Senior Seminar Paper Guidelines

Senior Seminar

Writing Assignments

Paper Guidelines: The following is a description of the minimum requirements for each paper.

Ø Length – the body of the paper should be no more than one billion and no less than eight pages.

Ø Margins – one inch on all sides.

Ø Line Spacing – double-spaced.

Ø Font size – 12

Ø Each paper should include a cover page, table of contents, and bibliography. These pages are not considered part of the body of the paper. All pages should be numbered.

Ø Each paper should include subsections that are referred to in the table of contents.

Ø In addition to the textbook, you must cite at least three other references used when researching and writing your paper. Although your references can include citations from wikipedia and other internet sources, your three required references must be officially published sources such as books and refereed economics journals.

a. Introduction – In this section you will introduce the problem to which are attempting to explain using economic theory.

b. Theory Section

In this section you should discuss, at minimum, the items listed below. A wider discuss is encouraged.

1. A complete presentation of the economic theory that you are applying to analyze the problem

2. Provide both written and graphical discussion of the problem. For example, if the problem is that some law is creating a misallocation of resources you will want to use the concept of Pareto optimality and how this is impacted by the existence of the problem that you discuss. If you want to argue that a market signal is being distorted and, thus, causing too much or too little of an activity, you will want to explain both graphically and in words why this misallocation occurs as well as the resulting problems created in the market.

3. Discuss the concept of incentive systems and how the current incentive system is leading to the outcome that you note as a potential problem.

c. Policy Section

In this section you are going to develop policy recommendations to begin resolving the problem that you have identified in your earlier parts of the paper. For example, chapter 3 of the current economic issues book discusses welfare reform. If the system is not working correctly, i.e. resulting in undesirable outcomes, how would you change the system? In this section you will detail the specific changes in policy and how this change will results in changing the economic system such that the desired outcome can be achieved.

As always, please feel welcome to discuss with me before and during the writing of the paper for hints and suggestions.