This course is designed to introduce new students in the economics program (freshmen and external and internal transfers) to the application of economic analysis in academia, business, government and the not-for-profit sector. Students will be exposed to the research and consulting activities undertaken by academic economists and economic practitioners as well as a discussion of the career outcomes of the alumni of the RIT economics program.

Microeconomics studies the workings of individual markets. That is, it examines the interaction of the demanders of goods and services with the suppliers of those goods and services. It explores how the behavior of consumers (demanders), the behavior of producers (suppliers), and the level of market competition influence market outcomes.

Mathematical Methods: Economics provides students with an introduction to quantitative techniques used in economics such as matrix algebra, one- and multi-variable differential calculus, and unconstrained and constrained optimization. The emphasis of the instruction is on the application of these techniques to fortify and broaden a student's understanding of traditional economic topics like utility maximization, cost minimization, duality in consumer theory, expected utility, and profit maximization.

This course registers the student’s completion of the capstone experience required for economics majors. The requirement can be fulfilled by either presenting a class paper at an approved on-campus or off-campus research conference or submitting a solo-authored or co-authored research paper to a peer-reviewed journal. Economics students experience conducting research and presenting their findings before an audience of their peers and professionals in the field. Students are sponsored by a faculty member, developing their pre-professional skills while learning how to do research first hand. Double-majors who satisfactorily complete a capstone experience in their primary major automatically fulfill the economics capstone experience requirement.

Co-op in a field related to Liberal Arts (at least 80 hours). Students will apply the accumulated knowledge, theory, and methods of the discipline to problem solving outside of the classroom.