undergraduate Economics

Learning Objectives:

Students will learn the fundamentals of environmental economics grounded in allocation theory. They will come to understand that environmental problems must be viewed as problems of the efficient allocation of scarce environmental resources. Methodologically, students will be able to use tools from game theory to characterize environmental problems as public good problems and tragedy-of-the-commons problems. In addition, they will be able to describe and evaluate potential environmental policy instruments that can be used to address market failures. Students will thus learn to independently analyze environmental policy problems from an economic perspective and to develop proposed solutions or evaluate them based on economic efficiency criteria.

Contents:

Welfare-theoretical foundations of environmental policy; presentation of the fundamental problem in environmental economics: the prisoner’s dilemma, public goods, and common-pool resources: theory and examples; environmental policy instruments: Regulatory requirements (command-and-control strategies), eco-taxes, environmental certificates, subsidies for environmentally conscious behavior, voluntary commitments, regulatory policy and liability law, issues of intergenerational distribution (the sustainability debate).