Bachelor

All courses in the Bachelor programme are taught in German.

Macroeconomics I & Exercises

Lecture & Exercises

- knowledge of fundamental macroeconomic problems and simple macroeconomic models.
- strengthening your analytical abilities for problem-oriented thinking and logical deduction.
- acquisition of technical skills to solve formal economic models.
- enhancing your understanding of economic theory and your capacity to combine theory and empirical work.

Macroeconomics II & Exercises

Lecture & Exercises

Macroeconomics II extends the knowledge you acquired in Macroeconomics I to the fields of open economies and dynamic economic models

Poverty and Globalization

Elective Seminar

Poverty and Globalization is an elective seminar that is intended to be attended during the fifth or sixth semester in the B.Sc. Economics programme. Prerequisite is the successful completion of the lecture Econometrics I. A successful completion of the lecture Econometrics II is of advantage. The seminar deals with the correlation between globalization and poverty, more generally between globalization and economic and social backwardness. Your task is to write an own study (joint with another seminar participant) on the impact the participation in international trade has on poverty or on other indicators for economic and social backwardness of a large group of developing countries.

Theory of Economic Growth

Lecture & Exercises

The lecture provides an introduction to the theory of economic growth. Basic knowledge in analysis and econometrics is essential to successfully participate in the course. Topics covered include: Stylized facts of economic growth, factor accumulation and technical progress, Solow-Model, convergence concepts, human capital, models of endogenous and semi-endogenous growth, poverty traps, green growth, economic growth of commodity-rich countries.

Classical Papers in Economics

Elective Seminar

This course presents papers that are of particular significance for the development of modern economic theory. All the papers discussed are older publications (period approx. from 1950-2000), yet they are of such fundamental importance that they are still cited in modern academic work. Both micro- and macroeconomic papers are discussed, but no econometric papers.

All the papers are in English and published in refereed scientific journals. The seminar is held in German. The seminar paper must be submitted in German.

Government Debt

Lecture & Exercises

The lecture deals with various aspects of government debt. Basic knowledge in mathematics, particularly in analysis, is essential to successfully participate in the course. Topics covered include: Measurement problems, government debt and private savings, debt sustainability and sovereign default, government debt in dynamically efficient or dynamically inefficient environments, government debt and endogenous economic growth.

Empirical Business Cycle Analysis

Lecture & Exercises

This course provides an introduction to empirical business cycle analysis using descriptive and structural models from time series econometrics. No prior knowledge of time series econometrics is required, but students should be familiar with basic econometrics. The course surveys the development of business cycles theory in recent decades and shows how theories can be tested empirically using modern time series methods. The lecture focuses on the application of methods, it does not cover the underlying estimation theory.