Core Economics Book
Dinah Lianes
The Curriculum Open-Access Resources in Economics Project (CORE Econ) is an organisation that creates and distributes open-access teaching material on economics. The goal is to make teaching material and reform the economics curriculum.[1] Its textbook is taught as an introductory course at almost 400 universities.[2] It provides its materials online, at no cost to users. It is registered as a charity[3] (CORE Economics Education) in England and Wales.
CORE Econ was conceived in late 2012, by Professors Wendy Carlin of University College London, Samuel Bowles of the Santa Fe Institute, and Oscar Landerretche [es], who at that time was Director of the School of Economics and Business of the University of Chile.[4] At the time, Professor Carlin wrote to colleagues to suggest they collaborate to revise the curriculum, noting that "altering the course of the undergraduate curriculum is like turning around a half a million ton super tanker. But I think that the time may be right for the initiative I am inviting you to join me in proposing."[5]
Launched in October 2013 at HM Treasury,[8] CORE Econ said its mission was to address these issues by creating a textbook incorporating contributions from many academics with different points of view that was "humbler, more empirical and more topical".[9] Professor Carlin wrote that students "are embarrassed when they are no more able to explain the eurozone crisis or persistent unemployment than their fellow students in engineering or archaeology", and that CORE Econ would ensure that "digital technology and interactive teaching methods will introduce students to an empirical discipline. They will learn to use evidence from history, experiments and other data sources to test competing explanations and policies."[10]
CORE Econ's courses are offered through open access online ebooks published on its web site. Its ebooks use a Creative Commons license[5] so that "any user can customize, translate, or improve it for their own use or the use of their students."[5]
This economics textbook was designed as the source material for taught courses in the first year of an undergraduate degree, although it has also been used in schools, and for advanced courses in public policy.
In 2018, CORE Econ posted the first units of ESPP, an ebook designed to introduce the economics to non-specialists, particularly students from outside economics courses who were taking economics as a minor. Like The Economy, it focuses on topics such as inequality, power, and environmental economics. ESPP is funded by the Nuffield Foundation.[12]
Also in 2018, CORE Econ posted the first beta units of Doing Economics, a collection of empirical projects designed to teach quantitative methods in economics using real-world data, also funded by the Nuffield Foundation.[12]
The day-to-day running of the project is based at University College London. The course and support materials have been created by academic economists who volunteer their time, including Yann Algan (Sciences Po, Paris), Timothy Besley (London School of Economics), Diane Coyle (University of Manchester), Cameron Hepburn (University of Oxford), Suresh Naidu, Rajiv Sethi, Margaret Stevens (University of Oxford), and Kevin O'Rourke (University of Oxford).[13]
The steering group is Wendy Carlin (University College London), Samuel Bowles (Santa Fe Institute), Margaret Stevens Archived 2018-08-26 at the Wayback Machine (head of the Department of Economics, University of Oxford), and Oscar Landerretche [es], the president of Codelco. In 2017, CORE USA, based at Barnard College, was set up to improve outreach in the US.[14]
Other prominent economists have contributed to the published material,[15] including Nobel laureates James Heckman, Alvin Roth and Joseph Stiglitz, who recorded videos for it on inequality in education, matching markets and the financial crisis.
Since 2019, the CORE Econ online material embeds the interactive visualizations of Our World in Data throughout the material.[16] This makes all data available for download and allows data selection for specific countries.
CORE Econ funds its projects through grants. Startup funding was provided by the Institute for New Economic Thinking. Current funders include the Nuffield Foundation, HM Treasury, Friends Provident Foundation, The Bank of England, and the International Economic Association.[17]
CORE Econ's authors claim that popular textbooks such as Principles of Economics by Greg Mankiw are little different in content to the first modern text book, Economics by Paul Samuelson, which was published in 1948,[18] meaning that these textbooks have ignored many of the innovations in economics since then:
CORE Econ argues that concepts developed in the second half of the 20th century, such as asymmetric information, strategic social interactions and incomplete contracts should be given greater prominence in undergraduate teaching. It claims that in most universities these ideas are "mentioned, if at all, at the end of the introductory course, or as special topics."[18]
Some curriculum reform campaigners have criticised CORE Econ for being too narrow and prescriptive, and not acknowledging competing schools of thought. Daniel Lapedus, the Rethinking Economics welcomed CORE Econ's "incorporation of a variety of thinkers in their curriculum, as well as their efforts to make economics more real and engaging for economics students ... But real critical pluralism that reflects the true diversity of real-world perspectives is still a long way off. There is plenty more rethinking yet to be done."[22]
The proportion of students gaining a first in the second-year microeconomics module rose from 22 per cent in 2014-15 to 32 per cent in 2015-16, while the proportion awarded third-class honours fell from 28 per cent to 11 per cent. ... In macroeconomics, the proportion gaining firsts was unchanged, but the number who attained a 2:1 rose from 21 per cent in 2014-15 to 36 per cent in 2015-16."[24]
In recent years, students and teachers alike have come to realize that there is an insufficient culture and knowledge of economics in our society. The study of economics and the reality of how our world operates differ enormously. This realization led to the creation of CORE, a new course and manual developed by professors of economics from around the world, including Yann Algan at Sciences Po. The goal of this course: to show that economic tools, often considered too abstract and theoretical, can help solve real-world problems and crises.
"What is the most urgent issue that economists should address?" - "Inequalities!" shout students all around the world when prompted. But there is also climate change, financial instability, unemployment. Faced with these expectations, economics courses disappoint or even divert students from the subject.
CORE-based courses have already been taught as a general introduction to economics in more than 100 universities around the world. Since its launch in 2016, more than 60,500 users in 186 countries and more than 6,100 teachers in 131 countries have used CORE. The paper version of the English eBook has already been reissued six times to reflect demand. Translations into Farsi, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, as well as an adaptation for Southeast Asia are in preparation. An enriched website was launched in September 2017 and a new project adapted to an audience of non-specialists in economics was recently developed by 20 universities.
***Students enrolled in the Econ BAH may take up to 10 units of 199D. The successful completion of an honors thesis and at least five units of credit in Econ 199D may replace the requirement for Economics 101 (WIM). The remaining units of ECON 199D may be used to meet the minimum field requirements for the major, as long as the number of units for the BAH is at least 85.
1. During their junior year, declared Econ students will be required to complete an ePortfolio of their work in the major. They will then need to meet with their advisor to discuss their ePortfolio and receive a grade for their work. More information about this requirement is available in the ePortfolio Student Guide.
2. Graduating seniors are required to enroll in ECON 101 as their final capstone course. This class fulfills the WIM requirement, as well as completing the Capstone project. Enrollment in ECON 101 is by permission only. Students who anticipate that they will be graduating in the following year will be asked to submit their preferences for the ECON 101 sections in late Spring-Early Summer of the year before. Preference forms will be available on the Economics Department Website, and students will be notified by email when they are available.
"The Stanford Economics Department has two central missions: to train students at the undergraduate and graduate level in the methods and ideas of modern economics, and to conduct both basic and applied research in economics that pushes forward the frontier of knowledge in the field."
At least 6 credits; must come from two of the four categories below. Courses used to fulfill a quantitative methods requirement or a concentration requirement or elective cannot also be counted toward a core applied economics requirement, unless that concentration is environmental, energy, and resource economics.
CORE Econ's The Economy is an interactive ebook for a first course in economics produced by an international collaboration of research economists, teachers and students committed to a global sharing of an economics that can address the challenges facing the world today.
Experiencing Economics is an ebook of experiments and games that you can run with your students online or in-the-classroom to help them learn about economics while participating in economically interesting situations. The experiments and games complement the units in The Economy and Economy, Society, and Public Policy, and can also be used alongside other textbooks.