Course Description:

The field of urban economics addresses a wide variety of questions and topics. At the most general level, the field introduces space into economic models and studies the location of economic activity.

Urban economics typically addresses four sets of questions, and this course is organized around these four areas. The first set of questions focuses on the development of urban areas. Why do cities exist and why do some grow more rapidly? How can local governments encourage such growth? The second set of questions addresses patterns of development within metropolitan areas. Why do certain parts of metropolitan areas grow more rapidly than others? How do firms and households decide where  to locate within given metropolitan areas? What determines the price of land, and how do these prices vary across space? The third set of questions concerns the spatial dimensions of urban problems. In this class, we will focus on housing, crime, and inner-city economic development. The fourth set of questions examine the spatial aspects of local government policy and explore the relationships between city, suburban, and state governments.

Perquisites:

The prerequisites for this course are basic microeconomics and high school-level algebra and geometry. Some familiarity with statistics or econometrics will be helpful.

Textbook and Reading Materials:

No formal textbook is required.

Course Assignments and Grades:

Final course grades will be based on the following breakdown:

- Referee Report on Three Papers (30% - 10%*3)

- Reading quizzes (3 [of 4] × 3%)

- Midterm exam (20%)

- Final exam (31%)

- Attendance (10%)

Guideline for writing a referee report is uploaded to Blackboard. Several sample referee reports were uploaded to blackboard as well.

Please go to this list of candidate urban economics research paper to choose the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd  papers you want to write the referee report on. Put down your name and choices of papers in the second, third, and fourth columns of the excel file.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jUblWKg7YIQgope2AFXeWtadYGlZ4KT1Sh7mFsmBZyE/edit#g id=0

The research papers can be found in this shared google drive folder:

https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1lAyInNF5e9LT7p2Ji0vIBT55pWdBG52B

NOTE: Each research paper can only be reviewed once (i.e., only one name on each row of the selection spreadsheet). If a paper is already chosen by one of your classmates, show your respect and choose another paper instead. If there is a paper that you really want to write the referee report on but has already been picked by someone else, you can reach out to the person and kindly ask for the swap of the papers. If both of you agree on the swapping, you can change the information in the rows of the swapped papers. Every referee report has a deadline. Late submissions are not accepted after the hard deadline.

Requirements for the Referee Reports:

1.    At least 3 Pages, Times New Roman, 12 Point Font, Single Spaced

2.    Make sure to include the following components in your referee reports:

•    The specific research question(s) examined in the paper

•    Detailed summary of the empirical data used in the paper (the data from which source? the

time period covered by the data, the specific variables from the data used in the paper

•    Review of the methodology used in the research paper. Particularly, how the empirical data is used for the quantitative analysis in the paper.

•    Discuss the main results in the paper

•    Critiques and recommendations for areas of improvement for flaws found in the paper.

Exams:

Both midterm and final exam will be all multiple-choice questions. The date for the mid-term is Wednesday, March 5th, 2025; the date for the final exam is 9:30-11:30am, May 7th, 2025.

Weights of midterm vs. final exam will be switched if needed: if you get a higher percentage score in the midterm exam than in the final exam, the midterm exam will be 31% of your final grade and the final exam will be 20% of your final grade. In contrast, if you get a higher percentage score in the final exam than in the midterm exam, the midterm exam will be 20% of your final grade and the final exam will be 31% of your final grade.

Curving of the final grades: your final grade of the course will be curved based on the highest score in the course. If the course has 1000 points available in total and the highest score achieved is 940, the 940 is the new 100%. If your raw score is 890, your final letter grade will be calculated as 890 out of 940, not  890 out of 1000.