Excel-based counterparts to all graphs in the chapters of Gwartney, Stroup, Sobel, and Macpherson Economics may be accessed below. For each chapter we provide an Excel workbook and a set of questions to guide users through the worksheets. The study guides are Word documents. The links to the individual workbooks and associated assignment sheets follow the chapter overviews below. Click on the chapter number here to move to the relevant part of this page: 1 3 4 17 18 20 23 24 25 26 27.  

A similar set of exercises based on chapters from Mankiw, Economics, is available here.

This material follows the text quite closely, using Excel workbooks to illustrate the graphical analysis that the text develops.

The Study Guide covers three related topics: Demand, Supply, and Market Equilibrium. Each of those topics is treated in a separate workbook. 

This workbook examines supply. It develops the concepts of the supply curve and producer surplus. It examines the distinction between a change in supply and a change in the quantity supplied. It shows the distinction between an elastic supply curve and an inelastic supply curve. Finally, it examines some of the factors that shift a supply curve.

This workbook examines market equilibrium. It shows how markets can result in an efficient quantity of a good being produced. It also examines the effect of changes in demand and supply on market equilibrium.

This chapter extends the analysis of markets to consider the relationship between product markets and markets for resources used to produce those goods or services. It examines the market for loanable funds where the "price" is the interest rate, and the market for foreign exchange. It also examines the effects of policies designed to keep the price above or below the price that would result in market equilibrium. Finally, it applies the analysis to the impact of taxes.

This chapter examines the economic roles played by government. Two of these roles are to address concerns in which markets lead to quantities that are not efficient, as defined in Chapter 3. One reason is less than perfect competition--"rigged" markets. The other is the existence of external costs or external benefits associated with the production and consumption of some goods.

Shows gains from exchange, based on the principle of Comparative Advantage. Shows gains and losses in specific domestic industries when those industries are open to international trade. Demonstrates the effects of imposing tariffs and quotas--who loses, who gains, and the reasons for a deadweight loss.

Uses the demand/supply framework to analyze aspects of the market for foreign currencies.

 Shows how a firm's cost relates to its output. Begins with an overview of types of cost--fixed and variable. Introduces the production function, from which costs are derived. Develops the following cost-curve relations: total cost, total variable cost; average total cost, average variable cost, marginal cost, average fixed cost.  

Shows how price taking firms act in order to maximize profits, and how firms' behavior relates to that of the market in  which the firms are located. Uses cost information (especially marginal cost) to develop the reasoning behind a price-taking firm's supply curve. Analyzes the connection between the firm and market in the short run and in the long run, thus developing the logic of the short-run and long-run industry supply curves.

Shows how price-searching (aka, price-making) firms act in order to maximize profits. Develops the concept of marginal revenue and shows how marginal revenue and marginal cost define the profit-maximizing output level. Develops the implications of free entry and exit (low barriers to entry). Introduces price discrimination.