ECON 363: Contemporary Canadian Problems
A topic-oriented seminar course. Problems are selected from a list that includes regulatory economics, poverty, unemployment, industrial policy, safety, social policy, government deficits/debt and stabilization policy and others. The format assists the student in gaining analytical skills through work on the selected topics.
ECON 451: Law and Economics
Legal rules and jurisprudence can have a significant effect on resource allocation. A key question is whether legal regimes affect the optimality of an equilibrium and succeed in bringing society closer to a welfare maximizing outcome. From another perspective, a relevant question is on the objective or motivation behind the enactment of specific legislation. Recent studies suggest that much legislation is consistent with simple welfare concepts developed by economists. The course focuses on these issues with examples drawn from property, contract, tort, and criminal law.
ECON 641: Public Economics, Expenditure (graduate)
This course studies the economic role of the public sector in a modern market economy. Topics include the efficient provision of public goods, externalities and public choice analysis of the growth in government spending. Time permitting, some issues in the public economics of taxation may be covered.
ECON 642: Public Economics, Taxation (graduate)
This course discusses the economic effects of taxation. Topics may include the design of a desirable tax system, the structure of income, consumption and wealth taxes in Cananda, the efficiency cost and incidence of various types of taxes, international aspects of taxation, and fiscal federalism. Time permitting, some issues in public expenditure theory may be covered.