Is this subject right for me?

Do you want to know why our government makes certain decisions and not others?
Do you enjoy the challenge of debating both sides of an argument?
Do you want to achieve a highly valued and respected AS/A level?

Economics develops a range of important skills for the future and can be a course requirement in many professional exams. It provides a good basic grounding, whether you are going directly into work or into Higher Education. Students in the past have gone straight into jobs in the banking and finance sector, but the majority go on to university, many to study Economics. We regularly get students into Oxford and Cambridge, and the London School of Economics.

What is the course content?

Part of the course (Macro-Economics) investigates the working of the whole economy. This involves analysing possible causes of inflation, unemployment, and the effects of government intervention in the economy. We also examine the complexity of international relationships and the interdependence between economies.
The other part of the course (Micro-Economics) examines the way in which the price system of free enterprise economies allocates scarce resources. We also look at the planned economy and examine the major changes that are taking place.
By the end of your two-year course of Economics, you will have considerable understanding of economic issues which sometimes appear to dominate the news:

• What does it mean when we read that the pound is strong against the dollar?
• What are the likely effects of this?
• Why do governments worry about inflation or the price of oil?
• What are the economic effects of the creation of the single European currency?
• What are the economic arguments for and against providing the health service free of charge to everyone in a community?
• How can we assess how living standards have altered in the UK since 1945?
• Why does the British economy tend to swing from booms to recessions and back again?
• Britain's top paid executive earns more than £2.5 million per year, up to 150 times higher than an average schoolteacher. What rationale is there for such a large pay difference?

How will your work be assessed?

Modular external examinations for AS will contain multiple choice questions and data response questions.

For the A Level, assessment will be through a combination of coursework, essays and data response questions.

What are the entry requirements?

The general entry requirements for studying at Advanced level apply, and must include a minimum of grade C in Maths GCSE. In addition, a minimum of grade C in English GCSE is preferred.

Other information

Very few students who do Economics AS & A Level have studied Economics before. This means that there is often uncertainty over what the subject is all about - and there is frequent confusion about the difference between Economic and Business Studies.

What is the difference between Economics and Business studies?

Business Studies focuses on business organisations by looking at two aspects in particular:

• The relationship between the business organisation and the economic, social, political and technological environment in which the firm operates.
• The process of decision-making within the organisation, for example, what products and services to produce, and how should they be marketed?

Economics does include some of these aspects, but only as one minor part, as Economics covers a much broader area than Business Studies. For instance, Economics looks at the international economic scene, as well as the role that the government plays in the sections of the economy that are still run by the state, and those sections that have been privatised.

What subjects combine well with Economics?

Economics fits equally well with Science, Arts and Social Science subjects, and each year our students have increasingly diverse programmes.

Some of our economists have in the past gone on to study subjects such as Architecture, Engineering, Law or mixed degree courses such as Economics with Politics, or Philosophy with Languages.

10/09