Introduction
Congratulations on being accepted into a Bachelor of Arts degree program! You are embarking on an academic journey that will offer you the best of a broad liberal education with the ability to specialize in various fields of study.
Economics is the systematic study of the logic of choice and human action under conditions of scarcity. Its concern is with how economic activity—the production, consumption, and trade of goods and services—is organized when resources are scarce. It seeks to develop an understanding of how individuals should, and do, make decisions, how societies structure economic activity, and the relative effectiveness of different institutions in relaxing, or mitigating, scarcity constraints. There are two primary focuses of economic inquiry: (i) understanding the strengths and limitations of markets relative to alternative institutions and (ii) understanding demand for the use of the government’s monopoly on the legal use of coercion and the potential effects of its exercise.
The Bachelor of Arts degree is offered as either a B.A. or B.A. (Honours), both requiring the completion of 120 units and normally four years of full-time study.