Spring 2007
City University
Problem set 1
Lecture 2
Problem set 2
Lecture 3
Problem set 3
and read introduction and section 2 of Sibling Rivalry and the Gender Gap (by J. Morduch)
Here are some lecture slides.(NB: there was a typo on the previous version, on slide 9: the probabilities have n as an exponent.)
The diary of Jeffrey Sachs and Angelina Jolie (yes, the one you know) in Africa on youtube! (in three parts)
Joe Stiglitz presenting his famous book "Globalization and its discontents" at the World Bank. The "fun" part is the very agressive speech by Kenneth Rogoff, who didn't like some parts of the book at all... (hum, they also discuss some interesting development issues of course)
Anyway, if some day you're bored and you don't know what to watch on TV, you can have a look...
Remember the tragedy of the commons and the lack of well defined property rights? Well, here's a FAO development project from 1999 trying to address this (among other issues) in Bangladesh. Also in Bangladesh, Grameen Fisheries, a sister company of the famous Grameen Bank, does interesting work in rural Bangladesh. Check out the other sister companies and the Grameen Bank itself of course. By the way, Grameen has very interesting internship opportunities (although now with their Nobel Peace Prize, there must be even more demands than before), a wondeful way to discover Bangladesh.
Here is a study of rural urban migration in China. And another one looking at gender issues in rural urban migration (in China as well)
Also, here are the Millenium Development Goals. Think about how some concepts you've been studying in my course (as well as in your other economics courses) relate to the Goals.
What we do in the course is by no means comprehensive. I just hope it will make some of you want to go further, which includes learning more and also critically assessing whatever you learn.
By the way, William Easterly's webpage at NYU has loads of interesting things, including his research papers, development data, book reviews, and links to various media articles where he appeared (for example, look at the latest, "fashion victims", where he was interviewed about the fact that celebrities get involved in development and humanitarian issues, and why he thinks it is not always a good thing)
Our last two lectures, on international trade, will be based on this book chapter. This is from the book "Macroeconomics" by Paul Krugman and Robin Wells. If you are interested, other chapters of the book are available on the unofficial Paul Krugman webpage (in the "Economic theory" section).
Here is another piece on whether international trade benefits the poor, by Dani Rodrik.