    “Marginal Productivity” (Collected Papers, Vol. 4, Ch. 14)
    “Interest and Profit” (Economic Heresies, Ch. 3)
    “Surplus and Accumulation” (Aspects of Development & Underdevelopment, Ch. 2)
  6. International Trade
    “Beggar-My-Neighbour Remedies for Unemployment” (Contributions, Ch. 17)
    “The New Mercantilism” (Contributions, Ch. 18)
    “Trade in Primary Commodities” (Aspects of Development, Ch. 4)
  7. Economic Development
    “The Poverty of Nations” (Collected Papers, Vol. 4, Ch. 11)
    Aspects of Development and Underdevelopment
  8. Capitalism and Socialism
    “Latter-Day Capitalism” (Contributions, Ch. 21)
    “Has Capitalism Changed” (Contributions, Ch. 20)
    “Socialist Affluence” (Contributions, Ch. 22)

 

Econ. 353 Paper/Take Home
Professor Joan Robinson

Do the following three questions:

  1. Experience in the 1980s seems to be fulfilling Kalecki’s prediction of a political trade cycle. Comment.
  2. a) Explain Keynes’ theory of employment.
    b) Keynes failed to make clear whether this theory was intended to apply to a closed or open economy. Does it matter? Why or why not?
  3. What is the meaning of capital as a factor of production?

 

Choose one of the following two questions:

  1. The orthodox doctrines of economics which were dominant in the last quarter of the nineteenth century had a clear message. They supported laisser faire, free trade, the gold standard, and the universally advantageous effects of the pursuit of profit by competitive private enterprise. This was acceptable to the authorities in an expanding and flourishing capitalist world, especially to the authorities in England, which was still felt to be the dominant center and chief beneficiary of the system. Comment.
  2. The so-called Quantity Theory of Money consists in mistaking a symptom for a cause. Comment.

 

 

Source: Copy provided to Economics in the Rear-view Mirror by D. Andrew Austin of the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

Image Source: Joan Robinson at Williams College, Fall 1982 in Joan Robinson and the Americans by Marjorie Shephard Turner, p. 112 (ebook price: $9.99). Published by M. E. Sharpe , 1989.

 

 

Categories
Curriculum Exam Questions Harvard Undergraduate

Harvard. Francis Bowen’s Final Exam for Political Economy, 1869

 

 

While collecting old economics examination questions at the Harvard University Archives, I happened to come across a final examination for Political Economy from the pre-Dunbar years. The senior year course during the academic year 1868-69 was taught by Francis Bowen who assigned his own textbook, The Principles of Political Economy applied to the Condition, the Resources, and the Institutions of the American People (2nd edition, 1859). In the following year (1870) Bowen published American Political Economy; including Strictures of the Currency and the Finances since 1861. One probably can presume his lectures were closer to the latter of the two books. 

For this post I have included Bowen’s obituary published by the Harvard Crimson as well as a summary of the Harvard College curriculum in 1868-69 as published in the annual report of the President of Harvard College.

 

__________________________

Bowen’s Examination Questions

POLITICAL ECONOMY.

  1. Explain the difference between the laws of England, France, and the United States in respect to the rights of inheritance and bequest of real estate and personal property, showing the economical results of each of the three systems.
  2. What are the Metayer system, the Allotment system, Tenant Right, the Cottier Tenure, Peasant Proprietors, and the advantages and disadvantages of each?
  3. Show the difference between Exchange Value, Market Price, and Cost of Production. What is the law of the Equation of Demand and Supply?
  4. Wherein does Monopoly or a Scarcity Value differ from ordinary Cost of Production? According to Ricardo, is Rent an element in the Cost of Production;–and why.
  5. How is the interchange of commodities between distant countries regulated not by their absolute, but their comparative, Cost of Production? Explain the Equation of International Demand, and show the influence of cost of carriage on International Values.
  6. By what is the Rate of Interest regulated? Does this Rate depend on the Value of Money? How does it affect the price of land?
  7. What are the fundamental rules of Taxation? Distinguish between Direct and Indirect taxation:–what provision in the Constitution of the United States on this subject? How ought this provision to affect the Income Tax?
  8. What effect has the Rate of Taxation on the amount of revenue collected? Ought taxes to be at the same rate on large and small incomes?
  9. When did the National Debts begin, and wherein do they differ from private debts? What is the Funding of a National Debt?
  10. How came both England and the United States to be in debt for a much larger amount than they ever received from their creditors? What are the arguments in favor of paying off a National Debt within the lifetime of the generation that contracted it?

Sen. Ann. June, 1869.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Final Examinations 1853-2001. Box 1, Folder “Final examinations, 1868-1869”.

 

__________________________

An Obituary for Francis Bowen

Francis Bowen.
Harvard Crimson, January 22, 1890

Late yesterday afternoon it was announced that Professor Francis Bowen had died at his home at one o’clock of heart failure. He was born on September 8, 1811, at Charleston, Mass., and was therefore in his seventy-ninth year. In 1833 he was graduated from the college in the same class with Professor Lovering, Professor Torrey, Dr. M. Wyman, Professor J. Wyman, and the late Dr. George E. Ellis of Boston. During the four years following his graduation he was an instructor here in intellectual philosophy and political economy. In 1843 he succeeded Dr. Palfrey as editor and proprietor of the North American Review which he conducted until 1854. He was appointed professor of history in the college in 1850, but the board of overseers refused to confirm the appointment on account of his unpopular views on politics. Three years later, however, he was unanimously confirmed as Alford professor to succeed Dr. Walker. In this capacity he continued to serve the college until December, 1889, when he resigned the professorship; so that he has been in active service over thirty-six years. He was a prompt and constant attendant at lectures and always interested in his work. Of late years he has done only half-work and is not well-known to many of the undergraduates. But his influence on the graduates has been remarkably strong, many of them remembering him with the greatest affection.

In the early days of the Lowell Institute he was one of the most popular lecturers in the country. In 1848-9 he lectured before the Institute on the application of metaphysical and ethical science to the evidences of religion; in 1850 on political economy; in 1852, on the origin and development of the English and American constitutions; and subsequently on English philosophers from Bacon to Sir William Hamilton. The most of these lectures were subsequently published. He also published an annotated edition of Virgil, Critical Essays on the History and Present Condition of Speculative Philosophy, Principles of Political Economy, a text book on Logic, Sir William Hamilton’s essays on metaphysics, condensed and edited, and not more than five years ago he prepared the report of the U. S. Silver Commission. In 1879 the degree of L. L. D. was conferred upon him by the University, an honor fifty crowning his years of usefulness. The last years of his life have been quiet and uneventful.

 

__________________________

 

Overview of Harvard College Courses of Instruction, 1868-69

APPENDIX.
I.

SUMMARY STATEMENT OF THE COURSE OF INSTRUCTION PURSUED IN THE SEVERAL DEPARTMENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY DURING THE ACADEMIC YEAR 1868-69.

I. ACADEMIC DEPARTMENT.

 

  1. RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION.

INSTRUCTION in Ethics and in Christian Evidences was given by the Acting President. During the First Term he heard recitations from the Freshman Class, twice a week, in Champlin’s First Principles of Ethics, and Bulfinch’s Evidences of Christianity.

During the Second Term he met the Senior Class twice a week, hearing them recite in Peabody’s Christianity the Religion of Nature, and delivering Lectures on the Christian Scriptures and the Evidences of Christianity. During the entire year the service of Daily Prayers was attended by him; and he supplied the Chapel pulpit on Sunday.

Two hundred and seventy-five students had leave of absence from Cambridge to pass Sunday at home; one hundred and forty-five attended worship in the College Chapel; and one hundred and sixteen attended other churches in Cambridge.

 

  1. PHILOSOPHY.

The means of instruction in this Department are recitations familiarly illustrated at the time by the Professor, lectures occasionally substituted for recitations, and written forensic exercises.

The Department was under the charge of Francis Bowen, A. M., Alford Professor, assisted by William W. Newell, A.B., Instructor in Philosophy. During the First Academic Term the Senior Class recited three times a week in Bowen’s Ethics and Metaphysics, and Bowen’s Political Economy. During a portion of the Second Term the same Class recited twice a week in Bowen’s Ethics and Metaphysics. An elective section of the same class also recited three times a week in Mill’s Examination of Sir W. Hamilton’s Philosophy, Schwegler’s History of Philosophy, Mansel’s Limits of Religious Thought, and Bowen’s Essays. The Junior Class recited twice a week to Mr. Newell in Bowen’s Logic, Reid’s Essays, and Hamilton’s Metaphysics. The Sophomores recited to Mr. Newell twice a week during one term in Stewart’s Philosophy of the Mind.

Forensics were read, in the First Term, once a month by the Seniors, half of the Class attending each fortnight. The Juniors also read Forensics once a month during one term.

 

  1. RHETORIC AND ORATORY.

This Department is under the superintendence of Francis J. Child, Ph. D., Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory, assisted in the teaching of Elocution by James Jennison, A. M. Instruction was given to elective sections of the three higher classes in the Early English Language and Literature.

Sophomores had two lessons a week, and studied Vernon’s Anglo-Saxon Guide and Morris’s Specimens of Early English.

Juniors had three lessons a week, and studied Vernon’s Anglo-Saxon Guide, Morris’s Specimens, and Morris’s edition of the Prologues and Knightes Tale from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

The Senior section read Thorpe’s Analecta Anglo-Saxoniea and Mätzner’s Altenglische Sprachproben.

One fifth of the Sophomore Class wrote Themes, and attended a critical exercise upon them, each week throughout the year.

The Juniors wrote Themes, and attended a critical exercise upon them, once every three weeks during the First Term.

The Senior Class had four Themes during the Second Term.

The inspection of performances for Commencement and for the other public Exhibitions is committed to this Department.

The foregoing statement relates to the duties of the Professor.

There are separate courses of instruction in Elocution, and in Reading, which are wholly under the care of the Tutor in Elocution.

The Sophomores and Freshmen attended him once every week during the year as required, and he gave instruction to extra sections from all the classes.

He superintended rehearsals of performances for the Public Exhibitions of the year; the final rehearsal for each of which is regularly attended by the Professor.

 

  1. HISTORY.

In this Department instruction was given to the whole Senior Class by Professor Torrey and Professor Gurney; the textbooks used being the Abridgment of Story’s Commentaries on the Constitution, Guizot’s Civilization in Europe, Arnold’s Lectures, and Hallam’s Middle Ages. An elective class read with Professor Torrey May’s Constitutional History and Mill on Representative Government. A special examination was held of students who had offered themselves as candidates for Honors after having pursued an additional course of study.

The Sophomore Class recited to Professor Gurney in “ The Student’s Gibbon ” during the First Term.

The Freshman Class recited to Mr. Lewis, in the Second Term, in Duruy’s “Histoire Grecque.”

 

  1. MODERN LANGUAGES.

This Department is under the superintendence of James R. Lowell, A. M., Smith Professor of the French and Spanish Languages, and Professor of Belles-Lettres. Elbridge J. Cutler, A. B., Assistant Professor, has special charge of the instruction in French and German. Bennett H. Nash, A. M., is instructor in Italian and Spanish. Thomas S. Perry, A. M., is Tutor of Modern Languages. Louis C. Lewis, A. M., was Tutor of Modern Languages during the last year.

French is a required study during the First Term of the Freshman year; and Ancient History is taught from a French textbook during the Second Term of that year. French is an elective study during the Senior year. German is a required study during the Sophomore year; and an elective during the Junior and Senior years. During the last year the Sophomores studied French instead of German, they having failed to study French during their Freshman year, for reasons given in the last Annual Report. Spanish is studied as an extra, i. e. without marks, during the Junior year, and as an elective during the Senior year. Italian is an elective in the Sophomore, Junior, and Senior years, and the students are allowed to study Italian during any one or two of these three years; but no Senior beginning Italian is allowed to receive marks for the same.

The Professor gave a course of lectures to the Seniors during the Second Term.

The Assistant Professor taught elective German to the Seniors in two sections, three times a week throughout the year. Text-books, Otto’s and Weisse’s German Grammars, “Egmont,” “Taugenichts,” “Braune Erica,” Schiller’s “Maria Stuart,” and Goethe’s “Wahrheit und Dichtung.” He also taught elective French to the Seniors in two sections, three times a week. Textbooks, Beaumarchais’s “Barbier de Seville,” La Fontaine’s Fables, Racine’s “Athalie,” “Selections from French Prose-Writers,” and Pylodet’s “ Littérature Française.”

Instruction was given in Italian as follows :—

To a section of the Senior Class, in three recitations a week. This section read portions of Tasso’s “Gerusalemme ” and of Dante’s “Divina Commedia,” upon which the Instructor gave explanatory lectures. The section also handed in written translations from English into Italian, and had exercises in writing Italian from dictation. They had one written examination beside the annual examination.

To a section of the Junior Class, in two recitations a week. The textbooks used were Cuore’s Grammar, Nota’s “La Fiera,” and Dall’ Ongaro’s “La Rosa dell’ Alpi.” They attended one private written examination, practised writing Italian from dictation, and gave in written translations from English into Italian.

To two sections of the Sophomore Class. Each section had two recitations a week in the same text-books as the Juniors. Each section was exercised in writing Italian from dictation. Beside the annual examination at the close of the Second Term, the Sophomores attended three written examinations.

Instruction was given in Spanish as follows : —

To a section of the Senior Class, which attended three recitations a week, and read Moratin’s “El sí de las niñas,” Lope de Vega’s “La Estrella de Sevilla,” and portions of “Don Quijote.” This section wrote Spanish from dictation, and also translations from English into Spanish. They had one private examination in writing, beside the Annual Examination at the close of the Second Term.

To a section of the Junior Class, which recited twice a week, studying Josse’s Grammar and Reader, and portions of Le Sage’s “Gil Blas.”

 

  1. LATIN.

During the last year this Department was under the superintendence of George M. Lane, Ph. D., University Professor of Latin, aided by Mr. James B. Greenough and Mr. Prentiss Cummings, Tutors. The instruction of the Senior and Junior Classes was conducted by Professor Lane, that of the Sophomore Class by Mr. Cummings, and that of the Freshman Class by Mr. Greenough.

Instruction was given to the Freshman Class in Lincoln’s Selections from Livy (two Books), the Odes of Horace, Cicero’s Cato Major, Roman Antiquities, and in writing Latin:

To the Sophomore Class, in Cicero’s Laelius, Cato Major, and Select Epistles; Terence’s Phormio, Eunuchus, and Adelphi; Quintus Curtius, selections from Ovid, Seneca’s Hercules Furens, and in Writing Latin:

To the Junior Class, in Horace’s Satires, Tacitus’s Annals, and Juvenal :

To the Seniors, in Juvenal, Cicero de Deorum Natura, Lucretius, and Plautus, in the regular elective division. Besides this, instruction was given to the candidates for Honors, in Tacitus and in Latin Composition.

 

  1. GREEK.

The Greek Department, in the absence of William W. Goodwin, Ph. D., Eliot Professor of Greek Literature, was under the charge of Evangelinus A. Sophocles, LL.D., University Professor of Ancient, Byzantine, and Modern Greek, and Isaac Flagg, A. M., and William H. Appleton, A.M., Tutors in Greek.

The Freshmen were instructed by Mr. Flagg and Mr. Appleton. They were divided into four sections, and attended four recitations a week during each Term, besides exercises in Greek Composition. The text-books were Xenophon’s Memorabilia, the Odyssey, and Lysias.

The Sophomores were instructed by Mr. Flagg. They recited twice a week, in four sections, and read the Prometheus of Aeschylus, the Birds of Aristophanes, and the Olynthiacs of Demosthenes. The elective section in advanced Greek read also Plato’s Apology and Crito, the Alcestis of Euripides, and half of the First Book of Herodotus. The Class was also instructed in Greek Composition.

An elective section of Juniors read the first three books of Polybius with Professor Sophocles. A section of Juniors read Aeschines, and Demosthenes on the Crown with Mr. Flagg.

An elective section of Seniors read Plato’s Apology and Crito, and the Electra of Sophocles with Mr. Flagg; and another section read the Antigone of Sophocles, the Alcestis of Euripides, and Thucydides with Professor Sophocles.

 

  1. HEBREW.

This Department, vacant the First Term, was filled the Second Term by Rev. Edward J. Young, Hancock Professor of Hebrew and other Oriental Languages, who gives instruction twice a week to such students as desire it.

 

  1. NATURAL HISTORY.

This Department, now wholly elective, was, in the absence of Professor Gray, under the care of Wm. T. Brigham, A.M.

The course was attended by sixty-four Students of the Junior Class; and the instruction was given by recitations in Structural Botany, lectures on Vegetable Physiology and Organography, and practical work in plant-analysis with the microscope, followed by oral and written examinations. Each student was occupied three hours each week in the lecture-room. From the Thanksgiving recess to the end of the First Term the Class attended recitations and lectures on Animal Physiology and Anatomy, under the care of Jeffri9es Wyman, M. D.

 

  1. ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY.

A course of twenty Lectures on the Anatomy and Physiology of Vertebrated Animals was delivered during the First Term, to members of the Senior Class, and to members of the Professional Schools, by Jeffries Wyman, M.D., Hersey Professor of Anatomy. The Lectures were given on Tuesdays and Thursdays, at 12 M. During the second half of the First Term, fifty members of the Junior Glass attended recitations from a text-book on Physiology, on Wednesdays and Fridays, from 10 to 12 A.M.

 

  1. CHEMISTRY AND MINERALOGY.

The instruction in this Department was given by Josiah P. Cooke, A.M., Erving Professor, and George A. Hill, A.B., Tutor in Physics and Chemistry. During the First Term the Sophomore Class studied Cooke’s Chemical Physics, reciting in three divisions twice each week, and passing two private examinations during the Term. In the Second Term the same Class studied “The First Principles of Chemical Philosophy,” passing one private examination, and the usual public examination at the end of the year. They also attended a course of Lectures, one each week, on General Chemistry.

Those of the Junior Class who elected this department attended during the whole year a course of instruction in Practical Chemistry, giving their attendance in the Laboratory six hours each week, in addition to the three regular hours of recitation. The text-books used were Galloway’s Qualitative Chemical Analysis and Cooke’s Chemical Philosophy; but the course is specially designed to train the faculties of observation and to teach the methods of scientific study, and hence the greater part of the instruction is necessarily oral. The course of Lectures on General Chemistry begun in the Second Term of the Sophomore was continued during the First Term of the Junior Year, two each week until the end of the Term.

Those of the Senior Class who elected Chemical Physics received instruction in Crystallography during the First Term (the text-book used being Cooke’s Chemical Physics), and during the Second Term in Blowpipe Analysis and in Mineralogy, the course consisting of Lectures and practical instruction in the laboratory and cabinet. Elderhorst’s Blowpipe Analysis and Dana’s Manual of Mineralogy were used as books of reference.

 

  1. PHYSICS.

During the last academic year instruction in this Department was conducted by George A. Hill, A.B., Tutor in Chemistry and Physics. Joseph Lovering, A.M., Hollis Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, was absent in Europe through the year, so that the usual courses of Lectures on Physics to the Senior and Junior Classes were not given.

The whole Junior Class recited to Mr. Hill three times a week during the First and Second Terms; and read Herschel’s Outlines of Astronomy and Lardner’s Course of Natural Philosophy [Optics]. This Class was examined at the end of the Second Term in both books.

The Class recited in three Divisions; each Division remaining with the instructor one hour at every exercise; in all nine hours a week.

 

  1. MATHEMATICS.

The instruction in this Department was given by Benjamin Peirce, LL.D., Perkins Professor of Astronomy and Mathematics; James Mills Peirce, A.M., Assistant Professor of Mathematics; Edwin P. Seaver, A.M., Tutor; and George V. Leverett, A.B., Instructor.
The Freshman Class recited, throughout the year, in four sections three times in the week, and in two sections, once in the week, from the following text-books: Peirce’s Plane and Solid Geometry, and Peirce’s Algebra. The Freshmen were also instructed in Plane Trigonometry.
The study of Mathematics was elective during the Sophomore, Junior, and Senior years.
In the Sophomore year the instruction in Pure and Applied Mathematics was arranged in four courses of two lessons a week each, and Students were allowed to elect one or more of these courses. The subjects taught were Analytic Geometry (Puckle’s Conic Sections, and lectures on the Elements of Analytic Geometry of Three Dimensions), the Differential Calculus (lectures and examples), Spherical Trigonometry
(lectures and examples), Elementary Mechanics (Goodwin and Kerr), and the Theory of Sound (Peirce).
Instruction was given to those who elected Mathematics in the Junior and Senior years, by lectures and recitations, on three days in the week, throughout the year, in Differential, Imaginary, Integral, and Residual Calculus, in the Calculus of Quaternions, and in the Mathematical Theory of Mechanics and Astronomy.
Applied Mathematics (Kerr’s Elementary Mechanics) was also an elective study in the Junior year.

[…]

 

COURSE OF INSTRUCTION FOR THE ACADEMICAL YEAR, 1868-69.

[…]

SENIOR CLASS.
FIRST TERM.

  1. Philosophy. Bowen’s Ethics and Metaphysics.—Bowen’s Political Economy.—Forensics.
  2. Modern History. Guizot’s and Arnold’s Lectures.—Story’s Abridged Commentaries on the Constitution.

ELECTIVE AND EXTRA STUDIES.

  1. Philosophy. Mill’s Examination of Hamilton’s Philosophy.—Last 140 pages of Bowen’s Logic.
  2. Mathematics. Peirce’s Analytic Mechanics.
  3. History. May’s Constitutional History.—Mill on Representative Government.
  4. Chemistry. Crystallography and Physics of Crystals.
  5. Greek. The Antigone of Sophocles.—The Alcestis of Euripides.
  6. Latin. Juvenal.—Cicero de Deorum Natura.—Tacitus’s Annals and Latin Exercises, with an extra Division.
  7. German. Goethe’s Egmont.—Schiller’s Wallenstein’s Lager und Maria Stuart.—Exercises in Writing German.
  8. French. Mennechet’s Littérature Française Classique.—La Fontaine’s Fables.—Writing French.
  9. Advanced Spanish. Moratin’s El sí de las niñas.—Lope de Vega’s La Estrella di Sevilla.
  10. Advanced Section. Tasso’s Gerusalemme.
  11. English. Thorpe’s Analecta Anglo-Saxonica.—Mätzner’s Alt-englische Sprachproben.
  12. Modern Literature. Lectures.
  13. Patristic and Modern Greek.
  14. Geology. Lectures.
  15. Anatomy. Lectures.

SECOND TERM.

  1. History. Hallam’s Middle Ages, one volume.
  2. Religious Instruction.
  3. Political Economy. Bowen’s, finished.
  4. Rhetoric. Themes.

 

ELECTIVE AND EXTRA STUDIES.

  1. Philosophy. Schwegler’s History of Philosophy (Selections).—Mansel’s Limits of Religious Thought.—Exercises and Lectures.
  2. Mathematics. Peirce’s Analytic Mechanics.—Lectures on Quaternions.
  3. Greek. Thucydides, First two Books.—Homer’s Iliad, Book IV.
  4. Latin. Lucretius and Plautus (Selections).
  5. History. Constitutional History.—Constitution of the United States, and the Federalist.
  6. Chemistry. Mineralogy and Determination of Minerals.
  7. German. Die Braune Erika.—Goethe’s Hermann and Dorothea.—Faust.—Writing German.
  8. French. Mennechet’s Littérature Française Classique.—Molière’s Misanthrope.—Beaumarchais’s Barbier.—Lessons in French Pronunciation.
  9. Advanced Spanish. Don Quijote.
  10. Advanced Section. Dante’s Divina Commedia.
  11. English. Studies of First Term continued.
  12. Zoölogy. Lectures.
  13. Modern Literature. Lectures.
  14. Patristic and Modern Greek.

[…]

 

The required studies of the Senior Class are History, Philosophy, and Ethics (together five hours a week). The elective studies are Greek, Latin, Mathematics, Physics, Chemical Physics, History, Philosophy, and Modern Languages (French, German, Italian, and Spanish). In each elective department there will be three exercises a week. Each Senior may choose three or two electives (at his pleasure), and receive marks for the same. Special students for honors may be permitted to devote the whole nine hours to two elective departments, under such restrictions as may be prescribed. Marks will be allowed in Modern Languages in the Senior year to advanced students only.

 

 

Source: Harvard University. Annual Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1868-69.

Image Source:  Portrait of Francis Bowen from the Harvard Square Library (Unitarian Universalism). The Harvard Book: Portraits.

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard Statistics

Harvard. Undergraduate Introduction to Economic Statistics. Final Exam, 1939

 

The exam questions seen below, even making an allowance for coming from an undergraduate course (nonetheless 13 of the 87 students were graduate students), indicate that the statistical training of economists at Harvard was a fairly low-grade affair even by the late 1930s, only a mechanical manipulation of different measures of central tendency and dispersion with a dash of trend-fitting and seasonal adjustment for good taste.

_____________________________

Course Listing

Economics 21a 1hf. Introduction to Economic Statistics

Half-course (first half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 10. Associate Professor Frickey.

 

Source: Announcement of the Courses of Instruction Offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences During 1938-39. (Second edition). Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. XXXV, No. 42 (September 23, 1938), p. 147.

_____________________________

Course Enrollment

 

Economics 21a 1hf. Associate Professor Frickey.—Introduction to Economic Statistics

Total 87: 13 Graduates, 23 Seniors, 17 Juniors, 25 Sophomores, 6 Freshmen, 3 Others.

 

Source: Report of the President of Harvard College and Reports of the Departments, 1938-39, p. 98.

_____________________________

1938-39
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
ECONOMICS 21a1

Part I

(One hour and thirty minutes.)
Answer any THREE questions.

    1. You are faced with the problem of computing an index of physical production of agricultural products for the years 1910 through 1935.
      1. What significant differences would you expect to find between the results of indexes computed as the weighted geometric mean of relatives and as the weighted arithmetic mean of relatives? Which average would you choose, and why?
      2. What difference would you expect to find among indexes computed respectively on the bases 1910, 1926, and 1935? Would you choose one of these three base periods, or some other base period?
      3. What sort of system of weights would you employ? Why?
    2. During a given interval in 1936, the wages paid to individual laborers in two New England cloth mills were recorded. A frequency table of wages paid was drawn up for each mill, and from the frequency tables, the following characteristics were computed.
Mean Wage Median Wage Standard Deviation of Individual Wages
Company A $25 $25 8.367
Company B $25 $16 23.875
    1. Inferring from the above data, describe the general nature of the frequency distribution of wages for each firm, and compare the wage conditions in the two firms.
    2. What “typical average” would you choose for the distribution of Company A? For that of Company B?
  1. The monthly ordinates of trend found by fitting a linear or curvilinear trend line to a time series of price data would be held by some to represent “long-run normal prices”—that is, the values which the price data would have assumed in the absence of short run cyclical disturbances. Others would maintain that these same trend ordinates are merely the outcome of the particular trend—fitting procedures applied by the statisticians, and therefore reflect only his arbitrary definition of what constitutes “trend” and what constitutes “cycle” in the price series. Evaluate the relative merits of these two points of view toward statistical trend lines, and state your own viewpoint.
  2. In an investigation conducted to ascertain the correlation existing between the value of the assets of firms and the amount of their annual net earnings, the following results were among those obtained. For the specialty store field, the line of regression of annual earnings on asset values gave a “standard error of estimate” of $1000. For the service station field, a similar line of regression of annual earnings on asset values showed a “standard error of estimate” of $500.
    Can we conclude from this that the correlation between earnings and assets is twice as great for service stations as for specialty stores? Why or why not? What additional data would you require in order to ascertain the actual correlation in each case and thereby clinch your argument?

 

PART II

(One hour and thirty minutes.)
Answer question 1, and either 2 or 3.

    1. (Approximately one hour.) The following is a segment of a time series for which certain statistical values have already been computed.
1st quarter 2nd quarter 3rd quarter 4th quarter
1924 21 27 34 40
1925 32 36 28 30
1926 35 37 31 35
1927 36 41 35 39

The central ordinate of trend (a), and the annual increment of trend (b), based on annual averages of quarterly data for a longer period, have been found to be as follows: a = 35; b = 4. The center of the trend period for which these quantities were computed falls at the middle of the year 1924.
The median link relatives, showing typical quarter to quarter change for a longer period, have been found to be:

1st q ÷ 4th q = 110
2nd q ÷ 1st q = 105
3rd q ÷ 2nd q = 85
4th q ÷ 3rd q = 112

Given the preceding data, compute for the period 1924 through 1927 the following:

    1. The quarterly ordinates of trend
    2. The relatives of actual items to the trend.
    3. The seasonally adjusted relatives to trend, to the base 100. (This last step will require also the computation of a seasonal index by the Persons method.)
  1. For the following frequency series, compute the quartile deviation, the coefficient of variation, and determine a good empirical mode. (Show your computations, but do not compute any square roots.)
Wages (dollars per week) No. of Men
0—5 22
5—10 29
10—15 18
15—20 12
20—25 9
25—30 5
30—35 3
35—40 2

 

  1. (a) From the data below compute a price index for 1933 on 1932 as a base, using the Fisher formula.
Commodity Unit Price per unit Physical quantity
1932 1933 1932 1933
A bu. $0.50 $0.60 60 50
B lb. $3.00 $3.30 22 20
C bu. $0.30 $0.24 240 200

(b) If the Fisher formula price index for 1934 on 1933 as a base is 110, and for 1935 on 1934 as a base is 90, construct from the index which you have computed and from the results just given an index for the four years 1932-1935 by which each year is related to a common base.

 

Mid-Year. 1939.

 

Source: Duke University, David M. Rubenstein Library. Lloyd Appleton Metzler Papers, Box 9, Folder “Dust Proof File”.

Image Source: Harvard Album 1947.

Categories
Chicago Exam Questions

Chicago. Exams for Introduction to Money and Banking, A. G. Hart, 1932-35

 

 

In an earlier post I provided the course outline and readings for the first money and banking courses taught by Albert Gailord Hart during the depths of the Great Depression. Today’s post provides transcriptions of the final examination questions for the course. Interesting to note that the course final exam was spread over two days in 1934 and 1935.

 

_______________________________

Course description

[Economics] 230. Introduction to Money and Banking.—The material in the course includes a study of the factors which determine the value of money in the short and in the long run; the problem of index numbers of price levels; and the operation of the commercial banking system and its relation to the price level and general business activity. Prerequisite: Social Science I and II or equivalent.

Source: University of Chicago, Announcements [for 1933-34], Arts, Literature and Science, vol. 33, no. 8 (March 25, 1933), p. 266.

_______________________________

Econ 230
A. G. Hart

FINAL EXAMINATION, DECEMBER 21, 1932

Answer questions I, II and III.

I. (About 20 minutes).

Suppose a large manufacturing firm wants more capital. It might establish a bank with $1,000,000 capital paid in in cash and $1,000,000 in deposits transferred from other banks. Apart from legal restrictions on the amount a bank may lend to a single borrower, could the manufacturing firm borrow $20,000,000 from the bank (reckoning 10% reserve)? If not, how much could be obtained from such a bank? Explain.

II. Answer all four parts, allowing about ten minutes for each:

a) Explain the difference between a sight draft and a cable draft in foreign exchange. Which includes an interest charge? Why?

b) Suppose demand depositors of the First National Bank of Chicago transferred $1,000,000 from demand to time deposits. What would be the change in the amount of reserve deposits which the First National is required to hold at the Federal Reserve? What would be the change in required reserve brought about by a similar shift of deposits in a state bank, member of the Federal Reserve System, in Cleveland, Ohio?

c) Explain what is meant by open market operations. How do they affect the money market?

d) Define Mr. Hawtrey’s concepts of “consumers’ outlay” and “unspent margin”. How do they figure in Mr. Hawtrey’s theory of the price level?

III. Answer any two parts, allowing about twenty minutes for each:

a) Explain the difference between the price level defined by the Fisher form of the quantity equation and a cost-of-living index for the working class. What might cause these two price levels to behave differently?

b) If counterfeiters succeeded in making perfect reproductions of Federal Reserve Notes and placed $100,000,000 in circulation, how would this differ from 1) an expansion of $100,000,000 in bank loans, 2) an extra $100,000,000 in greenbacks used by the government to pay unemployment relief in the following respects: i) effect on prices; ii) effect on the total volume of production and employment; iii) effect on the direction of production; iv) “forced saving”? Give reasons.

c) If citizens of a country increase their investments abroad, what influence will this have 1) on the price of sight bills on a foreign country; 2) on the balance of trade; 3) on the prices of domestic goods in the first country? Why?

d) What is the basis of distinction between “real” and “monetary” theories of the business cycle? Mention and criticise an example of each type.

_______________________________

Econ 230
A.G. Hart

Hour Examination, August 3, 1933

 

Answer questions I, II, and III

  1. Bank Statement:

The following items make up the condensed statement of one of the great New York banks for two recent call dates (to nearest $1000):

Item June 30, 1931 June 30, 1933
(000 omitted)
1. Stock of Federal Reserve Bank
2. Undivided Profits
3. U. S. Government securities
4. Other bonds and securities
5. Dividend payable July 1
6. Customers’ acceptance liability
7. Capital
8. Acceptances
9. Real estate
10. Reserve for contingencies
11. Deposits
12. Cash and due from banks
13. Surplus
14. Other assets
15. Other liabilities
16. Loans and discounts
17. Total resources
18. Total liabilities
$8,880
25,581
281,786
174,500
7,400
169,255
148,000
174,252
35,036
14,720
1,897,544
531,352
148,000
3,030
80,828
1,295,486
2,499,325
2,499,325
$8,160
8,705
207,955
246,845
2,590
91,443
148,000
93,354
32,069
3,334
1,408,337
351,374
50,000
15,466
18,747
779,755
1,733,067
1,733,067

A. Reconstruct the statement, separating assets from liabilities.
B. Which of the above items represent the investment of stockholders in the back? Do you think the total of these items bears a normal relation to total resources?
C. Does any of the above items show the bank’s primary reserves? If not, try to estimate their amount. Compare primary reserves with deposits. Do you think the proportion shows the bank to be healthy? Explain.
D. Which of the asset items consist wholly or in part of “secondary reserves”?
E. What items would replace #12 in a more detailed statement?
F. Suggest explanations for the decrease between 1931 and 1933 in items 11, 8, 5, 16, and 13.

 

  1. Federal Reserve:

A. What is the “open market committee”?
B. List three of the more important powers of the Federal Reserve Board over the Federal Reserve Banks.
C. Name five cities having Federal Reserve Banks

 

  1. Quantity Theory

It is the announced policy of the Roosevelt administration to spend about $3,000,000,000 within the next year on public works, raising the funds by borrowing from the Federal Reserve and member banks. In what sense is this “inflation”? Assuming no inflationary or deflationary actio from other sources, how much might this program be expected to raise the “general price level” in the long run? Explain.

 

_______________________________

FINAL EXAMINATION
Economics 230
Summer Quarter 1933

(follow link above)

_______________________________

 

FINAL EXAMINATION
Economics 230
Winter Quarter 1933

I
(About 30 minutes)

The following was the consolidated statement of the twelve Federal Reserve Banks for March 1, 1933 in abbreviated form:

Item March 1 Feb. 21, 1933
(000 omitted)
1. Total gold reserves
2. Total Reserves
3. Discounts secured by U.S. obligations
4. Other discounts
5. Total bills discounted
6. U. S. securities
7. Total bills bought
8. Federal Reserve notes in circulation
9. Total deposits
10. Reserve ratio against notes and deposits
$2,892,083
3,066,537
418,921
293,470
712,391
1,835,963
383,666
3,579,522
2,157,190
53.5%
$3,118,393
3,304,644
105,102
222,036
327,138
1,834,233
179,576
3,000,248
2,399,398
61.2%

Answer parts a) to d): a) Which of the above are asset items in which liabilities? What items are missing which would appear the complete statement? b) What makes up the difference between items 1 and 2 from March 1? c) Explain the changes in items 1, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 in terms of the conditions of the week covered, paying special attention to interrelations of the changes. d) Calculate free gold under the regular rules and under the Glass-Steagall Act (assuming notes issued not in circulation to be $100,000,000), as of March 1.

 

II

Answer all three parts, allowing about ten minutes for each:

a) Explain what is meant by open-market operations by the Federal Reserve Banks. Under whose authority are they conducted? What is their effect on the money market?

b) Explain the method of calculating “net demand deposits” for working out the required reserves of member banks.

c) Write out the Fisher equation of exchange and define the meaning of the symbols used. (Criticism or discussion not called for.)

 

III

Answer any two parts, allowing about twenty minutes for each:

a) Distinguish between “real” and “Monetary” theories of the business cycle. Mention and criticise an example of each.

b) Discuss: “The very process of financing increased production puts into circulation enough money to buy the added output, so that supply and demand must be equal. After all… trade is but a perfected system of barter.”

c) “In these days of serious world-wide maladjustments the importance of economic stability is likely to be over – rather than underrated.” Discuss.

d) Indicate the advantages and shortcomings of the quantity theory of money 1) for short-run analysis, 2) for predicting long-period tendencies.

_______________________________

 

ECONOMICS 230
Final Examination, Mch. 22-23 [1934]

Part I – answer questions 1 – 3 and either 4 or 5

  1. If the Federal Reserve wishes to diminish the reserves of the member banks, what can it do? Can anything happen to make these measures ineffective? If so, what?
  2. What is a letter of credit?
  3. What differences in meaning are there between the price level of Keynes’s first equation and that of Fisher’s equation?
  4. M. (100%) Nichols, of the First National Bank of Englewood, recently wrote to the R.F.C.: “when I believe that our merchants can safely and profitably borrow money, with a reasonable assurance of paying it back, I shall tell them so… I refuse to take this responsibility as I do not believe this is a safe time either to borrow or to loan.” Discuss this in relation to the government’s claim that refusal to expand bank loans is retarded recovery.
  5. It has been said that the effects of inflation are primarily on the distribution of wealth, those of deflation on its production. Discuss.

 

Part II – Answer questions 6-8 and either 9 or 10.

  1. Distinguish between F. R. Notes and F. R. Bank notes.
  2. Explain the meaning of “velocity of circulation”.
  3. Would the following tend to raise or lower the prices of foreign-currency units in dollars: a) increased demand for sugar in this country? b) an increase in our tariff duties on English textiles? c) resumption of payments to our government on account of war debts? d) the rise of wage rates in this country brought about by NRA? Explain briefly in each case.
  4. Do you think that the Roosevelt monetary policy will succeed in raising prices appreciably? Why and How? If you do, what do you think will be its effect on the following price relationships. Salaries vs. cost-of-living? Wages vs. cost-of-living? Farm prices for crops vs. prices of things farmers buy? Explain.
  5. Which of the following groups have most to gain by inflation and which least: policeman? Owners of mortgaged down-town real estate? Exporters? Railway bondholders? Railway stockholders? Wage earners? Unemployed steelworkers? Explain in each case, and if you cannot tell whether the group would gain, explain why you cannot.

_______________________________

Econ. 230
A. G. Hart

Final Examination
December 19-20, 1935

  1. Gold imports into the United States in the 22 months ending October 31, 1935 totaled nearly $2473 million (new valuation), increasing our monetary gold stocks by about one third. a) Suggest explanations for the movement. b) Estimate the effects of the inflow of total reserves of member banks; on their excess reserves. Explain your reasoning. c) Estimate the effects of the inflow on total reserves and on excess reserves of the Federal Reserve Banks, and explain.
  2. If American monetary policy brings about a substantial rise of prices within the next five years, how will this affect the interests of a) a widow with an annuity from a life insurance company; b) a railway engineer; c) a university professor; d) an unemployed carpenter; e) a postal clerk; f) an automobile mechanic. Give grounds for your answers.

 

 

  1. State and criticise the views of Gregory on the merits of the American devaluation from an international standpoint.
  2. Describes a means by which the American monetary authorities could act to stabilise: a) the dollar price of a foreign gold-standard currency, b) the volume of checking deposits in the hands of the public, c) an index number of wholesale prices. In each case what reasons are there for doubting the effectiveness of these means?
  3. (Optional – write only if time permits.) As among the three sorts of “stabilisation” mentioned, which would you prefer to see made the guide of monetary policy, and why?

 

Source: Columbia University Archives. Albert Gaylord Hart Papers. Box 61, Folder “Assignments and Other Memoranda for Reserve in Harper Reading Room Econ 230, A. G. Hart”.

Image source: Ibid.

 

 

Categories
Exam Questions Fields Harvard Statistics Suggested Reading

Harvard. General Exam Preparation for Statistics, 1947

 

 

______________________

April 1, 1947

SUGGESTIONS FOR PREPARATION IN THE GENERAL FIELD OF STATISTICS

Work in the two courses, Economics 121a and 121b, is in almost all cases an essential core of the preparation of the field of Statistics for General Examinations (requirements for the Special Field differ substantially), but such work does not constitute sufficient preparation. A considerable volume of additional reading is recommended, and Sections II and III below give certain pertinent suggestions; but candidates who wish to make other selections should submit their choices for the approval of one of the undersigned.

I. Foundation Theory

For statistical theory as such, a thorough knowledge of the work—in the classroom and in reading assignments—of Economics 121a is ordinarily adequate preparation. The main reading assignments in that course are:

C. U. Yule and M. G. Kendall—An Introduction to the Theory of Statistics, 1937 edition, entire book beginning with Chapter 6;

D. C. Jones—A First Course in Statistics, specified chapters on curve fitting and sampling;

W. P. Elderton-Frequency Curves and Correlation, specified portions on curve fitting and correlation;

but candidates should be prepared as well in the other assigned readings.

II. and III. Statistics Applied to Economics

Suggestions under heads II and III aim at giving the candidate an intensive acquaintance with (a) the applied statistical work of three specific authors, and (b) the applied statistical work in some particular economic area. Candidates who, in undertaking to meet these two requirements, select books or memoirs customarily treated in Economics 121b should understand that a more complete and intensive knowledge of such items is expected in the General Field than in 121b. In respect to each of these readings the candidate will be expected to know the contributions to statistical methodology in that item of reading, to have a critical appraisal of the statistical procedure used, and to know the importance and validity of the results for economic analysis.

The items listed below are merely suggestions; candidates may offer substitute readings for the approval of one of the undersigned.

II. Authors in Applied Statistics

In this section, no elementary statistics textbook is acceptable, nor will the classic Bulletin No. 284, U.S.B.L.S., by W. C. Mitchell, be accepted. Knowledge of these is taken for granted. For any author selected below, some book or extensive memoir presenting an application of statistics to economic problems is intended; but in no case should any item here be identical with one chosen under III below. Each candidate should select three authors.

Suggested Examples:

Sir Wm. Beveridge, Wheat Prices and Rainfall in Western Europe

A. L. Bowley, Wages and income in the United Kingdom since 1860

A.F. Burns, Production Trends

A. F. Burns and Wesley C. Mitchell, Measuring Business Cycles – (certain portions may be omitted; see the note at the end of this memorandum.)

W. L. Crum, Corporate Size and Earning Power

*E. E. Day, The Physical Volume of Production

Paul Douglas, Real Wages in the United States

Ralph Epstein, Industrial Profits

Mordecai Ezekiel, Methods of Correlation Analysis

Solomon Fabricant, Output of Manufacturing Industries

Solomon Fabricant, Employment in Manufacturing, 1899 -1939

*Irving Fisher, Making of Index Numbers

Edwin Frickey, Economic Fluctuations in the United States

Ralph G. Hurlin and W. A. Berridge, Employment Statistics for the United States

Simon Kuznets, Commodity Flow and Capital Formation

Simon Kuznets, National Income and its Composition (Vol. 1)

Simon Kuznets, Secular Movements

Wassily Leontief, Quantitative Input and Output Relations

F. C. Mills, Behavior of Prices

*W. C. Mitchell, Business Cycles—1927 ed. (statistical portions)

*W. M. Persons, Construction of Index Numbers (pp. 1-44)

*W. M. Persons, Indices of General Business Condition

Henry Schultz, The Theory and Measurement of Demand (statistical portions)

*Henry Schultz, Statistical Laws of Demand and Supply (the first part, on demand)

J. A. Schumpeter, Business Cycles, Vol. 1 (with emphasis on statistical portions)

Carl Snyder, Business Cycles and Business Measurements

Woodlief Thomas, et al., The Federal Reserve Index of Industrial Production, Federal Reserve Bulletin for August 1940, pp. 753-771; September 1940, pp. 912-924; July 1942, pp. 642-644; October 1943, pp. 940-984.

III. Statistical Studies in a Single Economic Field

The object of this section is to guide the candidate in studying statistical investigations of more than one author in some one economic subject. The candidate should choose one such subject, and have and intensive knowledge of the statistical work in that subject, or two or more leading authors. Comparisons among such authors will constitute a part of the requirement.

Suggested Examples

Index Numbers: *Fisher, Making of Index Numbers; * Persons, Construction of Index Numbers; (also, look briefly at Frickey, The Theory of Index-Number Bias, Review of Economic Statistics, November 1937.)

Secular Growth of Output: Burns, Production Trends; Fabricant, Output of Manufacturing Industries

Cycles, I: *Mitchell, Business Cycles (1927); Burns and Mitchell, Measuring Business Cycles (certain portion of this book may be omitted; see the note at end of this memorandum).

Cycles, II: *Persons, Indices of Business Conditions; Schumpeter, Business Cycles, Vol. 1

Multiple Correlation: Ezekiel, Methods of Correlation Analysis; Black et al., The Short-Cut Graphic Method of Multiple Correlations, Quarterly Journal of Economics, November 1937, pp. 66-112, and February 1940, pp. 318-364.

Employment: Fabricant, Employment in Manufacturing, 1899 – 1939; Hurlin and Berridge, Employment Statistics for the United States

Profits: Epstein, Industrial Profits; Crum, Corporate Size and Earning Power

Wages: Brissenden, Earnings of Factory Workers; Douglas, Real Wages in the United States

Prices: Mills, Behavior of Prices; Warren and Pearson, Prices (or Gold and Prices).

Distribution of Income: Brookings Report, America’s Capacity to Consume; Lough, High-Level Consumption

N.B. OF THE FIVE BOOKS CHOSEN UNDER II AND III, NOT MORE THAN FOUR MAY BE BOOKS WHICH ARE MARKED WITH A STAR (*) IN THE LISTS ABOVE.

Each candidate should submit his program, well in advance, for the approval of one of the undersigned:

L. W. Crum
Edwin Frickey

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1895-2003. Box 4, Folder “Economics, 1946-47”.

Image Source: Crum and Frickey in Harvard Class Album, 1942 and 1950.

 

 

 

Categories
Chicago Courses Exam Questions Suggested Reading Syllabus

Chicago. International Trade and Finance. Jacob Viner, 1933.

 

The first four pages of written notes taken by Milton Friedman for Jacob Viner’s course, International Trade and Finance, provide something of a course syllabus and list of suggested reading assignments. The notes are undated but in his civil service job applications, Friedman provided a list of courses by university, semester or quarter and course instructor. Milton Friedman took Jacob Viner’s course during the Winter quarter (January to mid-March) of 1933. Generally Friedman’s handwriting is easy to read, knowing the context, though some checking of authors’ names was required. I provide one sample from a particulary difficult five or six lines and welcome any alternative readings. Otherwise I am extremely confident in my transcription.

Elsewhere in his files, Milton Friedman had what appears to be a later photocopy of an exam for this course. The folder is labelled “Biographical: Class Exams circa 1932-1938”. “University of Chicago” and “Milton Friedman” are handwritten on the photocopy of the original typed copy of the exam.

Don Patinkin took the same course that was still taught by Viner in 1944: the course outline, readings and some exam questions are available in an earlier post.

_____________________________

International Economic Relations: Course Description

[Economics] 370. International Trade and Finance.—This course deals with the theory of international values, the mechanism of adjustment of international balances, foreign-exchange theory, the international aspects of monetary and banking theory, and tariff theory. Prerequisite: Economics 301 or its equivalent. Winter, Viner.

 

Source: University of Chicago. Announcements. Arts, Literature and Science, vol. XXXII, no. 12 (for the sessions of 1932-33), p. 361.

_____________________________

From Milton Friedman’s Course Notes

✓Mun England’s Treasure Ch. 2, 3, 4, 5, 20, 21

✓Hume Essays Moral & Political. Vol I—Essays (of Commerce/of the Balance of Trade)

✓Viner   Early English Theories. J.P.E. June & Aug, 1930. All of June article. pp. 418-431, 442-448 in Aug. article.

 

Bullionist Controversy

✓Silbering, Fin[ancial] & Mon[etary] Policy [of Great Britain During the Napoleonic Wars] Qu. Jour of Ec 1924

✓Angell ch III & Appendix A

✓Ricardo High Price of Bullion in works also in Gonner. Ricardo’s Essays

✓Viner Canada’s Balance, pp. 191-20[last digit smeared, might be “4”]

J.P.E. Oct 1926 pp. 600-608

✓J.S. Mill Principles Bk III Ch XXIV

✓Walker Money. Ch XIX & XX

Mill Principles Book III, Ch XIX, XX, XXI, XXII

Taussig, International Trade. Ch XVII, XVIII

 

1) Canada’s Balance pp. 202-212, 145-190

Angell pp. 170-174, 505-510

2) Ohlin. Is the Young Plan Feasible? Index Feb 1930

3) Angell-Q.J.E. May 1928

Rogers in Recent Ec. Changes Vol. II, Ch. II
Taussig, Int. Trade 325-332

4) Moulton on War Debts in Schanz Festgabe [Festgabe für Georg von Schanz zum 75 Geburtstag. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr. 1928. 2 vols. Papers by Beckerath, Lotz, Jèze, Einaudi, Stamp, Moulton, and others.]

____________________

with respect to 1) find answer:

  1. to what factor does Viner assign & to what factor does Angell says Viner assigns the immediate responsibility for the rise in prices. Also to what fact[or] he assigns it.
  2. What role does Viner assign & what role does Angell say Viner assigns & what role does Angell assign to the expansion of Canadian Bank loans.
  3. What is order of priority acc[ording] to Viner & acc[ording] to Ang[ell] of fluctuation in Canada bank demand liabilites & outside reserves.
  4. (cf. th[eory] by Mill or Tau[ssig]) If outside reserves was held as gold in Canada what role in the mechanism would the classical theory assign to them

 

Comparative Costs

Ricardo-Principles ch 7

Viner Welt-Archiv Oct, 1932

____________________

Manoïslesco Theory of Protection [Reviewed by Viner in JPE, Feb. 1932, pp. 121-125]

Grunzel Joseph. Handbuch der internationalen Handelspolitik (probably)]

Cherbuliez [, Antoine] Précis de la Science E., pp. 375-391

Walras “Théorie du Libre Échange. Revue d’Économique Politique XI (1897) pp. 651-664

or ‘Études d’Éc. Pol. Applique, pp. 286-304 [1898 reprint of previous article].

Pareto-Cours

Angell

Taussig. Int. Trade

Weber, Alfred. “Die Standortslehre und die Handelspolitik Archiv für Sozial. XXXII (1911) 667-688
____________________
Choose one & in about 10 days give appraisal thereof.

J.S. Mill Principles Bk III Ch XVII XVIII

Marshall. Money Credit & Commerce Bk III Ch VI, VII, VIII Appendix J[?] pp. 330-342

Terms of Trade

Taussig: Int. Trade see Index under Barter Terms of Trade.

Yntema Ch. 5.

Wilson Capital Imports, Ch 4.

Depreciated Paper

Taussig, Int. Trade 336-408

Graham Exchange Prices & Prod. in Germany. 97-99; 117-149

Cassel Money & Foreign Exchange after 1914, pp. 137-186

Cassel The Treatment of Price Problems. Ec J. Dec 1928

Ohlin International Trade Relations. Index Aug 1930

Bastable. Theory of Int’l Trade Ch 6.

League of Nations. [Financial Committee] Report of Gold Delegation, 1932 [Official no.: C.502.M.243.1932.II.A]

____________________

Read letter in last issue of Economica of a letter on the true something or other.

 

Source: Hoover Institution. Milton Friedman Papers, Box 120, Bound notes (Economics 370/J. Viner/10 a.m. S.S.B. 107).

_____________________________

Final Exam Questions Winter Quarter 1932-33

Economics 370

  1. Write notes on the following:
    1. “Increasing Returns” and the Comparative Cost Doctrine
    2. The “Law of Reciprocal Demand” and the “Equation of International Exchange.”
    3. The possibilities of partial specialization under free trade.
  1.       a.  Discuss the part played by international shifts in money incomes in adjusting balances of payments to international capital movements.
    b.  Explain briefly the part played in the lending country in connection with the same process by bank deposits and by bank loans.
  2. “The principles governing the rate of exchange may be illustrated by the following mechanical example. Represent two countries by two cisterns, and their stock of legal tender money by water, so that the depth of the water in either cistern may be taken to be the general level of prices in the corresponding country. If water cannot pass from either cistern to the other any divergence of depth may be produced at will by adjusting the respective quantities of water in them. This corresponds to the case of countries with independent currencies. If, however, the water can flow through a pipe leading from the base of one cistern to the base of the other, the depths in the two cisterns will always be identical.”
    Hawtrey, Good and Bad Trade, 1913, pp. 109-110.
    Comment briefly.

 

Source: Hoover Institution. Milton Friedman Papers, Box 115, Folder 13. “Biographical: Class Exams circa 1932-1938”.

Categories
Columbia Exam Questions Suggested Reading Syllabus

Columbia. Foundations of Social Economics. J.M. Clark 1937

 

Working with the papers of John Maurice Clark is not for historians who abhor dirt and disorder. Simply imagine going into an attic and finding the papers of your grandparents dumped shelf by shelf, pile by pile, with or without the social contrivance of filing, and now image the dust of decades has penetrated the recesses of box and folder. And yet there is much interesting stuff for the hardy to be found in the rummage of Clark’s career.

Three items are posted today from J. M. Clark’s course on the foundations of social economics: (i) five pages describing a course project for students to think about an economic constitution for a newly discovered, virgin continent that is 1/10 the scale of the United States which would be colonized by 1/10 of the U.S. population but run as an experiment in economics; (ii) an undated handwritten course bibliography; (iii) an undated typed final examination for the course.

Examination questions for one of the two courses taught back-to-back from a few years earlier can be found in Milton Friedman’s papers.

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COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

Economics 109—Foundations of social economics. 3 points Winter Session. Professor J. M. Clark.
M. and W. at 2:10. 401 Fayerweather.

The course pays attention to the nature of man, and of joint organizations which act as economic men; the economic ideal, viewed dynamically; the social meaning of wealth; the institution of exchange; the principles of choice, value, and cost; a functional analysis of production; the basic institutions of control; economic guidance; negotiation and bargaining; the factors of production and the laws of return; the problem of waste.

Economics 110—Dynamics of value and distribution. 3 points Spring Session. Professor J. M. Clark.
M. and W. at 2:10. 401 Fayerweather.

The functions of value and price; the dynamics of supply and demand for commodities and factors of production; the institution of competition; social vs. competitive schemes of distribution; value and expenses of production; expenses and ultimate costs of production; cumulative vs. self-limiting changes; the level of prices; economic rhythms.

 

Source: Columbia University Bulletin of Information, Thirty-seventh series, No. 28 (June 26, 1937). History, Economics, Public Law, and Social Science. Courses offered by the Faculty of Political Science for Winter and Spring Sessions 1937-1938, p. 27.

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Typed copy of Course Project, Econ 109
Winter Semester 1937

[handwritten note at top of page
“P.P. [per person?] 2-3 Objectives. 4-5 Strategic decisions.”]

Tentative project for Econ. 109.
(May be used as a carry-over in early meetings of 110 this year—Jan.-Feb., 1938)

Specifications for a new economic system.

A new continent, unoccupied and reproducing the area and resources of the U.S. on a one-tenth scale, has been discovered in the Pacific, and recognized as belonging to the U.S. Recognising that our present economic system is unsatisfactory, the Government has decided to use this area as a laboratory experiment in the setting-up of an altered system, starting from scratch with the advantage of hindsight as to the evils of our present system and trying to improve on them. More than one-tenth of our population, including quotas from all walks of life, have signified their willingness to try the experiment and to cooperate loyally in whatever system is selected. We needn’t take Al Capone [Chicago gangster kingpin] if we don’t want him, but we can have Owen Young [founder of RCA, the Young Plan regarding the reduction of German reparations was his namesake], Henry Dennison [important figure in scientific management movements] and others of like complexion if we want them.

This class has been designated as one of a number of groups to draw up and submit proposals, from which a plan for developing the area will ultimately be selected or otherwise made up. There are other groups concerned with religion, education and political government, and there will be interchange between all the groups before their various proposals are knit together. The political-government group is marking time until it finds what kind of a system it will have to devise a government for. There may be other groups set up on health, penology, family and social relations, art and possibly other matters as developments seem to require them.

[Handwritten title insert] First Strategic decision.

            We shall use modern scientific and technical methods of production. In departing from the pattern of the existing system, we are free to go all the way to the most complete communism, or to move in the other direction and try to set up a system more genuinely individualistic (and presumably more competitive) than the present one, if we think the chief trouble is that it is not individualistic enough.

Desirable ends, formulated as standards, so far as possible.

            “Maximum individual welfare”, including physical and mental health, personalities adjusted to social living, well-rounded exercise of faculties and adequate stimulus thereto, liberty of choice, within limits, barring things demonstrably harmful to individual or society but including choice of occupation, particular forms of recreation and consumption, adequate guidance in the exercise of liberty, possible special stimulation to activities regarded by proper and competent bodies as especially valuable.

More goods, for those who need them most, implying much greater equality of distribution that at present, but not neglecting importance of increasing total. Flat equality, or distribution (of all goods) according to need, debatable. What kinds of goods? Not much more food, not very much more clothing, much more adequate housing, more adequate education, much more adequate health service (but our religious board includes a couple of Christian Scientists!) “More goods” calls for stimuli to efficiency of production in all grades, and liberty to try new processes and new goods. Whole question of bureaucratic morale, of differentiated material rewards varying with performance (or in proportion to commercial worth of superior performance?) of comparative, quasi-competitive or completely competitive tests of performance.

Right to opportunity to work.

Relative stability of rate of production.

Adequate supply of capital to ensure progressive efficiency of production, with future product rationally weighted against present privation.

Rational distribution of family income over time, with balanced provision for old age and emergencies. (This may or may not be tied up with the provision of capital funds, as at present).

National defense, to the extent deemed necessary (We shall assume that it does not call for a totalitarian system.) [Handwritten note: “Can we safely assume that in 1947?]

Strategic decisions.

            Scope of consumers’ preference in deciding what goods and services shall be produced. We shall surely let them decide what color wall-paper and furnishings to have, and beyond certain minimum requirements what books to read and what recreations to follow. We may ration some things—if so, what?—but there will be some realm within which we let them have purchasing power which they are free to use as they choose. This will be our money, and goods will have a price, within this realm.

Shall we also let them choose whether to spend or not to spend? The dangers here are two: fluctuations of total spending (including that on capital formation) and excess saving not spent on capital formation. Unless incomes and the feeling of insecurity fluctuate heavily, the first danger is not great. With large concentrated incomes eliminated, the second danger would be practically removed. Fluctuating credit for busing durable consumers’ goods would create more danger; and for industrial investments, more still. Control of credit can be made effective downward, but not very well upward, even if credit is a public monopoly.

As to public services, I shall assume that we keep the present list, with reservations as to poor-relief if the need is changed or other agencies substituted; and that the question is as to additions. The big question is whether we make the main body of production a public service. If we do, it will be for two main reasons: to control inequality of distribution, and to control the relation between the current volume of production and the spendings (consumer and capital) it depends on to take the goods off the market, to the end that utilized production may be limited only by power and willingness to produce, no fall short of that limit as at present.

If we do that, problems arise of means to secure efficiency from workers and managers, source and allotment of capital and possible place and reward for private savings, determination of production programs and of kinds of goods and services to be produced, including new ones, organization of invention and incentives, determination of wages, of prices, of income devoted to free public series, pensions, etc. procedure concerning workers’ choice of occupation and shifting from one to another, selection of workers and treatment of those nobody wants—that’s enough to start with and to give some idea of the sort of thing that would be encountered. How combat the stagnation of bureaucracy, the multiplication of supervisors, the business of passing the buck and finding scapegoats for poor performance (I assume we shouldn’t want the scapegoats shot)? What sort of “social accounting” shall we use?

If we permit private saving, what shall we do about inheritance, and how prevent evasions of our policy.

We can embody the essentials of our plan in a constitution; how shall we provide for amendment? Shall the whole be in the hands of elected officials? If so, will anyone dare to support an opposition ticket? Will dissatisfied elements believe that a reelection was genuine and fair? Will such factors as these lead the system into a dictatorship of force, even if it did not start that way?

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Bibliography for Economics 109
[no date]

Economics 109

Veblen:         “The Place of Science in Modern Civilization”

The Theory of Business Enterprise
The Theory of the Leisure Class
The Instinct of Workmanship.

Davenport, H. J. “Economics of Enterprise”

Anderson, B. M. “Social Value”

Cooley, C. H. : “Social Process”

Hobson, J. A. : “Work & Wealth”.

Pigou, A. C.: “Economics of Welfare” or “Wealth & Welfare”

Tugwell, (ed):  “The Trend of Economics”.

Boucke, O. F.: Critique of Economics”.

Mill, J. S.:      “Principles of Economics”

Essays on “Liberty” and “Utilitarianism”.

Clark, J. B.    “The Philosophy of Wealth”.

“Essentials of Economic Theory”.

Dickinson: Motives in Economic Life

Parker, Carleton: The Casual Laborer.

Wicksteed: “The Common Sense of Pol. Econ.”

Watkins: G. P. “Welfare as an Economic Quantity”.

Hoover Committee “Waste in Industry”

Chase, Stuart: The Tragedy of Waste”.

Clark, J.M.: “Social Control of Business”

“Economics of Overhead Costs”.

Ely: “Property & Contract”.

Commons: “Legal Foundations of Capitalism”.

Sidgwick: Principles of Political Economy.”

Tawney: The Acquisitive Society”

Edie: Principles of the New Economics.”

[Day, Clarence] “This Simian World.”

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Economics 109
Final Examination
[undated]

 

Answer two questions, but not more than one of questions 3-8, inclusive.

  1. Discuss effects of recent military techniques on problems of the economic organization of a country.
  2. With respect to equality as a social-economic objective, what does the prevailing American social judgment favor? Note questions of degree of equality or inequality, and questions of different matters in respect of which people may be equal or unequal.
  3. “Individuals allocate expenditures so as to secure equal marginal utilities from money spent for different things, or to put themselves on a basis of indifference as between different expenditures”. Discuss. If true, why and by what psychological process; if not true, suggest amendments in the light of more realistic psychology.
  4. If you were founding a new society, what would you do about consumers’ freedom of choice, and why? If you allow such freedom in important degree, consider how far this commits you to other features of the present economic system.
  5. Discuss the economic importance of the “instinct of workmanship”.
  6. Compare the theory of “balked dispositions” with the tradition utilitarian treatment of the subjective sacrifices of production.
  7. Discuss economic significance of intelligence tests, in the light of the question what kind of a population is suitable or unsuitable to a system of private enterprise, either complete or modified.
  8. Discuss the social productivity of advertising and salesmanship, and compare this problem with the traditional concept of production, as bearing on the social productivity of private enterprise.
  9. Do the same for the social productivity of “bargaining” activities.
  10. Discuss the range of possible kinds of agencies available to perform economic functions.
  11. Would you assume that the attempt to maximize profits (with or without competition) standardizes economic behavior sufficiently to warrant using this assumption as a sufficient basis for deductive theorizing: that is, as furnishing all the basis such theorizing needs to take account of?
  12. Discuss the meaning of supply schedules or demand schedules, taking account of complexities or difficulties involved.

 

Source: Columbia University Libraries. Manuscript Collections. Papers of John M. Clark. Box 24, Unlabeled Folder.

Image Source: Detail from Columbia University group photo of economics department from the early 1930s. Columbia University Libraries. Manuscript Collections. Columbiana, Department of Economics Collection, Box 9, Folder “Photos”.

 

Categories
Exam Questions M.I.T.

M.I.T. General Exams in Macroeconomics, 1959-71

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The original plan of Economics in the Rear-View Mirror was to provide a single artifact for each post. Larger (composite) data sets are given dedicated pages (e.g. Harvard Ph.D.’s in economics 1875-1926; Chicago Ph.D.’s in economics 1894-1926Economics Rare Book Reading Room). Sometimes I come along a group of artifacts that are best kept together so I end up with a post like today’s that prints out as more than 25 pages of text. 

Today’s treasure is a fairly complete run of MIT general examination questions in macroeconomics for the period 1959-1971 found in a folder in the Evsey Domar papers at the Economists’ Papers Archive at Duke University. For a few of the exams we even have handwritten records indicating the questions chosen by the examinees and the grades awarded (I have omitted the names).

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May 22, 1959
General Examination in Macroeconomics

Answer four questions, including at least one from each group.

I.

  1. (a) Explain the basic economic philosophy which forms the foundation of modern national income (and gross product) estimates in Western countries.
    (b) Show how this philosophy is transformed into specific criteria used by the U.S. Department of Commerce in their estimates of Gross National Product, National Income, and Consumer Disposable Income. Be as specific as you can.
  2. Present a careful analysis of the problem of “Price Flexibility and Employment” and trace its discussion (that is, of its principal points) through economic literature beginning with Keynes’ General Theory.
    What practical conclusions follow from this discussion?
  3. It was repeatedly said in 1946 that “Increased production is the best cure against inflation.” Comment on this statement as completely as you can. (Hint: Consider the dual aspect of the production process.) In the light of your finding, do you think a labor strike to be deflationary or inflationary?

II.

  1. Construct a “flexible” multiplier-accelerator model in which the government plays an active role. That is, it levies a proportional income tax and engages in stabilizing expenditures.
    1. Imagine first that the tax on last year’s income is collected this year, while consumers recon their disposable income on a cash basis (i.e. income earned minus taxes actually paid). Government expenditures are constant. How do changes in the tax rate affect the behavior of the model?
    2. If the tax system should go on a withholding basis, so that the tax on this year’s income is collected this year, how does that affect the stability and other characteristics?
    3. Taking taxes as in (b), suppose government expenditures are proportioned to the gap between full employment income and last year’s income. Is this stabilizing?
    4. Suppose government outlays are a decreasing linear function of the observed rate of change of income. Is this stabilizing?
  2. It is often said that the cause of any depression is the previous boom and its “excesses.” Does this make sense in terms of modern business cycle theory?

III.

  1. “The purpose of taxation is never to raise money but to leave less in the hands of the taxpayer.” Comment fully and critically. Can you identify the author? (No great penalty if you cannot.)
  2. To the best of your ability, try to analyze the incidence of a corporate income tax. What empirical information would you need for this purpose? (Please be reasonable).
  3. “People are always willing to become wealthier. The problem of economic growth in advanced countries is: will the public be willing to add to its holdings of physical assets an amount equal to the unconsumed portion of full employment output?” Discuss fully including a description of the alternatives to holding physical assets, the efficacy of the price system, policy measures.

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February 8, 1960
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY

For the old-style exam (microeconomics alone), answer the first question (one hour) and any three of the others in Part I (two hours). For the new-style exam, answer any three questions in Part I (two hours) and any three questions in Part II (two hours), but without including both 3 and 4. Use separate books for Parts I and II.

PART I

  1. In a purely competitive economy, the only goods are food (F) and clothing(C), and the only factors are labor (L) and land (T), both fixed in supply. Each household supplies either L or T, but not both. Both goods are produced at constant returns to scale with both L and T. Isoquants are normally curved for both products; and, at any given marginal rate of substitution, a higher ratio of T to L is implied for F than for C.
    1. Show how the economy’s transformation curve for F and C is derived. Could it be either concave or convex or linear, and why?
    2. If everyone in the economy always divides his income equally between F and C, show how this determines uniquely what goods are produced, how they are produced, and for whom.
    3. How is that general equilibrium modified if the government imposes a tax on F and distributes the entire proceeds equally among all of the labor-supplying households. (Assume for simplicity that the tax and subsidy involve no administrative costs.)
    4. Would there be better ways of achieving the same redistribution of income? Explain fully why or why not.
  2. The demand for a monopolist’s produce is given by p = 50 – .001q. Within the relevant range, his total cost as a function of his output is C = 40q – .0005q2.
    1. In the monopolist’s long-run equilibrium, what are his price, output, and profit?
    2. How are those magnitudes affected if demand now increases to p= 56 – .001q?
    3. In general, what factors determine whether a monopolist’s equilibrium price will rise or fall in response to an increase in demand? Explain how the actual result in the present example fits in with those general principles.
  3. Plant capacity for a certain product costs $6 per year per unit of output. Given a plant of any particular size, any output up to the capacity level can be produced at a variable cost of $12 per unit; and outputs in excess of capacity are impossible. Demand is given by p = 24 – .001q (where p is the price of the product in dollars per unit and q is the quantity of product demanded per year).
    1. What are the long-run-equilibrium prices, outputs, and profits under conditions of (i) monopoly and (ii) pure competition?
    2. How are those equilibrium magnitudes affected in both the short and long run if new technological knowledge suddenly makes it possible to produce the product with a new type of equipment at a capacity cost of $5 per year per unit of output and a variable cost of $9 per unit of output. (Assume that, in the short run, new capacity can be added but none of the pre-existing capacity wears out. In the long run, all of the old capacity does wear out.)
  4. Show how an individual’s labor-supply curve can be derived from his basic preferences for leisure and income, assuming that he also has a fixed income from other sources. Then show the comparative effects of three alternative taxes that might be imposed to extract the same revenue from this man: (a) a lump-sum or poll tax, (b) a proportional income tax, and (c) a progressive income tax.
  5. Summarize Ricardo’s theory of rent, and evaluate its correctness and realistic relevance. In what sense, if any, does rent not enter into cost? Explain carefully.

PART II

  1. Discuss the role played by population growth in modern theories of economic development and business cycles. Be specific.
  2. Write an essay on the subject of “The General Theory After Twenty-Five (almost) Years.” Include in it, among other things, your evaluation of the usefulness of the book from the point of view of: (a) an advanced capitalist economy like the U.S.; (b) an underdeveloped mixed economy like India; (c) a centrally directed socialist economy like the USSR.
  3. Present your favorite theory (traditional, eclectic or entirely original) of the business cycle. Explain the empirical tests which you would subject it to. Be specific.
  4. Present an explanation of the causes of the current inflation in this country. Indicate the empirical tests which your explanation would have to pass. Be specific.
  5. (a) Explain the reasons why the economic activities of the government create special problems in national income (or gross product) accounting. Analyze critically the treatment of these problems by the U.S. Department of Commerce.
    (b) “Existing methods of international comparisons of per capita national income have an upward bias in favor of advanced countries.” Comment. “Don’t forget to indicate what these methods are.)

 

Comprehensive Exam Grades in Macro Theory
MIT Feb. 1960

[Student]

Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Average Remarks
[1] 50 (F) 30 (F) 60(D) F+ Fail
[2] 60(C-) 20(F-) 60(C-) D ? [guess: “Directed information to who? , ≥4 fail”]
[3] 70 (C) 65 (C) 70 (C) C Fair –
[4] 70 (C) 70 (C) C Fair –

A: 90-100
B: 75-89
C: 60-74
D: 50-59
F: less than 50

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September 19, 1960
General Examination in MACROECONOMICS

Answer three questions; at least one from each part.

I.

  1. Discuss Savings as an economic problem.
  2. a. Write an essay on the subject of “The Problem of Intermediate Products in National Income and Product Accounting.” Be as comprehensive as you can.
    b. Compare briefly the treatment of intermediate products in the Input-Output and Flow-of-Funds systems.
  3. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Economic Significance of the Rate of Interest.”

II.

  1. Write on the capital-output ratio as a tool for economic analysis, including some comment on:
    1. The problem of defining, measuring and interpreting the concept.
    2. Known facts about the historical course of the ratio..
    3. The role the concept plays in theories of growth and fluctuations.
  2. What are the facts about the relative magnitude of cyclical fluctuations in the output of capital goods and consumer goods? What are the theoretical implications of the facts as you know them? Discuss in this light the mildness of post-war economic fluctuation in the U.S.
  3. Write an essay on the contribution to the theory of economic growth of one of the following: Wicksell, Schumpeter, Kaldor, Tobin.

 

Macroeconomics Grades
Sep. 1960

Part I Part II Aver.
Q1 Q2 Q3 Q1 Q2 Q3
[1] G- G- F+/G- G-
[2] G F+ F-/Fail
[3] G+ F+ G- G-
[4] G+ G/G+ G- G/G+
[5] G G+ G- G
[6] G G G G

 

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February 6, 1961
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
Part II—Macroeconomics—Two Hours

Answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each Part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I.

  1. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “International Comparisons of National Income and Product”.
  2. Discuss saving as an economic problem. Trace the treatment of saving in the relevant economic literature.
  3. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Economic Significance of the Rate of Interest”.

Part II.

  1. Assume that inventory behavior is governed in the following Metzlerian way:
    1. Desired inventory is proportional to expected sales.
    2. Planned inventory investment behaves according to the capital stock adjustment principle (“flexible acceleration”).
    3. Expected sales equal last period’s sales.
    4. Current sales are proportional to current income, with unexpected sales made from stock.
    5. Income is the sum of Sales, exogenous government and fixed investment expenditures, and inventory investment (including unplanned!).

Now suppose operations research succeeds in (i) reducing the desired inventory-sales ratio and (ii) increasing the speed of adjustment. What effects will this have on the cyclical behavior of the system?

  1. Discuss the role of (i) floors and ceilings and (ii) autonomous investment in theories of growth and fluctuation, and say something about the realism of each concept.
  2. Formulate a one-sector model of economic growth using the following assumptions:
    1. One commodity, usable either as consumer good or as capital good.
    2. Its output is given by a production function with the stock of the capital good and labor as inputs, under constant returns to scale. (Consider various degrees of substitutability.)
    3. Depreciation proportional to stock of capital.
    4. Supply of labor grows geometrically, and exogenously, and is inelastically supplied.
    5. Competitive profit-maximizing rules.
    6. All profits are saved, all wages consumed.

Within this model, discuss the properties of the full-employment growth path (i.e. the development of output capital, wages, etc., which will equate desired saving and investment at full employment).

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May 22, 1961
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
Macroeconomics—Two Hours

Answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. (Course XV students answer ONE question from each part only.) USE A SEPARATE EXAMINATION BOOK FOR EACH QUESTION.

Part I.

  1. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Measurement of Economic Growth”. Include in it the description of existing methods, their rationale (the most important part) and your suggestions for improvement.
  2. Write an essay on “The General Theory after Twenty-Five Years”.
  3. a. Explain the nature and the rationale of the definition of the concept of money in “Price Flexibility and Employment” problems.
    b. “If the ‘Balanced-Budget Multiplier’ is correct, isn’t Say’s Law also correct?” Comment fully.

Part II.

  1. “By making existing capital assets obsolete, technological progress is alleged to create new investment opportunities and thus raise the level of income and employment. But to the extent that such obsolescence was foreseen, the assets were depreciated over a shorter period and thus gave rise to larger gross savings. Therefore, expected technological progress fails to stimulate the economy.” Comment fully.
  2. Present your favorite (traditional, eclectic, or original) business cycle theory. Indicate the empirical tests to which it will be subjected.
  3. “In order to prevent a cost-push inflation, wage rates in each firm or industry should not increase faster than its labor productivity; price increases will thus be avoided.”
    Comment fully and critically; indicate and justify your wage and price policy.

 

General Exam Grades “MacroTheory” May 22, 1961

[Part] I [Part] II
[Student] Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Q6 Average
[1] G G-/F+ F+ G-
[2] G- G-/F+ F- F+
[3] F+ G- G G-
[4] E- G- E- G+
[5] G+ G- F G-
[6] E-/G+ G F G
[7] G+ G- F- G-
[8] E- E- G+ E-
[9] Failed F F-/Failed Fail+
[10] F+ G G- G-
[11] G G F- G-
[12] G- G-/F+ F- F+
[13] F+ G- G G-
[14] G+ G- G G
[15] Failed G G-/F+ F+
[16] F-/Failed Failed Failed
[17] G-/F+ F F+

 

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September 18, 1961
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
Macroeconomics—Two Hours

Answer FOUR questions, TWO from each part. USE A SEPARATE EXAMINATION BOOK FOR EACH QUESTION.

Part I.

  1. State, explain and justify the treatment of government expenditures (Federal, state and local) in the computation of national product and its components. Why is government treated differently from other sectors? What is the logical foundation for such treatment?
  2. Compare and contrast the Keynesian and the so-called Classical systems.
  3. Contrast the investment criteria applicable to (a) an individual firm, (b) the U.S. government, (c) the government of an undeveloped country. Explain clearly your reasons for such differences, if any.
  4. Write an essay on “The History of the Consumption Function.” Indicate and evaluate the major contributions. How significant are they? Which one do you prefer and why?

Part II.

  1. Describe fully the “economic indicator” approach to economic forecasting. Evaluate its performance. Compare it with the use of projected models of GNP.
  2. Describe the long-term trends in (a) population, (b) output, (c) capital, (d) real wage rates, (e) interest, (f) relative shares, (g) capital-output and other important ratios. What constancies have people claimed to observe? What behavior is explicable by a simple neoclassical model? What points to technological change or to various non-neoclassical growth theories? Mention authors as well as theories.
  3. Summarize briefly the historical facts on business cycles or fluctuations here and abroad. What theories have been suggested? Besides naming names, give your own best way of cataloguing the different theories (e.g. non-linear, etc.).
  4. Give the basic facts on “growth” here and abroad, recently and in history. How could America increase its sustained growth rate? Be analytical and specific.

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February 5, 1962
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
Part II—Macroeconomics
TWO HOURS

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each Part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I.

  1. “Existing methods of national product computation exaggerate the rate of growth of real product over time in a given country, and overstate the ratio between the real product of highly developed and of undeveloped countries.”
    Comment fully.
  2. Compare and contrast the economic effects (on growth and level of income, employment, income distribution, and on any other phenomena you consider important) of population growth and of the growth of the capital stock.
  3. a.Explain the basic assumptions and reasoning used in the “Price Flexibility and Employment” discussions. (If you can, identify the authors involved.)
    b. Explain the nature and definition of the concept of money used in the same discussions.
    c. “If the ‘Balanced-Budget Multiplier’ is correct, isn’t Say’s Law also correct?” Comment fully..

Part II.

  1. Analyze a one-sector growth model in which net output is produced by labor and capital by a smooth neoclassical constant-returns-to-scale aggregate production function experiencing no technical change. Net output is divided up into consumption and net capital formation (or investment). Consumption, according to Modigliani, is 100 per cent of income when the capital wealth-to-output ratio is, say, 3, being a fraction at lower ratios and exceeding unity at higher ratios.
    1. First, let labor supply be stationary. Starting with very low capital, describe the evolution of the system’s output, wage rate, interest rate, capital, and various ratios (Q, w, r, k, k/L, Q/L, Q/k, wL/rk, etc.)
    2. Do the same if labor will always grow at 2 per cent per year.
  2. Describe and contrast business cycle approaches of (a) The National Bureau of Economic Research, (b) Econometricians like Tinbergen and Klein, (c) other typical modern Evaluate with respect to policy, prediction, explanation and present-day relevance.
  3. How can President Kennedy increase “growth” in a world with problems of international payments, possible wage-price “creeps,” fiscal burdens for defense, and stubborn productivity and personal thrift patterns. Prescribe, diagnose, and compromise dilemmas if there are any.

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May, 1962
GENERAL EXAMINATION—MACROECONOMICS

 

Answer three questions, including at least one from each part.

PART I

  1. a. Write an essay on the subject of “The Problem of Intermediate Goods in National Income and Product Accounting”.
    b. Suppose you were asked to compute national income and product for an economy consisting of a Prince and a number of slaves, from the point of view of the Prince. Explain the modifications of the usual methods that this assignment will require. Do you think it will result in a larger or a smaller income?
  2. A critic of Keynes’ General Theory once said that “What is new in it is wrong, and what is right is old”.
    Comment fully.
  3. “The problem of price flexibility and employment is a silly game based on the inclusion of some debtor-creditor relationships and the exclusion of others”.
    Comment fully.

PART II

  1. Is an economy which has been growing at full employment (and full utilization of capacity) helped or hindered in the maintenance of full employment (and utilization) by a more rapid rate of growth of the labor force?
  2. It is sometimes said that the widespread adoption of scientific inventory control, permitting lower inventory-sales ratios on the average, will have the effect of damping inventory fluctuations. Discuss this theoretically. Do the same for the advent of improved forecasting methods.
  3. Discuss the relation between the propensity to save and the rate at which potential output increases.

 

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September 17, 1962
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
Part B—Macroeconomics

TWO HOURS

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I

  1. Write an essay on the role of microeconomics in the construction and the testing of macroeconomic theory.

Part II

  1. Discuss and evaluate the treatment of government in the U.S. National income Accounts. Give special emphasis to the problems involved in using the figures for intertemporal and international comparison of the role of government both as a user of resources and as a producer.
  2. Write an essay on the “history, nature and significance” of the consumption function. 

Part III

  1. Discuss the issues of concept, theory, inference, and measurement that are involved in estimating the relation between investment and the growth of potential output.
  2. What is your theory of inflation? How does it tie in with modern business cycle theory?

 

________________________

 

GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
February 4, 1963

ANSWER ONE QUESTION FROM EACH PART (THREE QUESTIONS IN ALL).

Part I.

  1. Suppose that in an economy in equilibrium a large number of enterprises operating as proprietorships and partnerships decide to incorporate.
    1. List the principal ways in which the national income accounts might be affected in the short run. (Make explicit any reasonable assumptions you may want to make about real changes in the flows of spending and income.)
    2. What fallacious conclusions might you draw as to structural changes in the economy from these changes in the accounts if you did not know their source?
  2. Explain the basic economic philosophy which forms the foundation of national income and product estimates in the United States. Indicate how this philosophy is applied by the Department of Commerce in its estimates of Gross National Product, National income, and Disposable Income. (Be specific.)

Part II.

  1. Discuss, making use of an explicit model of income-determination, the various ways in which prices and wage rates enter into the determination of national income. In particular, what are the issues of theory and fact which are relevant to the debate about “underemployment equilibrium”?
  2. Identify and discuss, briefly and concisely, the nub of the issues raised by each of the following (where appropriate use an explicit model)
    1. “The rate of interest bears no necessary relation to the quantity or value of the money in circulation. The permanent amount of the circulating medium, whether great or small, affects only prices; not the rate of interest.” (J. S. Mill)
    2. “If it is true that the marginal propensity to consume of wage earners is higher than of profit recipients, one way to cure a deflationary gap and unemployment is to raise the money wage rate.”
    3. “Increased production is the best cure against inflation.”
    4. “The cause of any depression is the previous boom and its “excesses”.”

Part III.

  1. Discuss the critical issues of fact, theory, and value that are involved in designing a fiscal-monetary policy for the United States for the mid-1960’s. Elaborate, in particular, the criteria in terms of which you (“as economist”) would evaluate any particular mix of instruments.

 

________________________

 

General Examination in Macroeconomics
May 13, 1963

Answer three questions in all, including at least one from each part.

I.

  1. In the earlier postwar period it was often said that “Increased production is the best cure against inflation.” Comment on this statement. In the light of your comment, do you think a prolonged strike is inflationary or deflationary?
  2. a. Set up a reasonable aggregative model appropriate to a closed economy where the money wage rate is rigid ownwards (only downwards).
    b. Assuming that the initial equilibrium configuration yields “full employment” and that the money wage rate cannot fall below the initial equilibrium wage rate, trace the effects on the critical variables of

    (i) an increase in the nominal stock of money

    (ii) a decrease in the nominal stock of money

    (iii) an autonomous fall in the volume of investment

    c. In each case, how would your answers differ, especially as regards the possibility of “under-employment equilibrium”, if the money wage rate, as well as all other prices, were fully flexible?
    d. How would your answers differ if money wage rates were governed by two-way escalator clauses?

  3. Write an essay on the theoretical and empirical foundations of an eclectic macroeconomic theory of demand for investment.

II.

  1. In Kaldoria, the marginal (=average) propensities to save out of wages and out of non-wages are different. The latter exceeds the former by a considerable margin. Together wages and non-wages exhaust national income. Markets are such that when national income exceeds a certain value Y*, the share of profits in national income tends to rise, and when national income falls short of Y*, the share of profits tends to fall. Finally, all investment is exogenous.
    1. Show that Y* is a stable level of national income.
    2. Calculate the share of profits when national income is Y*.
    3. Can you think of any reasons why Y* should correspond to “full employment”?
    4. Discuss the factual validity of the theory. That is, does Kaldoria resemble any country you know well?
    5. Can you modify the theory to include a marginal propensity to invest out of profits?
  2. Suppose investment behavior is such that all investment opportunities which offer a rate of return greater than or equal to some fixed target rate R are instantly adopted. Labor and capital are the only factors of production and constant returns to scale prevail. (Use a Cobb-Douglas production function, if you like.) The labor force grows exogenously at a fixed annual rate g.
    1. What saving rate, relative to national product, will just maintain full employment equilibrium?
    2. How does that saving rate vary with g?
    3. What do you make of the common notion that a rapidly-increasing labor force makes it harder to maintain full employment?
  3. Describe the approximate timing of inventory investment during postwar American business cycles, and compare this with the results of some formal model of inventory fluctuations.

 

________________________

 

September 16, 1963
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
TWO HOURS

Please answer THREE QUESTIONS, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I.

  1. a. Write an essay on the subject of “The Problem of Intermediate Goods in National Income and Product Accounting”.
    b. Suppose you were asked to compute national income and product for an economy consisting of a Prince and a number of slaves, from the point of view of the Prince. Explain the modifications of the usual methods that this assignment will require. Do you think it will result in a larger or a smaller income?
  2. A critic of Keynes’ General Theory once said that “What is new in it is wrong, and what is right is old”.
    Comment fully.
  3. a. Explain the nature and the rationale of the definition of money in “Price Flexibility and Employment” problems.
    b. “If the ‘Balanced-Budge Multiplier’ is correct, isn’t Say’s Law also correct?”
    Comment fully. Explain the nature of both propositions.

Part II.

  1. Discuss the role of (a) floors and ceilings and (b) autonomous investment in theories of growth and fluctuations.
    Indicate the empirical tests to which the propositions expounded by you can be subjected.
  2. “In order to prevent a cost-push inflation, wage rates in each firm or industry should not increase faster than labor productivity.”
    Comment fully and critically. Indicate and justify your wage and price policy to achieve economic growth and stability.
  3. Explain and compare the roles which the growth of population and the growth of capital (separately and together) play in modern growth and business cycle theory.

General Examination Grades in Macroeconomics September 1963

Questions
 Student 1 2 3 4 5 6 Total Grade
[1] 18 25 22 65 Fair
[2] 29 24 26 79 G
[3] 30 29 29 88 E-
[4] 22 20 23 65 Fair
[5] 29 24 25 78 G

 

________________________

 

February, 1964
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
MACROECONOMICS—TWO HOURS
[Note: this exam recycled in February, 1968]

Answer THREE QUESTIONS, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I

  1. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “Comparisons of National Income and Product in Time and Space.” Indicate the biases which arise in such comparisons.
  2. “The problem of price flexibility and employment is a silly game based on the inclusion of some debtor-creditor relationships and the exclusion of others.” Comment fully. Indicate what definition of money used in your discussion.
  3. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Interrelationships between Money, Prices and the Rate of Interest.” Include brief reviews of the relevant theories.

Part II

  1. “In order to prevent a cost-push inflation, wage rates in each firm or industry should not increase faster than its labor productivity.” Comment fully.
  2. “If Hansen is correct, the faster is the rate of growth of population, the lower will be the unemployment level in the U.S.” Discuss fully. Include natural growth of population and immigration. In what respect does the growth of population differ from that of the stock of capital?
  3. Write an essay on “Floors and Ceilings in Business Cycle Theory.” Indicate the specific theories and your methods of testing each.

 ________________________

 

February 8, 1965
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
TWO HOURS

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I.

  1. Write an essay on the subject of “Keynes and Patinkin on the Relation between the Quantity of Money on the One Hand, and Interest Rate, Price Level and National Income on the other.”
  2. It is frequently said that existing methods of national income computations exaggerate the present-day American per capita income in comparison with that of less developed countries and in comparison with American income in the past. Comment fully and critically. Are there statistical methods which may impart an opposite bias?
  3. Compare and contrast the economic effects (on growth and level of income, employment, income distribution, and on any other economic phenomena you consider important) of population growth and of the growth of the capital stock.

Part II.

    1. According to the 1965 Economic Report of the President:
      1. “The general guide for wages is that the percentage increase in total employee compensation per man-hour be equal to the national trend rate of increase in output per man-hour.”
      2. “The general guide for prices calls for stable prices in industries enjoying the same productivity growth as the average for the economy; rising prices in industries with smaller than average productivity gains; and declining prices in industries with greater than average productivity gains.” (p. 108)
        1. What would this policy imply for:
          1. average unit labor costs
          2. average product prices
          3. income distribution
          4. labor allocation among industries and skills
        2. According to theories of inflation you find most persuasive, what aspects of the price-wage mechanism would be most likely to frustrate the Council guideposts that are outlined above?
      1. The U. S. economic recovery from 1961 to the present has been accompanied by less inventory investment, especially in manufacturing, than occurred in previous recoveries. Some pertinent data are presented below.

 

Manufacturing
(Monthly averages for year)
$ billions
Sales Inventories Ratio
1950 18.6 31.0 1.48
1951 21.7 39.3 1.66
1952 22.5 41.1 1.79
1953 24.8 43.9 1.76
1954 23.3 41.6 1.81
1955 26.4 45.0 1.62
1956 27.7 50.6 1.73
1957 28.7 51.8 1.80
1958 27.2 50.0 1.84
1959 30.2 52.7 1.70
1960 30.8 53.8 1.76
1961 30.9 55.1 1.74
1962 33.3 57.7 1.70
1963 34.7 60.1 1.69
1964 37.1 62.2 1.64

Source: 1965 Economic Report, p. 237.

 

It has been said that this development has

    1. substantially improved the ability of the economy to avoid a recession;
    2. made it more likely that if a recession does occur, that it will be milder than it would otherwise have been.
      1. Briefly evaluate the validity of this remark by reference to the data, distinguishing intended from unintended investment to the extent possible. What minimum additional information would be required in order to make a rigorous distinction between intended and unintended inventory investment?
      2. Discuss this observation critically in the context of a sensible model of cyclical fluctuations. Do so on the presumption that improved methods of inventory control have lowered the desired inventory-sales ratio.

REMARK: Part A will be given 1/3 weight. Part B will be given 2/3 weight.

      1. Consider several alternative growth models which include technical change, labor and capital. What effects would the following policy measures have on growth rates, output/head and consumption /head:
        1. A decrease in the rate of interest;
        2. An increase in the ratio of investment and savings to toal output;
        3. A decrease in the rate of population growth.

________________________

 

May 17, 1965
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
TWO HOURS

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I.

  1. (A) National product is defined as the sum of all final goods each multiplied by its price.
    (B) National income is defined as the sum of all net incomes of certain recipients.

Discuss the following questions:

i. What is a final good in (A)? What special problems arise from the presence of certain types of organizations?
ii. What is the rationale of multiplying each product by its price? What assumptions are implied in this procedure? Are they realistic?
iii. Whose net incomes are aggregated in (B)? What assumptions does this procedure imply? Are they realistic?
iv. Could you propose changes or improvements in the above procedures? What additional comments would you like to make?

  1. Explain the following concepts with a particular stress on the assumptions underlying them.
    1. The ordinary (Keynes’) multiplier
    2. The balanced-budget multiplier
    3. The acceleration principle

Indicate the virtues and defects of each concept and their use in economic analysis.

  1. Discuss saving as an economic problem. Trace the treatment of saving before Keynes, by Keynes and after Keynes. Evaluate the contribution of the several authors you mention critically.

Part II

  1. Consider a one-sector economy with:
    1. A conventional, constant-returns to scale, diminishing returns, technology
    2. A labor force growing at a constant geometric rate
    3. No technical progress
    4. A ratio of net saving to output which is a falling linear function of the wealth-output (i.e., capital-output) ratio

Trace out the evolution of such an economy under conditions of full employment and full utilization of capacity, starting from an arbitrary stock of capital; and show how its stead-state properties are determined.

  1. “The ‘built-in stabilizers’ cannot stabilize the economy at a full employment level but can dampen oscillations.”

Analyze this statement using the following model:

(1) Yt = Ct + It + Gt Income Definition
(2) Ct = α(Yt-1Tt-1) Consumption Function
(3) It = β(YtYt-1) Investment Equation
(4) Tt = λCt Tax Equation

Note: the tax equation is the stabilizer in this model. Assume government outlays Gt are constant through time.

  1. Some economists believe recent high unemployment levels in the United States are structural in nature, others that the main cause has been a fairly simple Keynesian demand deficiency.
    1. Explain the main elements of the “structuralist” position. (It will be assumed that you understand Keynesian National Income analysis.)
    2. Show how the correct interpretation of these (not mutually exclusive) causes affect the analysis of price level movements in the United States over the past decade, with reference to two or three of the main theories that have been applied.

________________________

 

September 13, 1965
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
Two Hours

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

PART I.

  1. “The problem of price flexibility and employment is a silly game based on the inclusion of some debtor-creditor relationships and the exclusion of others.” Comment fully. Why is a special definition of money required here?
  2. “Existing methods of national product computations exaggerate the rate of growth of real product over time in a given country, and overstate the ratio between the real product of highly developed and of underdeveloped countries.” Comment fully and critically.
  3. In the early postwar period it was often said that “Increased production is the best cure against inflation.” Comment fully on this statement. Assume that the increase in output is indeed possible, but indicate what kind of output you have in mind. What other information would you require? In the light of your comments, do you think that a prolonged strike is inflationary or deflationary?

PART II.

  1. According to the 1965 Economic Report of the President:
    1. “The general guide for wages is that the percentage increase in total employee compensation per man-hour be equal to the national trend rate of increase in output per man-hour.”
    2. “The general guide for prices calls for stable prices in industries enjoying the same productivity growth as the average for the economy; rising prices in industries with smaller than average productivity gains; and declining prices in industries with greater than average productivity gains.” (p. 108)
      1. Using relevant aspects of production theory, what would this policy imply for:
        1. Income distribution
        2. Labor allocation among industries and skills
      2. According to theories of inflation you find most persuasive, what aspects of the price-wage mechanism would be most likely to frustrate the Council guideposts that are outline above?

Your answers should consider departures from competitive behavior where pertinent.

  1. Describe the long term trends in (a) population, (b) output, (c) capital, (d) real wage rates, (e) interest, (f) relative shares, (g) capital-output and other important ratios. What constancies have people claimed to observe? What behavior is explicable by a simple neoclassical model? Which of these regularities seem to require the introduction of technological change or the abandonment of central neoclassical propositions? Mention authors as well as theories.
  2. Discuss the role of (a) floors and ceilings and (b) autonomous investment in theories of growth and fluctuations.

________________________

 

February 7, 1966
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
Two Hours

Answer three questions, including at least one from each part.

PART I:

  1. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Distinction between Final and Intermediate Products in economics”.
    Include in your essay (but don’t limit yourself to) the following points:

    1. The basic philosophy
    2. Governmental receipts and expenditures
    3. Input-output systems
    4. Federal Reserve Index of Industrial Production
  1. Discuss the following aspects of the “Price Flexibility and Employment” problem:
    1. The basic statement as presented by Patinkin
    2. The role and definition of money
    3. The role of expectations
    4. Your conclusions
  2. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Economic Effects of a Redistribution of Income from the Upper to the Lower Income Groups”. Indicate the positions on the subject of several economists whose views are relevant to your essay.

PART II:

  1. Is an economy which has been growing at full employment (and full utilization of capacity) helped or hindered in the maintenance of full employment (and utilization) by a more rapid rate of growth of the labor force?
  2. “I take leave to doubt whether there has ever been a trade cycle, i.e. a self-perpetuating cyclical movement, as opposed to a series of fluctuations due to the propensity of a private enterprise economy to exaggerate its response, either way, to the changes of history as it meets them.” Discuss this remark of Joan Robinson’s.
  3. Consider a conventional one-sector neoclassical growth model (i.e. constant returns to scale and smoothly diminishing returns in labor and capital, full employment). There is no depreciation and the labor supply is growing exponentially. The ratio of investment to output is constant. There is “disembodied” purely labor-augmenting technological progress going on exponentially at the rate a/j where j is the elasticity of output with respect to labor input (not necessarily a Cobb-Douglas constant).

Analyze how the steady-state rate of growth depends on the value of the investment-output ratio.

________________________

 

May 13, 1966
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
Two Hours

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

PART I

  1. Beginning at least with Adam Smith, there has been much ado in economic writings about productive and unproductive activities and about their proper treatment in national income and product accounts (and in their subdivisions).
    Write a comprehensive essay on this subject. Include in it, but do not limit yourself to, the following points:

    1. The principles and procedures followed by the U. S. Department of Commerce
    2. Alternative methods which might be followed and the reasons for them
    3. Special problems created by the presence of governmental activities
    4. The Marxist position on this subject
  2. Write an essay on the subject of “Economic Effects of an Increase in the Stock of Money.” Indicate the position taken by several important economists familiar to you.
  3. Explain the investment criteria which should be used by:
    1. A private American enterprise
    2. U. S. government
    3. A Planning Board of some under-developed country.

Emphasize the differences in criteria to be used and the reasons for the differences.

PART II

A short well-organized answer is best.

  1. Formalize the following assumptions into a model:
    1. Current consumption is proportional to last year’s national income;
    2. Current investment is proportional to last year’s profits;
    3. Current profits are an increasing linear function of current national income and the change in national income since last year;
    4. National income is the sum of consumption and investment.

Will the model generate cycles if disturbed, for plausible values of the parameters? (Assume that, other things equal, 40% of a year-to-year increase in national income flows into profits.)

Describe how the response of the model economy would be affected by the imposition of a proportional income tax (with consumption proportional to disposable income).

Same for a proportional profits tax, with investment proportional to after tax profits.

Compare the stabilization effects of the two, if the profits tax is levied so as to raise the same amount of revenue as the income tax at a constant level of national income.

  1. Following is the text of a letter from James Tobin.

“Following is the text of a letter from Joan Robinson:

‘Many thanks for sending me the offprint from Econometrica (Money and Growth). Your Keynesian long-period theory is very different from mine and Kaldor’s. I should say that a lower rate of interest will make the rate of profit higher. The rate of profit r = g/sp, i.e. is equal to the rate of growth divided by the proportion of profit saved. I should say that, within reason, and provided that an appropriate part of investment is in research and training, a higher rate of investment will generate a higher natural rate of growth, so that deepening need not occur.’

Does this make sense?”

Answer Professor Tobin’s question. (The “rate of interest” refers, say, to the rate on government bonds, the only asset apart from real capital. The “rate of profit” can be taken to be the marginal product of capital in a one-sector economy near a steady state.)

Compare the behavior of output per man or per man-hour in the short-run (i.e. in the course of economic fluctuations) and in the long run, for the economy as a whole. Comment on any analytical issues raised by the behavior.

________________________

February, 1968
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
MACROECONOMICS—TWO HOURS
[Note: recycled exam from February, 1964]

Answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

Part I

  1. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “Comparisons of National Income and Product in Time and Space.” Indicate the biases which arise in such comparisons.
  2. “The problem of price flexibility and employment is a silly game based on the inclusion of some debtor-creditor relationships and the exclusion of others.” Comment fully. Indicate what definition of money used in your discussion.
  3. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Interrelationships between Money, Prices and the Rate of Interest.” Include brief reviews of the relevant theories.

Part II

  1. “In order to prevent a cost-push inflation, wage rates in each firm or industry should not increase faster than its labor productivity.” Comment fully.
  2. “If Hansen is correct, the faster is the rate of growth of population, the lower will be the unemployment level in the U.S.” Discuss fully. Include natural growth of population and immigration. In what respect does the growth of population differ from that of the stock of capital?
  3. Write an essay on “Floors and Ceilings in Business Cycle Theory.” Indicate the specific theories and your methods of testing each.

[handwritten note: “special exam… She received good-/fair+ with charity]

________________________

14.452
FINAL EXAMINATION
May 23, 1968

Please answer each question in a separate examination booklet. Indicate on the front page of each booklet whether you are seeking only a grade in 14.452 or a grade in the general examination in economic theory. Those who seek only a grade in 14.452 should answer two questions in part I and two questions in Part II. Those who are taking the general examination in economic theory should answer two questions in Part II and two in Part III.

Part I

  1. Construct a difference-equation model embodying the following assumptions:
    1. Consumption is a linear function of disposable income lagged one time-unit;
    2. Tax revenue is proportional to national product;
    3. Investment is the sum of a component proportional to the current change in consumption and a component proportional to national product lagged one tie-unit;
    4. Imports are proportional to national product lagged one time-unit;
    5. Government purchases are constant.

Write down formally the conditions for an oscillatory response of the model to disturbance. When are the oscillations damped? How do variations in the tax rate affect these conditions? Suppose part of government purchases were made negatively proportional to the last observed change in national product?

  1. Why is technical progress an important part of the usual model of economic growth? Could increasing returns to scale play the same role? What is the special role of purely labor-augmenting (i.e. Harrod-neutral) technical progress?
  2. Imagine a planned economy choosing among steady states in the one-sector model, without technical progress. The planner values both consumption per head and capital per head (as a measure of national strength, say) and his preferences can be expressed by a system of conventionally-shaped indifference curves in consumption per head and capital per head.

Use this indifference map and the requirements for a steady state to show how the optimal steady state is chosen. Prove that the optimal capital per head will exceed the “Golden-Rule” (maximal consumption per head) level. Show what happens to the optimal position if the rate of population growth increases. Discuss briefly the case of a one-time upward shift in the production function.

Part II

  1. In the generalized multiplier-accelerator model, the equation \frac{dK}{dt}=I\left( Y,K \right) means that “investment decisions are always carried out”, so that when

I\left( Y,K \right)\begin{matrix}  > \\  < \\  \end{matrix}S\left( Y \right)

“unintended consumption or saving” occurs. Replace the above equation with \frac{dK}{dt}=S\left( Y \right) and interpret and analyze the resulting model. Compare its behavior with the case analyzed in class.

  1. Suppose I = I(Y,K) and S = S(Y) are the schedules of desired investment and saving. In what sense is IS a measure of excess demand in the aggregate commodity market?

How is it that no specific supply variables (labor force, for example) appear in this measure? Under what circumstances is it natural to suppose that dY/dt responds to (IS)? (Y = real output, p = commodity price level). Under what circumstances is it natural to suppose that dp/dt responds to (IS)?

  1. Consider a one-sector non-monetary model of growth under the following assumptions:
    1. The production function in intensive form is q = Akb;
    2. The wage is equal to the marginal product of labor;
    3. Investment demand is such that the after-tax return on capital is always at a target level r*;
    4. There is a tax on profits at rate t and the government spends all its revenue on consumption;
    5. The savings rates from wages and after-tax profits are both equal to a constant s.

Find the tax rate that will permit a steady state at full employment. When will it be between zero and one? How does it change if s changes? Interpret.

  1. Consider a one-sector growth model, with two factors of production (capital and labor), constant returns to scale, and no technical progress. Suppose that the propensity to save out of profits and capital gains is equal to one, and the propensity to save out of wages and transfer payments (taxes = negative transfers) is zero.

Money, which is non-interest-bearing government debt, is the only alternative asset to capital. The desired money-capital ratio is of the form \frac{m}{k}=L\left( {f}'\left( k \right)+{{\left( {{\dot{p}}}/{p}\; \right)}^{e}} \right) where m is the real per capita stock of money, k is the capital-labor ratio, and  {{\left( {{\dot{p}}}/{p}\; \right)}^{e}}is the expected rate of inflation which is equal to the actual rate {{\dot{p}}}/{p}\; in the steady state.

Government purchases are zero and the budget deficit, which is equal to the excess of transfers over taxes, is financed by issuing money.

    1. Describe the steady-state characteristics of the model.
    2. Find the rate of inflation that maximizes steady-state consumption per head.
    3. Suppose that {{\left( {{\dot{p}}}/{p}\; \right)}_{o}} is the rate of inflation in (b) that maximizes steady state consumption per head. Would a higher rate of inflation lead to a higher or lower long-run capital-labor ratio?

Part III

  1. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Problem of Weights in National Income and Index-Number Construction”.
    Explain the criteria which are used, should be used (for what purpose?) and why.
  2. Discuss the economic effects of an increase in the stock of money. Include an evaluation of the positions of several (not less than two) prominent economists familiar to you. How would you test the correctness of their positions?
  3. Discuss the effects of inflation of the level of real investment.

________________________

 

GENERAL EXAMINATION IN ECONOMIC THEORY
Macroeconomics—Two hours
Sept. 1968

Answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question.

PART I

  1. “Existing methods of national product computation exaggerate the rate of growth of real product over time in a given country, and overstate the ratio between the real product of highly developed and of underdeveloped countries.”
    Comment fully.
  2. Write a comprehensive essay on the subject of “The Interrelationships between Money, Prices and the Rate of Interest.” Include brief reviews of the relevant theories.
  3. Write an essay on the subject of “The Economic Effects of a Redistribution of Income from the Upper to the Lower Income Groups.”
    Include in your essay the evaluation of several current theories on the subject.
    Consider as many economic effects as you can.

PART II.

  1. “In order to prevent a cost-push inflation, wage rates in each firm or industry should not increase faster than the growth of its labor productivity.”
    Comment fully.
  2. Consider the effects of technological progress on employment of labor. Be as comprehensive as you can.
  3. What are the built-in stabilizers and how do they work? Can we rely on them to achieve price stability and full employment?
    Discuss the subject fully.

________________________

 

Spring, 1969
GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
Three Hours

Please answer FOUR QUESTIONS distributed as follows:

Part I—without choice—1 hour
Part II—any two questions—40 minutes each
Part III—any one question—50 minutes

Use a separate examination book for each question.

PART I

The Federal Government wishes to stop the current inflation of the aggregate price level. What are the issues in choosing among various fiscal and monetary policies directed to this end? Try to use macroeconomic models (expressed algebraically, graphically or verbally) to illustrate the problems involved.

PART II

  1. Write an essay indicating what you think are the most important ideas about the determination of the rate of investment in economic theory and in economic practice. (Suppose the problem came up in the course of presenting the static Keynesian macroeconomic model of income determination.)
  2. In the two-asset neo-classical growth model à la Tobin or Sidrauski we have two basic equations:
    1. \dot{k}=sf\left( k \right)-nk-\left( 1-s \right)\left[ \dot{m}+nm+{{\pi }_{m}}m \right]{{p}_{m}}
    2. {{p}_{m}}m=L\left[ {{p}_{m}}m+k,{{\pi }_{m}},{f}'\left( k \right),f\left( k \right) \right]

Suppose we add the requirement that

    1. {{\dot{p}}_{m}}=\pi _{m}^{*}{{p}_{m}}, that is that the government always vary its deficit to produce a constant rate of deflation \pi _{m}^{*} (which would, of course, be an inflation if .) \pi _{m}^{*}<0

 

    1. Show that this model can be expressed by the two equations

1a) \dot{k}=\frac{sf\left( k \right)-nk-\left( 1-s \right)n\left( {{p}_{m}}m \right)}{\left[ 1+\left( 1-s \right)C \right]}

where C={\left[ {{L}_{1}}+{{L}_{3}}{f}''+{{L}_{4}}{f}' \right]}/{\left( 1-{{L}_{1}} \right)}\;>0

2a) {{p}_{m}}m=L\left( {{p}_{m}}m+k,{{w}_{m}},{f}'\left( k \right),f\left( k \right) \right)

Why are the pairs of k and (pmm) which make \dot{k}=0 the same regardless of \pi _{m}^{*}? HINT: When \dot{k}=0 what is the increase in the per capita real money supply? What determines the increase in the total real money supply?

    1. Show the dynamics of this system graphically by sketching the combinations of (pmm) and k that make \dot{k}=0 and those that satisfy 2a) (the aa schedule). What is the effect of a higher {{\pi }_{m}} on the stable steady-state stock of capital?
    2. Under what conditions can the government force the economy to the golden-rule capital stock by enforcing an appropriate \pi _{m}^{*} through fiscal policy without changing s (assume that pmm must always be positive for any \pi _{m}^{*})?
  1. Consider a vintage growth model with fixed factor proportions (clay-clay) a constant labor force (n=0), and Hicks neutral technical change at rate γ. Suppose the economy in question invests every year in a given fixed quantity of new machines (not a constant fraction of income), and has always followed this policy. Assume perfect competition, and full employment.
    1. Write down the production function for a given vintage. What rates labor and capital-augmenting technical change are implied?
    2. What is the labor requirement per machine of vintage τ?
    3. Find the economic life time of capital.
    4. Describe the growth paths of output, wages, quasi-rents and the labor share of income.
    5. Suppose the economy suddenly doubles its investment and then holds it constant. What will happen to wages and the life-time of capital as time passes?
  2. What growth model or growth model ideas would be helpful in studying the effects of a redistribution of income from businessmen to workers on investment and/or growth? You may develop a model explicitly or simply write an essay reviewing the important concepts and their relevance to the question.

PART III

  1. You are asked to compare the per capita national income of some underdeveloped country, such as Brazil, with that of the United States. Assume that the Brazilian currency (a) is convertible into dollars and (b) that it is not convertible.
    Discuss as thoroughly as you can the problems involved in this comparison and the methods used for dealing with them. Evaluate these methods critically and present and justify your own recommendations.
  2. Explain what is meant by “The Money Illusion” and what role does its presence and absence play in theories of employment, interest and prices. Be as comprehensive and as critical as you can.

 

General Examination Grades in Macroeconomics
Spring 1969

Spring 1969
90 = perfect
[1] 83 Ex+
[2] 79 Ex
[3] 78
[4] 77
[5] 75 Ex-
[6] 75
[7] 75
[8] 74 Ex-/G+
[9] 74
[10] 73 G+
[11] 72
[12] 72
[13] 71
[14] 71
[15] 71
[16] 70 G+/G
[17] 70
[18] 69 G
[19] 69
[20] 69
[21] 69
[22] 69
[23] 68
[24] 67
[25] 67
[26] 67
[27] 66
[28] 66
[29] 66
[30] 65 G/G-
[31] 65
[32] 64 G-
[33] 64
[34] 62
[35] 61
[36] 57 F+
[37] 56
[38] 53 F
[39] 50 ?
[40] 49
[41] 48

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MACRO GENERAL
February 3, 1971

DO THREE QUESTIONS, AT LEAST ONE FROM A AND ONE FROM B. 40 Minutes each

A

  1. There has been a long-standing dispute among economists whether money is or is not neutral. Explain what this dispute is about, what the major positions are, and present and justify your own position on the subject.
  2. In order to stimulate investment expenditures by business, President Nixon has suggested a more accelerated treatment of depreciation for income tax purposes. For simplicity assume that every depreciable capital asset can be written off for tax purposes in half the usual time. Analyze the proposal and state and justify your conclusions.
  3. The Bergson Index may be defined as the ratio of Soviet output (industrial production or GNP or a similar measure) to Soviet inputs (labor and capital) divided by a similar ratio for the U.S., first in Soviet and then in American prices for some given year. On finding that this Index is less than one, Bergson has concluded that the Soviet economy is less efficient than the American.
    1. Which comparison (that is, in Soviet or in American prices) is more likely to be more favorable for the USSR? Why? (This is the less important part).
    2. Evaluate critically Bergson’s conclusions. (This is the more important part).

B

  1. Use a simple macroeconomic model that describes the interaction of the real and financial sectors to describe a theory of determination of the price level. Is simultaneous unemployment and inflation consistent with this theory? What parts of the theory would you modify to take account of simultaneous unemployment and inflation?
  2. Define the “golden rule” growth path and derive conditions for an economy to be on it. Compare some actual economy’s performance to the golden rule and, if you can, estimate the saving necessary to reach it. Would you favor such a policy?
  3. Consumer spending in the U.S. is currently in a slump. What hypotheses can you advance to explain this fact?

 

________________________

 

GENERAL EXAMINATION IN MACROECONOMICS
June 24, 1971
TWO HOURS

Please answer THREE questions, at least ONE from each part. Use a separate examination book for each question. Write your CODE NUMBER on your book but not your name.

PART I

  1. In a recent speech, Simon Kuznets suggested the following method for expressing the relative rate of growth of real national income of a country: calculate the relative rate of growth of real income of each person (or family) and then take the unweighted arithmetic mean of these rates. Let us call the resulting rate
    1. Compare the rationale behind Kuznets’ suggestion with that of the conventional computation of the rate of growth.
    2. For what purposes would you use each method? Why?
    3. Suggest other ways for achieving Kuznets’ objective.
    4. How would the magnitude of K compare with that of the conventional rate?

(Note: do not worry about the distinction between national income and gross product.)

  1. Write an essay on the subject of “Economic Effects of the Retardation of Population Growth in the U.S.” (You may choose a comprehensive approach or concentrate on some issues you regard particularly important and interesting.
  2. Analyze the effects on aggregate demand and supply, both in the short and in the long run, of a prolonged strike in some important industry. Consider several relevant cases.

PART II

  1. When the current Republican administration came into office it faced substantial and rising rates of inflation, and inherited from the last Democratic administration a moderately restrictive fiscal policy. Write a memo to the President outlining his macroeconomic policy options with pros and cons for each. (Would you list different options if you were Paul Samuelson rather than Milton Friedman?)
  2. Use some complete macroeconomic model to discuss the ways monetary policy influences aggregate demand. Try to judge which mechanisms are likely to be strong and reliable, which weak and uncertain.
  3. Capitalia is a two-class society in which land is not a constraint, workers save and capitalists invest. Its population growth rate is 1%. Nothing has ever happened in Capitalia except exponential growth.
    1. What is the rate of return to capital?
    2. Does the production function make any difference to your answer in part a)? Explain.
    3. If the production function is Cobb-Douglas with capital exponent .2, find the capital per head, output per head, and consumption per head.
    4. In an unexpected development, population growth doubles. What begins to happen to the rate of return, per capita saving, and the saving as a fraction of output?
    5. The government decides to maintain earlier levels of per capita saving “to avoid the impoverishment of our nation” by taxing workers. Comment on this policy. What will per capita consumption be under this policy?

________________________

Source: Duke University. Rubenstein Library. Evsey Domar Papers, Box 16, Folder “Ph.D. Economic Examinations. Macroeconomics.”

Image Source:From the Flying Car to the Giant R2-D2: The Greates MIT Hacks of All-Time“, by Robert McMillan. Wired, March 20, 2013.

“Boston’s Harvard Bridge is 364.4 Smoots long. And the fact that anybody would remember this in 2013 was probably the furthest thing from MIT freshman Oliver Smoot’s mind on the October 1958 night that he lay himself down, time and again, along the bridge, allowing his fraternity brothers to measure its length (each Smoot is about 5 feet, 7 inches). It was a fraternity prank, but the next year the bridge’s Smoot markers were repainted. Thus, an MIT landmark — and a unique unit of measurement — was born.

Smoot himself went on to become a board member of the American National Standards Institute — a standards man through and through.”

 

Categories
Courses Exam Questions Problem Sets Syllabus

MIT. Core Microeconomic theory III. Hal Varian, 1975

Hal R. Varian, chief economist at Google since 2007, was a 28 year old assistant professor at M.I.T. in 1975 when he taught my cohort the third in a sequence of four half-term courses that constituted MIT’s required core of graduate microeconomic theory. He assigned draft chapters from his graduate textbook Microeconomic Analysis (published in 1977). For this post I have transcribed the course outline, five problem sets and the final examination for the course.

Core microeconomic theory at MIT in 1974-75:

14.121 (linear models and production) was taught by Martin Weitzman,
14.122 (competitive and noncompetitive market structures) taught by Robert L. Bishop,

14.123 (theory of the consumer and resource allocation) was taught by Hal Varian,
14.124 (capital theory, uncertainty and welfare economics) was taught by Paul Samuelson.

_______________________

14.123—Microeconomic Theory III
Theory of the Consumer and Resource Allocation

Professor Hal R. Varian, E52-353, 3-2662
Spring, 1975

Feb. 5 advanced placement exam
Feb. 10 utility; demand; expenditure
Feb. 12 indirect utility; Slutsky equation
Feb. 17 no class
Feb. 19 no class
Feb. 24 demand functions; duality
Feb. 26 expected utility; properties
Feb. 28 general equilibrium; existence
Mar. 3 welfare theory
Mar. 5 the core of an exchange economy
Mar. 10 general equilibrium and production
Mar. 12 dynamics and general equilibrium
Mar. 17 malfunctions of the market mechanism
Mar. 19 final exam

Course text will be lecture notes available from me. Malinvaud and Arrow and Hahn are highly recommended secondary reading. There will be four or five problem sets and a problem session on Fridays, 9-10:30.

_______________________

 

14.123 Spring, 1975
Professor Hal R. Varian

Consumer Theory I

  1. Consider a consumer with a Cobb-Douglas utility function:
    u(x,y) = a ln x + (1-a) ln y.
    Calculate:

    1. demand functions for x and y
    2. the indirect utility function
    3. the expenditure function
    4. the Hicksian demand functions.
  2. In a general equilibrium analysis, we cannot take income as an exogenous variable in the demand function since income, y = p.w, depends on the vector of relative prices. Derive the Slutsky equation for Dpm(p, p.w) in this case.
  3. At a general equilibrium price vector p*, we have aggregate supply equal aggregate demand:
    Σ mi(p*, p*.w) = Σ wi. Show that if all agents have identical marginal propensities to consume each good (Dymi(p*, p*.w) = Dymj(p*, p*.w) for all i and j) then all aggregate demand curves must be downward sloping at equilibrium. More generally, show that Dp(Σ mi(p*, p*.wi)) is negative semi-definite.
  4. Define eij = (-pj/xi) Dpjmi(p,y) be the cross price elasticity of good i with respect to price j, and ri = pmi(p, y)/y, the income share of commodity i.
    Show that r1e11 + r2e21 +r3e31  = r1.

_______________________

14.123 Spring, 1975
Professor Hal R. Varian

Consumer Theory II

  1. A consumer is found to have a utility function of the form
    u = -1/x1 – 1/x2.

    1. Starting from the utility function, compute the market demand functions for the consumer when he has income y and faces prices p1 and p2.
    2. Use the market demand functions to show that the indirect utility function is
      u = -( √(p1) + √(p2))2/m.
    3. Compute the expenditure function from the indirect utility function.
    4. Compute the consumer’s compensated and market demand curves from the expenditure function.
  2. Suppose at prices (p1, p2) = (5,10) and income y = $100, a rational consumer consumes the bundle (6,7). Assume that we have measured the following derivatives:

∂H1/∂p(p1, p2, ū) = -2
∂H1/∂p(p1, p2, ū) = +1
∂M1/∂y (p1, p2, y) = 2/7

where H1 and H2 are the Hicksian demand functions for goods 1 and 2 and M1 is the Marshallian demand function for good 1. Find an estimate of the consumption bundle of the consumer at (p1, p2) = 5,11).

  1. Suppose a consumer has an expenditure function of the form e(p, u) = u.g(p). Show that his utility function is homogenous of degree one. Suppose e(p,u) is of the form e(p,u) = h(u)g(p). How does the consumer’s behavior differ?
  2. Suppose a consumer has a differentiable expected utility function for income with Dyu(y) strictly positive. Show that he will always take a small enough bet as long as it has positive expected value.

_______________________

 

14.123 Spring, 1975
Professor Hal R. Varian

General Equilibrium III

  1. Show that Walras law holds for a production economy with fully distributed profits.
  2. Prove the theorem that a general equilibrium is pareto efficient for an economy with production.
  3. Suppose we have a productive economy with two agents. The producer has a production function x = q1/2 where x is output and q is labor.
    The consumer has a utility function u(x,q) = x1/2(1-q)1/2. Calculate the general equilibrium real wage and equilibrium level of profits.

_______________________

 

14.123 Spring, 1975
Professor Hal R. Varian

General Equilibrium Theory and Welfare Economics I

  1. Show that any solution to

max Σ ai ui(xi), ai>0
s.t. Σ xi ≤ w

is necessarily pareto efficient.

  1. Suppose we have two agents with indirect utility functions

v1(p1, p2, y) = ln y –a ln p1 – (1-a) ln p2
v2(p1, p2, y) = ln y –b ln p1 – (1-b) ln p2

and initial endowments

w1 = (1,1)
w2 = (1,1)

Calculate the market clearing price.

  1. We have two agents with utility functions

u1(x1, y1) = a ln x1 +(1-a) ln y1
u2(x2, y2) = b ln x2 + (1-b) ln y2

and initial endowments

w1 = (1,0)
w2 = (0,1)

Calculate the market equilibrium prices in terms of the parameters a and b.

_______________________

 

14.123 Spring, 1975
Professor Hal R. Varian

General Equilibrium Theory and Welfare Economics II

  1. Two agents with strictly convex preferences have equal initial endowments
    w1 = w2. They trade to an arbitrary allocation in the Core (w1,w2), (x1,x2). Prove that this allocation is necessarily fair:

    1. Draw an Edgeworth box and give a geometric argument;
    2. give an algebraic argument in the general case (there is a one-line proof.)
    3. Show in a three person economy there are allocations in the equal division core that are not fair.
  2. Suppose we have n agents with identical, strictly convex preferences and we have some initial bundle of k goods to be divided among them. Let x be a fair allocation; show that x must give the same bundle to each agent. (Recall that a fair allocation is one that is strongly pareto efficient and such that no agent prefers any other agent’s bundle to his own.)
  3. Show that under appropriate assumptions of convexity, every pareto efficient allocation is necessarily a solution to a problem of maximizing a weighted sum of utilities. What is the economic interpretation of the weights?
  4. Suppose we are at a market allocation that is considered good. Since it is a market equilibrium it is pareto efficient and therefore maximizes a certain weighted sum of utilities Σ ai* ui(x). Accordingly, we will use Σ ai* ui(x) to evaluate small projects. Suppose we are considering a small project that will change x = (x1,…, xn) to x´= (x1´,…, xn´). Show that it should be undertaken if and only if it increases national income; that is, iff Σ p.(xi´-xi) >0.

_______________________

 

14.123 FINAL EXAMINATION
March 19, 1975

Professor H. Varian

Answer any 2 out of 4. All questions have equal weight. Good luck!

  1. A consumer has a utility function of the form u(x1, x2) = ln x1 + x2. He faces prices p1 and p2 and has income y. Calculate:
    1. his Marshallian demand functions for each good
    2. his indirect utility function
    3. his Hicksian demand functions
    4. his expenditure function.
  2. There are two consumers A and B with the following utility functions and endowments:

UA(XA1, XA2) = a ln XA1 + (1-a) ln XA2 , WA = (0,1)
UB(XB1, XB2) = min (XB1, XB2) , WB =(1,0)

Calculate the market clearing prices and the equilibrium allocation.

  1. We have n agents with identical strictly concave utility functions, u1(x1),…,un(xn). There is some initial bundle of goods w. Show that equal division is a pareto efficient allocation.
  2. A consumer has a differentiable expected utility function u(y) with u´(y) > 0. (There are no conditions on u´´(y)). His initial level of wealth is w and he is contemplating a bet which gives him $e with probability p > ½ and he loses $e with probability 1-p. (Notice the bet has positive expected value.) Show that he will always take the bet if e is small enough. (Hint: try Taylor series.)

 

Source: Personal copies.

Image Source: Detail from 1976 departmental group photo.

Categories
Exam Questions M.I.T.

MIT. Microeconomic Core Theory II. Bishop, 1974

_______________________________

Microeconomic Theory II”, the second of four half-semester core microeconomic theory courses at MIT, was actually the first offered during the academic year 1974-75. It was taught by Professor Robert L. Bishop. In this post we find 29 sample questions for the five sets of topics covered in the courses. Also included are the waiver exam for testing out of the course and the final examination for the students who took the course

The course “text” was the mimeographed manuscript on economic theory written by Bishop that was on closed reserve at Dewey Library and consulted by presumably at least a dozen cohorts over the 1960s (perhaps even earlier) and 1970s. A copy of that manuscript can be found in the Edwin Burmeister papers at Rubenstein Library of Duke University. 

 Two papers (especially the second) by Bishop covering some of the course material are:

Bishop, Robert L. “Duopoly: Collusion or Warfare?” The American Economic Review 50, no. 5 (1960): 933-61.

Bishop, Robert L. “The Effects of Specific and Ad Valorem Taxes.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 82, no. 2 (1968): 198-218.

Core microeconomic theory at MIT in 1974-75:

14.121 (linear models) was taught by Martin Weitzman,
14.123 (duality) was taught by Hal Varian,
14.124 (capital theory, uncertainty and welfare economics) was taught by Paul Samuelson.

_______________________________

 

Topics in 14.122, with Sample Questions

  1. Review of demand and supply, elasticities. Walrasian v. Marshallian stability conditions. Demand and supply as seen by the individual seller or buyer.
    1. What various formulas have been proposed for measuring the arc elasticity between two points on a demand curve, (q1,p1) and (q2,p2)? Discuss the virtues and defects of the various definitions. Can any one be said to be “best”?
    2. Compare the Walrasian and Marshallian stability conditions as to (a) their content, (b) the types of markets in which they are realistically applicable, and (c) the situations in which they do not agree.
    3. If 1000 sellers have fixed supplies of 50 units each of a good, how does the demand confronting each individual seller relate to the market demand (a) as to slope, (b) as to elasticity? How are the answers affected if each seller has a positively sloped supply schedule?
  2. Review of the revenue and cost curves of the firm and its long-run and short-run equilibrium. Comparative implications of competitive and monopolistic equilibrium.
    1. Show how the price elasticity of demand for a good is related to average and marginal revenue. Why is a monopolist never in static equilibrium in the range where his demand is relatively inelastic?
    2. Given the linear demand p = a –bq, show that price elasticity depends only on p and a, or only on q and a/b. When do two linear demands have the same elasticity (a) at any given price, (b) at any given quantity?
    3. Given two linear demand (with different slope and different axis-intercepts) and a point on one of them, find geometrically the point on the other with the same elasticity.
    4. A linear demand and a demand that is concave from above are tangent at a particular point. In the vicinity of that output, how much can you say about the relative magnitudes, slopes , and curvatures of the respective marginal revenue curves?
    5. Given relevant segments of a monopolist’s AR, MR, and MC curves (but not AC), show how much his profit is reduced if he is forced to charge a somewhat lower price than his profit-maximizing one—on the assumption that he still has an incentive to satisfy the full demand at the new price.
    6. “Short-run marginal cost is typically smaller than long-run marginal cost, since the former reflects only variable cost while the latter reflects full cost.” Discuss.
    7. Discuss the virtues and limitations of Lerner’s concept of the degree of monopoly power, M = (AR-MC)/AR. Would it make any difference if he had defined it as M´ = (AR-MR)/AR?
    8. “A profit-maximizing monopolist, in contrast to a pure competitor, would always prefer to sell more than he actually can, at the price he hooses to set. This is why monopolists frequently advertise and pure competitors never do; and it is also why equilibrium can be analyzed by means of demand and supply curves in pure competition but not in monopoly.” Discuss.
  1. Long-run and short-run equilibrium of the purely competitive industry, with comparative statics problems. Supply curves reflecting pecuniary v. real or technological externalities.
    1. Give as many distinct reasons as you can why a purely competitive industry’s long-run supply curve may be positively sloped? Negatively sloped?
    2. “If a purely competitive industry’s long-run equilibrium is disturbed by a sudden increase in demand, the effects on price are likely to be greater in the short run than the long, and the effects on output are likely to be just the opposite.” Discuss.
    3. Under what circumstances, if any, is the Marshallian producers’-surplus area above a supply curve a defensible concept? When is it clearly indefensible?
    4. In a purely competitive industry with negatively sloped demand, can a commodity tax lower the price? Can it raise price by more than the amount of the tax? Show that the answers differ according as the stability conditions are assumed to be Walrasian or Marshallian.
    5. In a purely competitive industry where firms all have u-shaped costs and the industry’s long-run supply is horizontal, compare the effects of a specific commodity tax, a franchise tax, and a limited licensing of firms—such that all would have the same effect on industry output.
    6. Assume that a distinctive type of grape can be grown only on a distinctive type of vineyard land, which is valueless in any other use. This land varies widely in quality from one acre to another. The only other factor, labor, is homogeneous and in perfectly elastic supply to this single industry. (Assume, for convenience, that one firm always cultivates just one acre, irrespective of relative factor prices.)
      1. If the land is widely owned and the grape industry is purely competitive, show how its long-run supply curve is derived. Then, for some given grape demand, show how the aggregate equilibrium rent is determined.
      2. What would be the comparative effects of a tax on the grapes and a tax on the vineyard land that would raise the same revenue? Might the landlords ever prefer the latter tax?
      3. Starting from the equilibrium in (a), assume that laborers become free to allocate themselves on the vineyard land and receive equal per capita shares of the total grape revenue. How would this affect the price and quantity of grapes, incomes, and allocational efficiency?
    7. Explain why, in some purely competitive industries, social marginal cost may be different from private marginal cost.
  2. Comparative statics of monopoly: changes of demand, cost, taxes, various regulations. Equilibrium with advertising, with price discrimination, with systematic seasonal shifts of demand.
    1. In a monopoly with negatively sloped demand, can a specific tax lower price? Can it raise price by more than the amount of the tax? Show that the answers depend on the second-order conditions for a profit maximum. Are these special results more or less likely than in pure competition (cf. question 15).
    2. For any given specific tax, does a fully equivalent ad valorem tax exist (a) in pure competition, (b) in monopoly?
    3. “Not only does a monopolized industry produce less than a competitive one would, but also when superior productive equipment becomes available, the monopolist is motivated to introduce it more slowly.” Explain wherein you agree or disagree.
    4. What determines whether a static-equilibrium monopoly price will rise or fall in response to an increase of demand? Does it make any difference whether the demand increase is spontaneous or induced by advertising? Can an increase in demand ever reduce a monopolist’s equilibrium output?
    5. Under what circumstances will a price ceiling imposed on a monopolist
      1. leave him with incentive to satisfy the full demand at that price,
      2. induce him to produce an output that is positive but not great enough to satisfy the full demand, or
      3. drive him out of business?
    6. “The greater is a firm’s degree of monopoly power (in Lerner’s sense), the more likely is it to find advertising profitable.” What can be said for and against this proposition?
    7. When is it profitable to discriminate as to price in two markets for a physically homogeneous product? Are there any circumstances in which the buyers in both markets may benefit from the discrimination?
  3. Monopolistic competition: oligopoly and product differentiation.
    1. Why are none of the duopoly solutions proposed by Cournot, Bertrand, Stackelberg, and Chamberlin wholly satisfactory?
    2. If duopolists produce differentiated products, what are the comparative consequences under (a) price-quoting and (b) quantity-setting? Specifically, compare the Cournot and Bertrand equilibria, the corresponding Stackelberg equilibria (and warfares), the potentialities for collusion, and the potentialities for warfare.
    3. How and why is the problem of oligopolistic interdependence allegedly avoided in Chamberlin’s large-group case of monopolistic competition? Are you satisfied that it is really avoided? Compare it in this respect with pure competition.
    4. As compared with simple monopoly, what additional sources of uncertainty are there with respect to comparative-statics problems under monopolistic competition?

_______________________________

Waiver Exam—14.122
September 11, 1974

Answer any TWO questions (about 40 minutes each):

Question 1:

  1. Show how the total, average, and marginal cost curves of a one-product firm are related to one another in the long-run—as to intersections, minima, inflection points, etc. (Assume that the total-cost function is continuous up to at least its second derivative and that production is subject first to net economies of scale and then to net diseconomies.)
  2. Show how those same long-run cost curves are related to their short-run counterparts, identifying all notable points of correspondence.

Question 2:

In a small community surrounding a lake, workers can get all the employment they need in industry at a wage of $20 per day. An alternative employment is to catch fish in the lake and sell it in the environs at a constant price of $10 per bushel. With labor valued at the going wage, the cost of fish per bushel rises with the total amount of fishing. Specifically, the average cost of fish (in dollars per bushel) is related thus to the total number of bushels caught per day:

C = 2 + .005q

  1. With free entry to the lake, how much fish will be caught?
  2. Show that everybody can be made better off if the community levies an appropriate tax per bushel of fish. What is the optimal tax?
  3. If, alternatively, the lake were privately owned and the owner could hire labor to catch fish at the same cost as before, what output would maximize his net income?
  4. Would it always be appropriate, as in (b), to impose a tax on any competitive industry with a positively sloped supply curve? Explain briefly.

Question 3:

“If a specific tax of given magnitude is imposed on a good that is producible at constant unit cost, the equilibrium price may be raised either more or less under monopoly than under competition. Even when the price rises by an appreciably smaller amount under monopoly, however, it is still very likely to be socially disadvantageous to tax such a monopolized good rather than competitive ones.” Explain fully wherein you agree or disagree with each sentence.

_______________________________

14.122
November 1, 1974

One hour and a half
Answer any FIVE of the following six questions:

  1. If a specific tax is imposed on a commodity produced by a purely competitive industry, what effects on price can be ruled out under the stability conditions specified by (a) Marshall; (b) Walras? Explain.
  2. You are given this cost function:

C= aqc + bq,

where C is total cost, qc is an absolute-capacity output (fixed in the short run), q is the actual output (less than or equal to qc), and a and b are positive constants. Draw carefully the implied long-run cost schedules and several sample sets of short-run cost schedules—total, average and marginal. Comment on the relationship between long-run and short-run marginal cost.

  1. “When the demand for a monopolist’s product increases, his profit-maximizing price may rise, remain the same, or fall. The conditions governing this result are exactly the same whether the increase in demand is spontaneous or induced by advertising.” Explain why you agree or disagree.
  2. “Fully equivalent specific and ad valorem taxes are possible in pure competition but not in monopoly.” Explain why you agree or disagree.
  3. When does a positively sloped supply curve imply some form of producers’ surplus, and when does it not? Explain.
  4. In an oligopoly with differentiated products, would the price be lower in a Cournot equilibrium or a Bertrand equilibrium? Explain.

Source: Personal copies.

Image Source:Robert L. Bishop at MIT Museum  .