Instructor: Robin D. Hanson, Asst. Professor, Economics (rhanson@gmu.edu, http://robinhanson.com)
Office Hours: Officially Monday 2:30-4. But I'm usually in at Carow Hall 10b. Call ahead (703-993-2326) if you want to be sure.

Catalog Entry:

Econ 844 Industrial Organization and Public Policy I (3:3:0). Prerequisite: ECON 611 or permission of instructor. Structure of American industry and underlying determinants. Analysis of structure and conduct on industrial performance in light of theory and empirical evidence. Rational antitrust policy and analysis of impact on structure and performance.

Oz Shy, Industrial Organization, Theory and Applications, MIT Press, ISBN 0-262-69179-5, 1996. (errata)

Carl Shapiro, Hal R. Varian, Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy, Harvard Business School Press, ISBN: 087584863X, 1998.

F.M. Scherer, Industry, Structure, Strategy, and Public Policy, Harper Collins, ISBN 0-673-99289-6, 1996.

Jean Tirole, The Theory of Industrial Organization, MIT Press, ISBN 0-262-20071-6, 1994.

Dennis Carlton and Jeffrey Perloff, Modern Industrial Organization, Third Edition, Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-321-01145-7, 2000.

Jeffrey Church and Roger Ware, Industrial Organization, Irwin McGraw Hill, 2000, ISBN 0-256-20571-X

• Class Participation Please contribute to class discussions.
• Industry Presentations You will each give a roughly 30 minute presentation to the class on the industrial organization of some industry. It is all right to base this on a chapter of the Scherer text. A signup sheet will be circulated the first day of class.
• Research Paper Your paper should aim at being publishable in a mainstream economics journal (though an unusual choice of “industry” is fine). A safe strategy is to find some published paper that interests you and make some modest variation on it.
• Paper Presentations You will each present a preliminary draft of your paper on either Oct 22 or 29. I strongly encourage you to come talk to me as soon as you have an idea for a paper - I can be very useful in helping you to flesh out your idea. In fact, I hereby offer to buy each student lunch once this semester, if we'll talk about your paper. Let me know when you're available.
• Homework Homework will be assigned weekly, typically one problem per week.
• Exams A midterm and a final exam will be given in class, with questions similar to the homework. Tests are closed book, but you may bring one 8.5"x11" paper of notes. One problem on the final will ask you to describe one of the industries presented in class.
• Grade Weights: Class Participate 5%, Present Industry 10%, Homework 10%, Midterm 15%, Final 25%, Present Paper 15%, Paper 20%.

Sam Peltzman, Review of The Handbook of Industrial Organization, The Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 99, No. 1. (Feb., 1991), pp. 201-217.

Hal Varian, How to Build an Economic Model in your Spare Time

Tyler Cowen, Law as a public good, Economics and Philosophy, 8:249-267, 1992. See also Law as a Private Good, and Market Provision of Law, Networks, and the Paradox of Cooperation.

Robin Hanson, Location Discrimination in Circular City, Torus Town, and Beyond

Misc. New Economy Articles