Economics Fundamentals

This is an introductory course which aims to explain the basic principles of economic theory through convenient examples, drawn from informatics domain. The market based economic system is analyzed in order to understand: the behavior of the players (consumers, firms and State), the mechanism behind market equilibrium price and quantity, the virtues and the failures of real markets. During the course we will discuss the following topics: demand and supply theory, production and cost theory, consumer theory, the perfect competitive market model, imperfect form of market competition. The theory is always presented and explained by discussing applied cases that deal with relevant issues for the informatics world (network externalities, patent and copyright, information economics, etc.). To stimulate the students on their economic thinking attitude, the teaching approach is a mix of traditional (ex cathedra) lectures and open classroom discussions. Course material is available on moodle.