BYU Macroeconomics and Computational Lab: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 21:37, 24 May 2014

Revision as of 21:42, 24 May 2014

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== History ==

The program began in 2011 as a Mentoring Environments Grant (MEG) from the BYU Office Research and Creative Activities (ORCA) <ref> [https://orca.byu.edu/ BYU OfficeORCA Researchwebsite and Creative Activities] (ORCA)</ref>. It was known initially as the "Macro Lab". Initial funding was for three research assistants and was begun early in 2012. Two graduates of the BYU Mathematics Department's IMPACT program, Bryan Perry and Ben Tengelsen, were hired as research assistants at this time. They worked with the three co-investigators for the original MEG grant, Richard W. Evans, Kerk L. Phillips and [[David E. Spencer]].

At the same time the BYU Mathematics Department began the phaseout of their IMPACT program,<ref> [http://impact.byu.edu/ BYU IMPACT program]website </ref> in favor of a new applied math major. Funding from an anonymous donor allowed the IMPACT boot camp to continue under the auspices of the Macro Lab with a heavy emphasis on computational macroeconomics. At this time the name was changed to the "Macroeconomics and Computational Lab". The initial MCL boot camp had eight students attending both the math and economics classes, with one additional student each in the Math and Economics classes only.

During 2011 funding was secured by the [[BYU_College_of_Family,_Home_and_Social_Sciences|College of Family Home and Social Sciences]] to conduct a conference dealing with some aspect of economics. These funds were earmarked by the Department of Economics for a macroeconomics conference. By pooling funds and with the help of Hoover Institution computational economist, [[Kenneth Judd]], the MCL was able to host the initial Computational Public Economics Conference (CPEC) in [[Park City, Utah]] in December 2012. The keynote speaker was Nobel laureate, [[Thomas Sargent]], of [[New York University]].<ref>[http://mcl.byu.edu/CPEC2012/ CPEC 2012 website]</ref>

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Boot Camp is open to all BYU students who have the necessary background including core courses in economics and mathematics. Experience with an object-oriented programming language is strong recommended, but not a strict requirement. Students take six credit hours of courses, three in mathematics and three in economics. Lectures are on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 8:00 a.m. to noon. Computations Labs are held on Tuesday and Thursday during the same time period.

Students use [[Python_(programming_language)|Python]] as their primary programming language, but [http://www.mathworks.com/products/matlab/ [MATLAB]], Dynare and [http://http://www.dynare.org/ Dynare[Mathematica]] are also used for some economic applications.

Mathematical topics covered include: inner product spaces, spectral theory, convex analysis, constrained and unconstrained linear and nonlinear optimization and dynamic programming.

Economic topics include: overlapping generations modeling, dynamic stochastic general equilibrium ([[DSGE]]) modeling, DSGE numerical methods, curve and distribution fitting, time-series filtering, [[Vector_autoregression#Structural|structural VAR estimation]], and parallel programming techniques for DSGE models.

The most recent boot camp curriculum is available at the [https://economics.byu.edu/Pages/MacroLab/Boot-Camp.aspx BYU MCL boot camp webpage].

== December Conference ==