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ECON-S441

Advanced microeconomics

academic year
2023-2024
2024-2025

Course teacher(s)

Mathias DEWATRIPONT (Coordinator), Jan BOUCKAERT and Alexis WALCKIERS

ECTS credits

5

Language(s) of instruction

english

Course content

Choice under uncertainty and its limits

Contract theory: adverse selection, moral hazard, signaling, multidimensional contracts and mulitlateral contracts

Topics in industrial organization: horizontal and vertical differentiation, two-sided markets

Objectives (and/or specific learning outcomes)

The course introduces a number of more complex microeconomic models as well as some of their applications to insurance or labour contracts, corporate finance, investment decisions and interactions between undertakings. These models are derived by relaxing some assumptions of the basic economic model. By taking into account features that are ignored by simpler models, more advanced models may shed light on tradeoffs between these simpler models or highlight difficulties that require a more in-depth analysis. When used appropriately, the more complex models may help allocate resources in a more efficient manner.

Teaching methods and learning activities

Course + exercises

References, bibliography, and recommended reading

–Hal R. Varian (2009), “Intermediate Microeconomics: A Modern Approach,” Norton

–Patrick Bolton and Mathias Dewatripont (2005), “Contract Theory”, The MIT Press

–Paul Belleflamme and Martin Peitz (2010), “Industrial Organization: Markets and Strategies”, Cambridge University Press

Other information

Contacts

mdewat@ulb.ac.be

Campus

Solbosch

Evaluation

Method(s) of evaluation

  • Other

Other

Mid term exam: theory and exercises. Counts for 1/3 of the final grade if and only if the grade of the mid term exam is higher than the grade of the final exam.

Final exam: theory and exercises.

Language(s) of evaluation

  • english

Programmes