Teaching Monetary Economics at undergraduate studies

Question

I teach Monetary Economics (not Money and Banking) in the second year of undergraduate studies. My students have already studied both Principle of Economics and Macroeconomics. I have considerable problems in designing the appropriate balance of my course. In fact, I cannot find any references for teaching Monetary Economics at undergraduate level. Is there such a course at US universities? Any suggestion for a good textbook for such a course? Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

First things first. How do you define money?  In My new book WHO'S AFRAID OF JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES? I point out that all market transactions are determined by the use of money denominated contracts -- and using Keynes's chartalist definition of money, then money is the thing that the State says will legally discharge all contractual obligations.
In Walrasian economics all contracts for delivery today and foe every forceable date in the future, all market transactions are completely determined at the initial instant of time.nc

But in the real world, time is a devise that prevents everything  from happening st once.  Thus when households earn income at any point of time, they usually do not spend their entire income initially by entering  into contracts for spot delivery and payment  and also forward delivery and payment at all future dates [as they are assumed to do in Walrasian microeconomic foundations]. Instead they  SAVE some of their income in  liquid financial assets which they expect they can resell for money in the future when they find a future money contract that comes due and they need money to meet their contractual obligation.   Thus Keynes liquidity theory becomes the basis of macroeconomics as I explain in my book WHO'S AFRAID OF JOHN MAYNARD KEYNES?

Thus the student immediately understands that production is determined by contractual orders and savings is the cause of unemployment and producing less-- while dissavings[including going into debt to buy more than one's current income ]  encourages increased production.

Answer 2

If I may ask, what is your institution's macroeconomics course like? What do people learn?

Comments

I teach Monetary Economics at the Saints Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Macedonia.  In the second year, the students have Macroeconomics  in the first semester and Monetary Economics in the second semester. Macroeconomics covers the things such as: money and demand for money, money supply and monetary policy, output employment and prices, aggregate demand and output, aggregate supply and inflation,  aggregate demand and aggregate supply, business cycles, fiscal policy and public debt, open economy macroeconomics,  real exchange rates,  etc.

On the other hand, the course in Monetary Economics covers the following topics: monetary theory (Keynes' liquidity reference theory, monetarism,  New Classical school, New Keynesian school)  money supply, money demand, monetary policy strategies (exchange rate pegs,  monetary targeting, and inflation targeting),  monetary policy instruments, monetary policy transmission mechanism, stabilization policies in Macedonia,  monetary-fiscal policy coordination, etc.

Thus, there is considerable overlap in the two courses.

Answer 3

Hello Goran: excellent question. I'm signed on to teach an undergrad class in monetary economics in the spring. I had taught something similar at Oberlin years ago (I'm now at Williams) and I could find any good book at the time - and I still can't - so I'll probably do as I did before, using notes and articles. There is an old (vintage 2000) book by Lewis and Mizen, published by Oxford University Press, but its approach is pretty dated IMO. It's tempting to write my own - but would definitely be a niche market, and hard to find a publisher. Feel free to contact me if you'd like to see the syllabus from my Oberlin course, or what I'm putting together for my spring class. - Ken