Unit 8- Eonomics - MacroMirco Issues.doc

Unit 8: Economics: Micro and Macro Theory and Application Learning hours: 60 hours Unit level: 5 Description of Unit This unit is one of eighteen units leading to a BTEC HND in Global Trade Business. This Unit is designed to build on a candidate’s introduction to economics and expose them to microeconomic and macroeconomic applications of theory. The unit introduces current issues in economics and provides an opportunity for candidates to analyse and evaluate them. This Unit introduces learners to Microeconomic theory, in Outcome 1; learners are looking at the behaviour of groups within an economy. Learners are then introduced to Macroeconomic theory, where they look at the study of the economy as a whole in Outcomes 2 and 3. Unit is internally assessed. Summary of learning outcomes To achieve this unit a learner must: Assess costs, structure of markets and the role of profit. Investigate types of unemployment and inflation. Appraise a government’s use of revenue and expenditure. Content Costs, structure role costs, structure role: costs of the firm (short run and long run costs); characteristics of market structures (perfect competition, monopoly and oligopoly); price and output behaviour in perfect competition; monopoly and oligopoly; role of profit maximisation; alternatives to profit maximisation. Unemployment and inflation. unemployment inflation: types of unemployment (frictional, cyclical, seasonal and structural); solutions employed to combat unemployment; types of inflation (Keynesian and Monetarist views; solutions employed to combat inflation; impact of unemployment and inflation on individuals and businesses; recent trends in unemployment and inflation in the UK. Revenue and expenditure. revenue expenditure: aims of fiscal policy; fiscal policy methods in the UK; government spending and its effects; aims of monetary policy; monetary policy methods in the UK; government use of fiscal and monetary policy in the UK over the last 20 years; re