I wanted to follow up on the essay portion of your final exam. What I'm looking for is your ability to start putting together the various concepts and tools we have covered in macroeconomics in order to:

1. Provide an assessment of the current state of the U.S. economy.

Here I want you to analyze what's going on in terms of the key economic indicators (GDP, inflation, productivity, unemployment, deficit, trade, etc.) PLEASE don't just copy some section out of a text or recent article or you will be severely penalized. I want your interpretation of these things, in your own words. There are tons of analyses out that you can use. Make sure you note any source you use. Here's a good one that I just read from the NY Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/02/business/economy/jobs-report.html?_r=1.



The key to answering this section is to organize your essay with an outline and then just flesh it out. For example, you will be expected to comment on the GDP; here's a sample of how you might organize that answer:

a. Definition of GDP, explaining the different components

b. What are the strengths and weaknesses of the measurement?

c. What has been going on with GDP lately?

d. How have the individual sectors been performing?

e. What are the different reasons for the current GDP growth? Which one do you believe? Why?



2. Give some policy prescriptions to the president for how to improve the economy. The key here is to start by explaining to the president your economic viewpoint, i.e., do you believe that the nation's economic problems can be solved by relying on the market, the government, or some combination of the two. It is critical that you explain this to the president. To help, I have attached some of the PowerPoint slides that I used a lecture in a face-to-face class a couple of weeks ago. I didn't have time to record sound to it, so if it's confusing in parts send me an email.

The lecture starts out by reviewing expansionary and contractionary fiscal and monetary policy tools. These are the options that the government has to deal with the 4 different economic situations which are identified in the slides. It also points out the advantages and disadvantages of each strategy when used to deal with the different economic situations.

Then the lecture goes into the basic Republican and Democratic strategies. (BTW don't assume that because Trump is a Republican you need to advocate a conservative approach; there are plenty of Democrats advisers trying to get his ear!) This is the key part of the lecture that you need to address in your essay. Are you proposing an expansionary or contractionary policy and why?



OK, that's it for now. Since this will be a big part of your grade, you should start working on this essay now. Since I'm giving you so much time, I will be grading it strictly. Again, any whiff of copying from a text or an online source without attribution will be severely penalized. I want your thoughts.



If you have questions, please let me know. Also, I've already reviewed a few drafts of student essays and pointed out where they could improve.