Term papers are due at the beginning of the last class, 8:30 AM on Monday
December 10. You may work in groups of up to three students on a paper,
and each group will turn in only one paper and get a single grade for all
members of the group. The paper should conform to the following format:
Length: No less than 10 pages and no more than 16 pages, including
any tables, figures, and appendices. Text should be done on a word
processor, double spaced with one-inch margins, and in a font no smaller
than 11 point. Fonts in tables should be no smaller
than 10 point.
Grades will be based in part on the quality of the presentation,
including both the quality of the writing and the clarity of any tables
or other presentation of results. So pay attention to what it looks
like, and make sure that your reader will know what you are up to.
Sources of any information that you report must be clearly
indicated. How you do this is up to you, including use of footnotes to
text and tables, citation of references, etc.
Start with a cover page giving the title of your project, authors'
names, and date, plus some indication that it is a term paper for
SPP/Econ 573. The cover page does not count as part of the maximum 16 pages.
Be sure to number your pages of text. I get grumpy when you don't.
Do not use covers or binders of any kind. Just print on white 8 1/2
x 11 paper and staple in the upper left hand corner.
Content: What needs to be included in your paper depends somewhat on
the topic and the methods that you have used to address it. For most
papers, I would expect to see at least the following:
Description of the problem (do not assume that the reader already
knows much, if anything, about it) and the program, project, or policy
that you are addressing.
Identification of the gainers and losers from the policy, as well as
the sources of these gains and losses and the methods you will use to
quantify them.
Assumptions of your analysis.
Description and source of data used in your analysis, and the actual
data unless they are too bulky to include.
Results, including both net benefits to each of the different gainers
and losers and a calculation of the total net benefit of the policy.
Recommendation based on your results.
Sensitivity analysis.
Discussion of any gains and losses that you have not been able to
quantify and whether these might change your conclusion.
Not every paper will include all of these elements, and some will include
other things. Also, it is up to you how you arrange all of these bits;
there is no need to organize them as I have here.
Your paper should use whichever of the tools of analysis from the
class are appropriate for your problem. For example, if consumers and/or
producers are facing different prices in markets as a result of a policy,
then you should take account of changes in their welfare as a result,
presumably by using changes in consumer and producer surplus. If a
policy involves costs and benefits at different times, then you'll need
to use discounting. If uncertainty about costs or benefits is an
important part of your problem, you will want to think about certainty
equivalents. And if income redistribution is an important element of a
policy, then you may need to consider different weights on the changes
affecting different groups. However, for some problems one or more of
these tools will not be needed, and that is fine too. What is important
is that you use the tools that are appropriate to deal adequately with
your problem, not that you use all of the tools you have learned.
I hope to put some papers from last year's course on reserve in
Foster for you to look at. I'll let you know when I do.