ECON 440 - Seminar in Industrial Organization

Unit(s): 4

Economists understand firm behavior by applying a simple rule for profit maximization: Marginal Revenue equals Marginal Cost. Models of perfect competition and monopoly are the simplest applications of this rule, but fail to explain many of the things firms do in real markets. Industrial Organization (IO) is motivated by observed deviations from the classical models of perfect competition and monopoly. Topics include models of price discrimination, product differentiation, oligopoly, entry deterrence, collusion, etc. in order to understand how different market institutions lead to different restatements of the profit maximization rule.

Grading: OPT
Prerequisite(s): ECON 204, ECON 205, ECON 304, ECON 305, and ECON 317.