The course is designed for part-time non-degree education of shipbrokers at the Nikola Vaptsarov Naval Academy, Varna, Bulgaria. The basic aim of the course is to give a fundamental understanding of the economic theory of shipping and international trade, to develop analytical skills and to relate theory with empirical evidence.
This is a course in economic theory. While the focuses of the discipline are theory and analytical constructs, I will refer to many applied examples during the term, both as a way of explaining the economic intuition and as a way of helping you see the usefulness of economic theory. The greatest challenge in this course is getting you to think like economists, that is, getting you to naturally approach problems in the context of some economic model, and to use the model's predictions to understand the problem.
Macroeconomics encompasses the aggregate economy and is concerned with issues such as the total output, interest rates, inflation and unemployment. This course will attempt to combine economic theory with practical, everyday applications. The goal of this course is to give students a sufficient understanding of economic issues and problems so that they may understand the impact of government policy, econom-ic phenomena, and the choices people make.