CFAI - Economics

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redbaron

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Ok here is my frustration. I had Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Money and Banking, as an undergraduate, and MBA Economics in graduate school.
Now I am reading the CFAI Economics and I am shaking my head, wondering what a joke. Are we to remember all of these graphs, charts, and numerous shifts in demand/supply, and MC =MR, etc. How does one tell what is important and what is not? It is almost impossible to remember all of this. Does anyone have a good strategy for Econ?
Thanks
 
Yes you have to remember. There’s no way to tell which are going to come out and which are not (else everyone will just be learning the minimum).
 
econ you get the least bang for your buck.. sooooo much material and only 24 questions… i made about 300 flash cards for econ.. alot of 2 part questions on the test…if you know it cold you can snag some easy points
 
Here’s my $0.02 (like equity, probably overvalued):
Graphs are typically NOT on the exam, but the intuition behind them is. Approach the graphs as a pictorial way of telling a story. You can do the same verbally. However you do it, make sure you get the “story” (i.e. the intuition) behind the graph.
I also thought there was a lot of low hanging fruit. A lot of work for the # of questions, but a fair amount of time for the number you’ll probably get right.
 
I was doing fine in Econ until I came to foreign exchange. That stuff messed me up and you will see questions in that area. And of course, what you don’t know, you think the whole test is based on those questions.
 
by the way Econ was the hardest section for me on Level I exam in December and I heard that was also the case in June of this year.
 
busprof Wrote:
——————————————————-
> Here’s my $0.02 (like equity, probably
> overvalued):
>
> Graphs are typically NOT on the exam, but the
> intuition behind them is. Approach the graphs as
> a pictorial way of telling a story. You can do
> the same verbally. However you do it, make sure
> you get the “story” (i.e. the intuition) behind
> the graph.
>
> I also thought there was a lot of low hanging
> fruit. A lot of work for the # of questions, but
> a fair amount of time for the number you’ll
> probably get right.
^^Is bang on. Get the story, plus a few key points - Producers want to produce at MR=MC. GDP = C+I+G+X etc.
For exam day, solve intuitively.
 
I was in the same boat. On all my practice test, eco was easily my worst score. I basically gave up on it in Novemeber and focused on other areas, but a week before the test, I reviewed some things that I felt I would definitly see, and ultimately did.
- the difference between classical/keynsian/monetarist policies
- foreign exchange (cross rates, etc.)
- basics of price elasticity
- perfect competition/monopolistic competition/oligoploy/monopoly
- understand the chart in the schweser notes about what happens due to expected/unexpected shifts in monetary/fiscal policy
I knew that stuff cold and felt like I performed better on the actual exam than I did on the practice schweser exams or the CFAI online exams. I still don’t expect to score >70 there, but I think I made up the difference in some other sections by conceding a bit.
However, it is still early, so you have plenty of time to go through it and master some of the concepts. I would recommend supplementing your study time on other, more heavily weighted sections with a little bit of economics here and there, rather than trying to just hammer straight through the book. It was incredibly dull and vague to me, and I think that was part of the problem.
Of course, I may end up failing, so take all this with a grain of salt.
 
U majored in econ, got an MBA in economics, and yet u can’t sit thru all these HS econ stuff? I dont know, something smells fishy about your educational background.
To me, econ is the easy and interest, and its not rocket science to understand the graphs
 
he never said that he majored in econ nor did he say that his mba concentration was econ…
 
They never ask graphs in exam for econ. ONLY intuition behind the story and lots of 2 sections questions. You HAVE to supplement your reading with some research of major terms on the internet.
HTH
 
I just finished Section 4 and Section 6 fo Econ. What messed me up were the perfect competition, monopoly etc in section 5 so I skipped it.
But over all its very interesting. I have engineering background by the way…
You need to definately know “AS-AD” reading before you get to section 6.
 
I was fairly pleased with the amount of economics material in the L1 curriculum. I was a math major but I have taken a whole bunch of courses dealing with econ. I was relieved to see no mention of isocost, isoquant, etc..
Is it just me or is the “international economics” section omitted from the June 2008 exam? I already finished the Econ book and there was no mention of anything of the sort.
 
redbaron,
I would agree with you: economics is really a lot of information for *only* 12% of the exam.
Think about one thing, on the exam, there are questions on all topics, the easy ones and the difficult ones. So you should try to understand all concepts as much as you can.
I good tip (at least for me): the Secret Sauce, that will be published in a few months…
Regards,
Marc
 
when i started studying eco i tried writing notes, but then realised it was a waste of time, and the most inefficient method, considering how much info there was to learn…
i found that really learning the graphs helped alot…. like they say, a picture says a thousand words….
 
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