IB STUDY
Notes from past IB students for the present
This part of the course contains the foundations of economics by examining how individual buyers and sellers interact. Within microeconomics, you will study the concepts of demand and supply, elasticities, government intervention and market failure. In addition to this, HL students study theory of the firm.
This is my favourite part of the course as it takes a broader view of the economy from a national perspective. You will therefore learn about how households, firms, banks, the government, exporters and importers can affect an economy. I hope my notes will encourage you to see the enjoyment in this!
In this final section of the course, studying geography becomes very useful (but don't worry if you haven't, I didn't). This makes up a very small part of the course in terms of content, but includes topics covering measuring development, factors influencing sucessful development and the balance between markets and intervention.
For international economics, as the name suggests, you will learn about how countries interact and trade with each other. For instance, once you have studied this section of the course you will know about free trade, protectionism, exchange rates, the balance of payments, economic integration and, for HL students, the terms of trade.
Here is where the learning begins...
Economics can be a very challenging subjet, but going over the concepts in your own time as you learn the course (when the mountain of coursework, CAS and EE is not too high) is definitely the way forward. Some people seem to pick the subject up naturally, however, despite its logical foundations, some of the most intelligent people I know found it difficult as all of the components of the subject are interlinked. Therefore, I will aim to help you to not only get an understanding of the content itself, but also of how cyclical economic processes seem to be.
Sadly, knowing the syllabus is not enough for IB economics. You will be required to apply your knowledge in the exams and for the internal assessment. So here are some resources to help you with this (including my own coursework pieces).
