Intermediate Microeconomics
Econ 430
Semester Research Paper
Producing a Research Paper to address an important Public Policy Issue
Purpose of the Research
In this intermediate microeconomics course, we are going to study several models from the simple demand-supply model to complex general equilibrium models. We will focus our attention on microeconomic theory and some aspects of public policy issues in both developed and developing countries. In particular, the validity of these theories depends on competent empirical analysis with the relevant data. The empirical evidence emerging from these empirical analyses will be used by policy makers to make good economic policy decisions. The goal of this research paper is to help you think about critical public policy issues and find ways to address them. You are going to use economic theories and models to achieve your goal. To do this you will need to choose your own topic and write a standard research paper.
Task
Your task is to state a research question, use the relevant literature of your research topic and develop a methodology to address the significant policy question you have posed. The paper should be 15 pages in length. The outline of your paper must contain the following:
1. Abstract (One paragraph of a summary of your findings)
Your research paper MUST have an abstract and this should be a summary of what you have done. It summarizes your research findings.
2. Introduction (Brief overview of your topic and statement of the research question including a paragraph on the layout of your paper)
This should include a well-defined research question or statement of a problem that requires empirical or theoretical analysis. It should also include a paragraph of the layout of your research paper.
3. Summary of the Literature: As a researcher, you should demonstrate a good command of the relevant literature and organize your work in the context of this literature. To get a good command of the relevant literature you will need to read many economic research papers. I have provided you with a link of many research papers to assist you with your research. You can also access my paper by going to: https://sites.google.com/site/akamara2556/
4. Methodology (The economic model used, the type of data and method of analysis)
If you are writing an empirical research paper, please make sure your paper has the following:
· A clear statement of the hypothesis
· A clear statement of the empirical method used.
· A thorough description of the data that you used to carry out the research or analysis.
· A very good presentation of the empirical results.
· Summary and conclusions
If you are writing a theoretical paper, please make sure your paper has the following:
· A clear description of the model You might want to go to my homepage to learn how to model https://sites.google.com/site/akamara2556/
· A clear statement of the results.
· Mathematical proofs that support the results you have in your paper.
· A brief summary
5. Results
Here you need to summarize all your results in plain English
6. Conclusion
What you need to do here is to provide a complete synopsis of the entire paper
7. References
You list all the material you have consulted when doing your research. One thin I need to mention here is that you should list the last name of the author first followed by the first name initial. For example, “Nava F and Schiraldi P R (2019), “Differentiated Durable Goods Monopoly: A Robust Coase Conjecture”, American Economic Review Vol 109 No. 5 pp. 1930-1968.
Organization of the Research Paper
Your research paper should be presented in the following format.
1. Structure: I expect every paper to have a format that is consistent with the layout of all research papers in economics. This means it should be divided into sections as in standard research papers in economics journals.
2. Writing Style: As an economist, your writing should be clear and concise. You should present your paper like other papers published in economic journals.
3. Citations: The APA style or the citation style used in Journal of International Economics, Economic Journal, American Economic Review, Journal of Economic Perspectives etc.
Perform this task and submit your final paper on July 08, 2022 at 11:59PM
Selecting a topic
A very good research paper is either a theoretical paper or an empirical paper or a combination of both. This implies that to come up with a standard research paper, you will need to collect, compile (in an orderly form) and analyze data or you will need to formulate, build or study a theoretical model.
How do you select a topic?
The answer to this question is simple. The first thing that you should do is to decide which paper you are planning to write. Is it an empirical research paper or a theoretical research paper? If you are planning to write any of these two types of paper in economics, you will need to go through some research studies that have been conducted and try to develop your own topic from them. To reduce the burden on you I have provided you with some links for research topics and ideas below:
Microeconomics Econlib: https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Microeconomics.html
World Bank Policy Research Working Papers https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/9
World Bank Policy Research Working Papers https://www.worldbank.org/en/research/brief/world-bank-policy-research-working-papers
The World Bank Research Observer https://academic.oup.com/wbro
International Monetary Fund Publications https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/subject.asp
American Economic Association Microeconomics https://www.aeaweb.org/journals/mic
Accessing the Data
The good thing about writing research papers on a microeconomic topic is that data is very easy to get. Here are some important places where you can go to get free data.
WDI Data http://datatopics.worldbank.org/world-development-indicators/
World Bank Open Data https://data.worldbank.org/
Indicators-World Bank Open Data https://data.worldbank.org/indicator
Data.gov https://www.data.gov/
United Nations Data http://data.un.org/