i. Use diagrams to describe in detail how a market determines the price of a product.

Module: IY008 - Economics
Tutor:
Report Assignment Brief
Module: IY008 - Economics This report is worth 40% of the overall mark for the module. For this report assignment you need to fulfil the task that is set out below. The word limit for this report is 1250 words (±10%) Submission is through the Turnitin link on the VLE page for the module. Marks for work submitted after this date will be reduced in line with the college’s policy on late submission You must ensure that this assignment is your own work and in your own words Any ideas/theories based upon the work of other writers must be fully acknowledged and correctly referenced both within the text and the bibliography. It is not acceptable to quote major sections of text, even if it has been fully referenced.
Report Task
i.        Use diagrams to describe in detail how a market determines the price of a product.     ii.        Apply these theoretical principles by selecting an existing product to assess how and for what reasons the price of your chosen product might change.   iii.        Briefly speculate as to the most likely impact of future changes in the price of your chosen product – providing a reasoned argument for your forecast.
Suggestions: You may find it useful to think about this question in separate but related parts; To begin with you will need describe the theory of how a market works. This means that you must identify and use all the appropriate key terms and concepts to describe the functioning of a market and how an equilibrium price is established. Select a product (this can be a good or a service or a combination of both) and use this as an example to demonstrate the ideas you will have discussed in the first part of the work, considering the main factors that are important for determining the price of your product Based on what you have found out about the product make a judgement about how the conditions of supply and demand are most likely to change in the near future and describe how this might impact on the market price of the product. This will be a speculation (a forecast) but some form of reasoned argument needs to be included to support your assertions. Aim to write about 400 words to address each of the three parts of the task. We expect to see references to at least five academic works see below for suggestions regarding this; Your notes or materials provided in class will not be counted as academic references; Wikipedia will not be counted as an academic reference; The marking criteria are listed below. These are the things we will be looking for when marking your report;

Module: IY008 - Economics

Marking Criteria

Marks for this assignment will be given according to the following criteria:

a)   Whether you include the appropriate key terms and ideas from the topic;

b)   How clearly you describe the process of price discovery in a market;

c)   How fully you can apply basic theory to the case of a chosen product;

d)   whether you use diagrams to help explain your ideas, the quality and relevance of the diagrams you use and how well you introduce these into your work;

e)   the quality and depth of research you carry out for this piece of work;

f)    the accurate referencing of any texts and data sources that you have used in answering the questions;

g)   the overall level of communication of your answers;

Hints and Tips 

Module: IY008 - Economics

• Marks will be awarded (or withheld) according to how well your response answers the question set out in the previous box. You should think very carefully about the content of your work and whether this is relevant to the question

• You should set aside a significant amount of time to plan, research, write and edit and review your work. As a guide, you should expect to spend 30 hours preparing this assignment.

• This is a report assignment. A report is a highly structured form of writing and should include headings and/or sub-headings. As with all written assignments your report should be word processed.

• You need to think very carefully about how you communicate your ideas. Work which is not clear will not be awarded a high mark. If work is very unclear it may not be possible to award it a pass mark!

• Consider very carefully how you structure your report. To answer the question you will have to include a large number of different ideas so you should think very carefully about how these ideas fit together.

• You need to be able to introduce the work of other experts to support your own points without plagiarising or committing any other form of academic misconduct.

• You must think very carefully about the research you conduct and the resources that you use. Marks will be awarded according to the quality of the research material that you use.

• Academic sources can include books, academic journal articles, and published expert reports. All academic sources are peer-reviewed. which means that they are written by an expert in the field and have passed review by other experts who judged the source for quality and accuracy.

• You should also consider very carefully how you introduce the work of others into your work as marks will be awarded for the quality of the referencing and your skills at providing in-text citations.

• The word limit for this assignment is 1250 words (±10%) so your report should be between 1125 words and 1375 words in length. (This limit does not include your reference list or diagram labels).

• The question specifically requests that you use diagrams as part of your answer. Marks will be withheld if you do not include diagrams! Marks will be awarded for both the accuracy and appropriateness of the diagrams you use.