The purpose of this course is to provide students with an overview of the principles of economic analysis. The topics we will cover range from the behavior of "small" economic agents such as individuals and firms (microeconomics) to the behavior of “large” market aggregates (macroeconomics) and national economies. Learning economics is not so much a matter of acquiring knowledge of a collection of facts about the economy but rather a process of learning to view behavior and social phenomena through the prism of economic concepts and theories. By the end of the course, you should be able to think as economists – that is, be able to analyze questions involving choices made by individuals, organizations, and society subject to the constraint of scarce resources in a rigorous and logical manner. The methods learned in this course apply to questions ranging from how a tax on a good (say alcohol or gasoline) affects consumer behavior to why nations trade with each other, and what is the role of global trade in growth and development.