ECO 2801S
Methods for Empirical Microeconomics
(Labour Economics II)
2009
This is the
public Òfront endÓ for the more detailed course website accessible through the
University of Toronto Portal (Blackboard).
Background
For the
academic year 2008-09, ECO 2801 (Labour Economics II) is the course number and
name assigned to what will eventually be a new course, ÒMethods for Empirical
Microeconomics.Ó This course is directed at graduate students conducting
research in the Òapplied microÓ fields, especially (but not exclusively)
labour, development, and public economics. The course will typically be offered
in the spring (second) semester.
For further
background, and a discussion of the labour course sequence for 2008-9, please see here.
Course Description
While it
has a labour course number, this is not purely a labour economics course: it is
a course in empirical modeling and applied econometrics. The tools covered in
the course, however, are central to those used in empirical labour economics,
as well as other applied microeconomics fields like development and public
economics. The focus will be the identification of causal relationships using
regression-based analysis. Likely topics to be covered include: Experimental
design and program evaluation; Instrumental variables; Panel data, fixed
effects, difference-in-differences, and related strategies; and regression
discontinuity. Empirical examples
will be drawn from recent work in labour, development, and public economics.
The
readings are drawn from two sources:
1) The book
by Josh Angrist and Steve Pischke, ÒMostly Harmless Econometrics,Ó
and
2) A
selection of journal articles.
One element
of the evaluation scheme is a critical evaluation of an empirical paper, and an
in-class presentation (which will require a third hour of meetings per week,
probably in the second half of the semester). While the course is targeted at
PhD students, qualified MA students are welcome in the course.
Syllabus
Link to Blackboard course
website (utorid required)
ECO2801H1-S-LEC0101: Labour Economics II