Journal of Economic Education最新文献

{"title":"Computer-Aided Instruction on the World Wide Web: The Third Generation","authors":"Joseph I. Daniel","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595953","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595953","url":null,"abstract":"Computer-aided instruction (CAI) moved from mainframe computing in the 1960s and 1970s, to microcomputing in the 1980s, to the threshold of network computing in the late 1990s. Previous generations of CAI have met with limited but increasing success and acceptance. Economic educators were generally disappointed with mainframe CAI and questioned its cost effectiveness and value added. Siegfried and Fels (1979, 942) summarized this view: \"CAI in [undergraduate] economics do[es] not appear to be the route to nirvana [it was] once expected to be. CAI appears to generate no more (or no less) cognitive achievement but probably costs more than conventional methods.\" Nevertheless, economic educators expected microcomputers to reduce development costs and to overcome CAI's earlier limitations. By the late 1980s and early 1990s, evaluations of introductoryand intermediate-level CAI programs ranged from the damning-\"Economics software engages the student at 'the lowest level of computer use' (drill) and little intellectual development is likely at this level\" (Reclam and Sexton 1994, 368, quoting from Yoho and Walstad 1990)-to the enthusiastic-\"The microcomputer has become a major pedagogical instrument of demonstrated value\" (Smith and Smith 1989, 73). In spite of the promises and disappointments of earlier generations of CAI, I argue that the World Wide Web represents an even greater change in the cost structure of developing, distributing, and using CAI software than the movement from mainframe to microcomputer. The Web can sustain a level of experimentation, innovation, and collaboration necessary to produce significant advances in CAI. The Web fundamentally alters the cost structure of instruction and learning by changing the costs of authoring, publishing, distributing, modifying, updating, applying, and using economic course materials. However, realizing the potential benefits of Web-based instruction requires that course materials be redesigned to reflect the expanded possibilities for interactivity, adaptability, rapid distribution, and integration of text, audio, video, graphics, animation, spreadsheets, and programming within a common package. Instructional software should not remain merely supplementary to a traditional textbook as has been previously argued (e.g., Walbert 1989).","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"48 1","pages":"163-174"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73826736","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The IS-LM Model: Is There a Connection Between Slopes and the Effectiveness of Fiscal and Monetary Policy?","authors":"D. W. Findlay","doi":"10.1080/00220489909596094","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909596094","url":null,"abstract":"The IS-LM model, as noted by Barron and Lowenstein (1996), continues to be an important analytical tool in many money and banking and intermediate macroeconomic textbooks.' The model is used, for example, to explain fluctuations in output and interest rates and to illustrate the analytics of fiscal and monetary policy.2 A number of textbooks also use the IS-LM model to examine how the output effects of given changes in the money supply and government spending (or taxes) depend on the model's parameters and on the slopes of the IS (investment-saving) and LM (liquidity preference-money supply) curves. This has become a particularly important application of the model given recent policies and economic developments.3 In these textbooks, one often finds the following \"slope rules\": (1) monetary policy is more effective the flatter the IS curve; (2) fiscal policy is more effective the flatter the LM curve; (3) monetary policy is more effective the steeper the LM curve; and, less frequently; (4) fiscal policy is more effective the steeper the IS curve. The use of these slope rules creates at least two problems for an instructor (and the student). First, whereas rules 1 and 2 are always correct, rules 3 and 4 are, at best, misleading and, at worst, incorrect. Second, some students invariably memorize such rules without being able to explain and to show how changes in the underlying parameters of the IS-LM model affect the slopes of the IS and LM curves and the effectiveness of fiscal and monetary policy. Explanations of shifts of the IS curve generally focus on the size of the horizontal distance between the two IS curves, but explanations of shifts of the LM curve generally focus on the size of the vertical distance between the two LM curves. In this article, I offer instructors a slightly different presentation of the IS-LM model. Specifically, a number of benefits emerge if the instructor simply focuses on what determines the size of both the horizontal and vertical distances between the IS curves and between the LM curves. This approach can be easily incorporated into any course that currently presents the IS-LM model. Students will be able to examine graphically how changes in the parameters alter the effectiveness of fiscal and","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"84 1","pages":"373-382"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86700906","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Trends in Undergraduate Economics Degrees, 1997--98","authors":"J. Siegfried","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595998","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595998","url":null,"abstract":"A 30 percent decline in the number of bachelor's degrees earned in economics over the three years from 1991-92 to 1994-95 created consternation in numerous American economics departments. Shortly thereafter, Robert Margo and I (1996) cautioned against alarm about this decline, noting that adjustments to previous postwar shocks to economics enrollments had regularly returned the number of economics degrees to approximately 2.2 percent of total degrees. In contrast, Becker (1997) argues that the decline in majors may be related to academic economists persistence in using \"chalk and talk\" while other disciplines have turned to more appealing teaching methods. Although the number of economics degrees continued to fall in 1995-96, the rate of decline slowed considerably, to about 3 percent that year (Siegfried 1998). In 1996-97, the trend turned upward, and the number of undergraduate economics degrees grew further in 1997-98. New results from a sample of 120 colleges and universities show a 10 percent rise in the number of undergraduate economics degrees awarded from the trough year of 1995-96 to 1997-98 (Tables 1 and 2). Although a recovery in undergraduate economics degrees undoubtedly is underway, there remains a long way to go (an additional 31 percent rise is required) to recover to 1991-92 levels. Furthermore, the overall trend masks huge differences among types of institutions. In 1997-98, undergraduate economics degrees at private economics Ph.D.-granting universities actually attained their peak level for the 1990s. Two successive years of double-digit increases easily compensated for the modest losses suffered by this group from 1991-92 to 1994-95. Economics degrees at exclusively undergraduate private colleges and universities are down 16 percent during the 1990s. The largest declines, however, are in the public sector, especially at large public universities with graduate programs","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"1 1","pages":"325-328"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"84156095","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Grade Divergence as a Market Outcome","authors":"Donald G. Freeman","doi":"10.1080/00220489909596091","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909596091","url":null,"abstract":"Grade point averages (GPAs) for college courses have been increasing at least since the 1960s (Kolevzon 1981). Grade inflation has been the subject of a considerable literature investigating the causes (McKenzie 1975; Kolevzon 1981; Dickson 1984), consequences (Millman et al. 1983; Sabot and WakemanLinn 1991; Shea 1994), and suggested remedies (Zangenehzadeh 1988). Perhaps less well documented is that grade inflation has occurred at different rates across university departments, causing average GPAs to diverge across disciplines. In particular, grades in the sciences, including economics, tend to be lower than grades in the humanities and in pre-professional fields (Shea 1994; Becker 1997). Sabot and Wakeman-Linn (1991) documented the division of colleges into highand low-grading departments as a byproduct of their work on grade inflation. They found that this division is affecting enrollment patterns, with students abandoning \"harder\" or low-grading disciplines like math or science in favor of \"softer\" or high-grading disciplines. Thus, grade divergence may be exacerbating the shortage of technically qualified graduates by skewing enrollment away from science and engineering. Similarly, the recent decline in economics majors may reflect student aversion to tougher grading practices in economics relative to other disciplines (Becker 1997). I offer an economic explanation for grade divergence. My hypothesis is that, given equal money prices per credit hour across disciplines, departments manage their enrollments by \"pricing\" their courses with grading standards commensurate with the market benefits of their courses, as measured by expected incomes.I analyzed grade divergence using a cross-section of 59 fields of study from a recently published survey of college graduates by the National Center for Education Statistics, A Descriptive Summary of 1992-93 Bachelor's Degree Recipients: 1 year later (NCES 1996). The survey tracks 1992-93 college graduates to determine outcomes from postsecondary education, including returns to investment in education. Using this sample, I found evidence consistent with the economic explanation of grade divergence: Graduates from high-grading fields of study have lower earnings than graduates from low-grad-","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"60 1","pages":"344-351"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79544717","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Longitudinal Effects of Economic Education on Teachers and Their Students","authors":"Sam Allgood, W. Walstad","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595946","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595946","url":null,"abstract":"Teacher education in economics is essential if high school students are to have an opportunity to learn economics. Teachers need to develop a solid understanding of economics through course work because students cannot be expected to learn what teachers do not know. In fact, research in economic education at the high school level has found that the number of economics courses taken by teachers has a positive and consistently significant effect on the economic learning of students (Becker, Greene, and Rosen 1990; Bosshardt and Watts 1990). For most teachers, however, the amount of course work in economics is limited. Studies of teacher education programs at colleges and universities show that most prospective social studies teachers (the ones most likely to teach economics in the schools) take about four college credit hours of course work in economics, and only 11 states have specific requirements for course work in economics for teacher certification (Walstad 1992). Although some teachers can correct deficiencies in their economic education by taking in-service courses and workshops, these programs are of short duration and often limit content coverage to the level of a one-semester principles course. Taking just one or two courses in economics is inadequate preparation in the view of a distinguished national committee of economists and educators that","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"1 1","pages":"99-111"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85968291","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Role Playing in the History of Economic Thought","authors":"Tom Oberhofer","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595947","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595947","url":null,"abstract":"Active learning has been widely recognized as central in a student's mastery of a subject (Angelo and Cross 1993; Pascarella and Terenzini 1991). One type of active learning is role playing, which has been used effectively in a variety of fields. For example, Bhawuk (1990) discusses it as a technique to foster cross-cultural awareness; Smokowski (1992) describes its use in psychodrama; and McCaughey (1991) describes its role in exploring acute psychological distress. Role playing is also widely used in studying economics and evaluating social policy options (Williams 1992; Hester 1991; and King and LaRoe 1991). It has also been part of a number of experiments reported in this journal (Leuthold 1993; DeYoung 1993; Bell 1993; Fels 1993). Most closely related to the topic of this article is the example used by Brooks (1985) in a history of psychology course. In each case, role playing is a part of the course experience for students, usually intertwined with other, more traditional academic experiences. In no case was it the exclusive technique used in the delivery of course material. In this article, I describe a history of economic thought (HET) course built entirely on a role-playing model. This course places unusual demands on students and faculty but has led to a remarkable student engagement with the subject matter.","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"51 1","pages":"112-118"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88277572","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"A Computer-Aided Exercise for Checking Novices' Understanding of Market Equilibrium Changes","authors":"A. Katz","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595952","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595952","url":null,"abstract":"The difficulties of teaching introductory principles of comparative statics equilibrium analysis are well known, and failures to grasp their essentials often leave beginning students with a weak foundation for studies of other topics in economics. In this article, I describe a computer-aided supplement to the introductory microeconomics course that enhances students' understanding with simulation-based tools for reviewing what they have learned from lectures and conventional textbooks about comparing market equilibria. The heart of the method is an exercise that asks students to predict the consequences of supply and demand shifts by constructing statements of the form \"If X increases (or decreases), then Y increases (or decreases)\" where the X and Y variables are chosen from a menu including variables such as income, population, demand, supply, equilibrium price, equilibrium quantity, and so forth. The if-then statements are an alternative to the usual textbook way of describing equilibrium market changes, forcing students to translate what they have learned into a somewhat different format from the more traditional approaches. Although most students find the translations difficult, they typically show a dogged persistence in getting them right and, in the process, learn from their mistakes. The computer-based aids are essential to the way in which students have been doing the exercise in my classes-as an integral part of instructional software that I have been developing known as the Smithtown Collection. The collection derives from a laboratory prototype developed by cognitive psychologists (Shute, Glaser, and Raghavan 1989; Shute and Glaser 1990a, 1990b) who were interested in comparing computer-based learning in economics with other disciplines.' The exercise, adapted from the prototype, owes much to what psychologists have learned from studies of skill development, especially the importance of repetitive practice. Smithtown and my adaptations of it for classroom use have been described elsewhere (Katz and Ochs 1993; Katz 1992; Raghavan and Katz 1989), so I shall outline only those features that are directly relevant to understanding","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"105 1","pages":"148-162"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77092154","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Teaching Fisher's Theory of Interest in a Simple Auction Setting","authors":"Donald W. Swanton","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595937","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595937","url":null,"abstract":"Theories of the interest rate begin with either the supply and demand of loanable funds or the stock of investment opportunities and their rates of return. Fisher's (1930) two-period model has an undifferentiated stock of investment opportunity. Teaching the standard Fisher theory of interest to undergraduates is generally difficult and not very successful. The graphical version with its double tangency solution to the production-consumption problem is only convincing to undergraduate economics or finance majors with unusual mathematical sophistication. Moreover that treatment, found in Hirschleifer (1970) and in Fama and Miller (1972) as well as in later treatments like Howe and Gronewoller (1990), has no capital goods and no explicit capital market. The model I propose requires no graphs and puts students in the position of being present at the auction for credit to see how simple maximizing behavior determines the rate of interest and how outside factors raise and lower it.","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"35 1","pages":"43-51"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87775254","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Turning Merit Scores into Salaries","authors":"W. Becker","doi":"10.1080/00220489909596099","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909596099","url":null,"abstract":"Much has been written in the higher education administration literature about measuring the research, teaching, and service outcomes of faculty members (Braskamp and Ory 1994; Dilts, Haber, and Bialik 1994; Lewis 1996; Centra 1993). How each of many multiple outcomes enters salary determination equations is also well studied, with even similar departments of economics apparently adopting different fixed-weight formulae for assigning a salary index and/or changes to a salary index for multiple research, teaching, and service outcomes (Ragan, Warren and Bratsberg 1999).1 But the methods for allocating salary raises to individuals on the basis of an aggregate merit score, when faced with the constraint of a fixed amount of money for raises, receive little attention. For example, the authors of the four works on higher education administration previously mentioned addressed the measurement of faculty output, the weighting of output, and the assigning of merit points, but they did not address the algebra for converting merit points to salary raises given a fixed-budget constraint.2 A single formula for merit-raise salary schemes based on either a fixed cash amount, a percentage of base salary, or any combination of the two is provided here. What is unique about this formula is that it makes explicit how merit scores, together with prior salaries and the pot of money available for raises, determine individual salaries. There are no arbitrary thresholds or untraceable relationships between merit scores and the pot of money available for merit raises.","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"11 1","pages":"420-426"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79200007","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Experience with Scripted Role Play in Environmental Economics","authors":"D. Alden","doi":"10.1080/00220489909595949","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00220489909595949","url":null,"abstract":"Role play is a rarely used teaching technique in universities (Newble and Cannon 1995) and for teaching economics, in particular. My aim is to describe how scripted role play can be used to teach economics. I present a brief justification for using role play as a teaching technique for economics and instructions for running a scripted role play. I provide part of a scripted role play that I designed for use in an environmental economics course to illustrate how the role-play process works.","PeriodicalId":51564,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Education","volume":"31 1","pages":"127-132"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"1999-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74132267","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}