Public Policy Analysis Assignment

Your Challenge:

(1) Identify a current federal, state, or local public policy issue that: (a) interests you, (b) allows you to apply microeconomic reasoning, and (c) has not been thoroughly covered within our class. (You may write about an issue that has been discussed in class if you address the issue in greater depth or in a new direction.)

(2) Research your issue to familiarize yourself with the major policy and microeconomic arguments that relate to your issue.

(3) Apply at least one microeconomic concept studied in our class such as incentives, marginal thinking and sunk costs, opportunity cost, elasticity, competition, externalities, public or common property goods, efficiency, poverty and/or equity, etc., to develop a policy position regarding your issue.

(4) Identify your target audience and advocate for your position.

Example Public Policy Topics:

Traffic Control, Gas or Other Product Taxes, Education Reform, Crime Deterrence, Pollution Control, Poverty and Inequality, Price Control Policies, Monopoly Regulation, Safety Regulation, Drug Policy, Health Care Reform, Social Security Reform, Farm Subsidies, Protection of Species, Funding for a Public Good, etc.