Intermediate microeconomics
Undergraduate · Economics
Syllabus focus
Topics typically covered
Standard syllabus
Consumer and producer theory
- Preferences, utility, and MRS
- Constrained utility maximization and demand
- Income/substitution effects; Slutsky (as taught)
- Technology, isoquants, and cost minimization
- Cost curves from optimization
- Profit maximization in competitive markets
Equilibrium and uncertainty
- Partial equilibrium welfare analysis
- Exchange Edgeworth box and efficiency (intro)
- Production general equilibrium survey
- Expected utility and risk aversion (intro)
- Insurance and asymmetric information models
- Externalities in an optimization framework
Market structure and strategy
- Monopoly and price discrimination
- Oligopoly: Cournot, Bertrand, Stackelberg (as taught)
- Game theory tools for strategic interaction
- Factor markets and monopsony (intro)
- Public goods and mechanism ideas (survey)
- Behavioral departures survey (optional)
STEM / applied
Mathematical practice
- Lagrangian setups for standard problems
- Comparative statics from FOCs
- Spreadsheet/Python numerical optimization (optional)
- Graphing indifference/isoquant solutions
- Interpreting elasticities from derived demands
- Problem-set proof/derivation habits
Applications
- Antitrust case framing with models
- Auctions and mechanism design awareness
- Policy incidence with calibrated simple models
- Reading intermediate-text appendices
- Bridging to IO or labor electives
- Capstone: solve and interpret a multi-part optimization set
Study units
Each unit includes a study guide, worksheets, review, practice test, and answer key. One unit is free; subscribe for the full class.
- Consumer and producer theory
Preferences, utility, and MRS
Coming soon - Equilibrium and uncertainty
Partial equilibrium welfare analysis
Coming soon - Market structure and strategy
Monopoly and price discrimination
Coming soon
Notes
Math intensity varies (calc I vs multivariate). Tutoring follows the department’s calculus expectations.