- Have you ever wondered how do governments make economic policies to smoothly run the country?

Gayle Allard, a professor of Economic Environment and Country Analysis at the IE Business School in Madrid, has designed a free online course to help you understand economic policymaking. It will help you understand how governments influence the macroeconomy. The two basic questions that will be tackled in this course include:

- How are the governments of developed countries responding to the economic crisis they have been facing since World War II?
- Have they been successful in policy making or should they do more?

Some key topics that will be discussed in this course include monetary policy, fiscal policy, debts and deficits and structural reform. This online course will also cover some current debates, including fiscal stimulus vs. austerity and rules vs. quantitative easing. The course starts with a review of some basic macroeconomic concepts, such as GDP, inflation, unemployment. Then the participants will analyze how fiscal and monetary policies work. In the end the students will get to know what other policies are opened to the governments to overcome the drawbacks of fiscal and monetary policies.

At the end of the course the participants will be asked to try their own hands at policymaking keeping in view any real time economic issue. There are no prerequisites for this course but a prior knowledge of basic economic concepts could help. Successful students will earn signed Statement of Accomplishment from instructor.

Author Bio

Gayle Allard has a PhD in Economics from the University of California, Davis. She has lived and worked in Spain for over 20 years and is currently a professor of Economic Environment and Country Analysis at the IE Business School. She has also served IE University as Vice-Chancellor for Research. Most of her research work focuses on labour markets. She has also worked on development issues, especially the influence of institutions on economic success.