This course is designed to give you the basic mathematical tools needed to understand, work with, and eventually create the kind of models that drive public policy decisions. We’ll remind you of your (perhaps forgotten) algebra, run through the basic ideas of differential calculus, and think through the use of probabilities and statistics. You probably won’t feel comfortable going toe-to-toe with Paul Krugman (who, as the Nobel committee reminded us, was an excellent international economist before he became a rich and famous pundit). But you will have the background to take on graduate work in public policy. In a year or two, you may very well be able to take on Krugman. (Certainly you won’t need to repeat yourself so often as he does.)
This course fulfills the quantitative prerequisites for newly admitted LBJ students in both statistics and calculus.