Macroeconomics is a section economic theory, which studies the patterns of functioning of the economy as a whole.
The subject of macroeconomics are economic processes occurring on the scale of the national economy . The key problems of macroeconomic analysis include: determining the volume of national production, the reasons for the existence of unemployment, the nature of economic cycles, the factors and mechanism of economic growth, the causes and conditions for the development of inflation, the influence of foreign economic factors on the state of the national economy.
Macroeconomics uses aggregation principle , according to which individual economic agents or processes are combined according to certain qualitative characteristics into aggregates (sets) and are considered as a whole.
From a macroeconomic point of view, only four macroeconomic entity :
ü households (consumer sector);
firms (entrepreneurial sector);
ü Government (public sector)
ü abroad (foreign economic sector).
households show demand for goods and services and at the same time are suppliers of economic resources. They receive income from factors that together form the national income. Part of the income is spent on consumption (consumer spending), while the rest goes to savings.
Firms demand for resources by offering goods and services in turn. In addition, they invest and influence the amount of capital in society.
State performs a regulatory function and influences the decisions of households, firms and the functioning of markets (receives taxes, pays subsidies, carries out government loans and public procurement).
Abroad- all economic entities interacting with the national economy through the channels of international trade and capital flows.
All subjects of macroeconomics are interconnected by a system of national markets, including: the market for goods, the market for factors of production, the financial and money markets. The actions of subjects of macroeconomics determine the condition of macroeconomic equilibrium.
In macroeconomics, they operate with the concepts of "stocks" and "flows". Stock is a quantity that can be quantified this moment time and characterizes the state of the object (capital stock, money supply in circulation, the number of unemployed). Flow - this is a value that can be determined for a certain period of time and characterizes the "flow" of processes. (national income, volume of investments).
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Macroeconomics - a section of general economic theory that examines the fundamental problems of the economy at the level of the national economy as a whole. The term "macroeconomics" was introduced into circulation relatively recently, but macroeconomic analysis itself arose almost simultaneously with economic science. In essence, already in the "Economic Table" F. Quesnay a macroeconomic model of economic life is presented. Elements of macroeconomic analysis are also found among representatives of English classical political economy. He used the macroeconomic approach very widely in his theory. K. Marx. AND only the neoclassicals, with their methodological individualism, veered towards microeconomic analysis. In the XX century. In the development of the macroeconomic direction of research, an outstanding role was played by J. Keynes. In fact, macroeconomics as an independent scientific discipline was formed after the publication in 1936 of the book by J. Keynes " General theory employment, interest and money."
In it, the author developed a whole system of concepts and categories new to economic science and used them as tools for functional macroeconomic analysis, which are currently used by scientists of all schools and areas of economic theory. Not even by accident M. Friedman, one of the active opponents of Keynesian theory, the head of modern monetarism, argued that all economists of today are Keynesians. However, even those who do not consider themselves as such admit that thanks to the work of J. Keynes they have become competent economists.
There is no insurmountable chasm between macroeconomics and microeconomics. And this is also the merit of J. Keynes. All macroeconomic analysis rests on a microeconomic basis - on laws of supply and demand and on theories of economic equilibrium.
Differences in tasks, goals and tools of analysis are significant, and they must be seen and understood.
1. In the course of microeconomics at the center of the study are the simplest realities of economic life: individual consumers, households, manufacturing firms. The object of analysis is the markets for certain goods, the supply and demand for them, as well as the resource markets interacting with the markets for consumer goods and services.
Before macroeconomics there are other tasks. She explores general economic processes in general, i.e. market conditions and results all subjects economic relations. To maintain a balance between them, a special subject is needed - state. Therefore, in macroeconomics the most important economic agent the state becomes the presence of which, although microeconomics assumes, is far from being in the first roles.
Economic phenomena are considered by macroeconomics in their totality. But as a result of joint actions of participants in economic relations, results appear that can have both positive and negative consequences for the system as a whole and for its individual agents. In this case, state intervention in economic relations is intended to correct them in a certain way. Government actions aimed at stabilizing and developing economic relations are called economic policy .
The state establishes the "rules of the game" in the national market: it determines the tax policy, tariff rates, quotas, subsidies, as well as the laws according to which the participants in economic relations act. The state, represented by the government, acts as one of the subjects of the market, i.e., an active party defending national interests.
A schematic diagram of the interaction of economic agents in the national economy with the participation of the state is shown in fig. 1-2.
2. In microeconomics, only the real sector of the national economy is considered. Macroeconomic analysis proceeds from the existence of "credit money" in the country. The processes of their interaction form the monetary (monetary) sector. The interaction of the real and monetary sectors is the main problem studied by macroeconomics.
3. The subject of macroeconomics- patterns of functioning of the national economy. Macroeconomics analyzes the interaction, mutual influence of the most important segments of the national economy: labor markets, money, capital, goods and services, natural resources.
In general, in the subject of macroeconomics, there are three components:
National economy;
State economic policy and regulation;
Interaction of national economies within the world economy.
The main three problems that macroeconomics studies are:
Unemployment (employment)
Inflation (prices)
The economic growth.
At the same time, the subject of macroeconomic analysis is expanding. This also begins to include the problem of external economic equilibrium, reflected in the balance of payments.
- 1.1. Macroeconomics as a branch of economic theory. The subject of macroeconomics.
- 1.2. Methods of macroeconomic study.
- 1.3. The main tasks, problems and concepts of macroeconomics. Model of national economic circulation.
- 1.4. Economic policy and scientific directions in macroeconomics.
Basic concepts
Aggregation. Tasks and problems of macroeconomics. Keynesianism, neo-Keynesianism and post-Keynesianism. Macroeconomic policy of the state. macroeconomic models. Methods of macroeconomics. Model of national economic circulation. Monetarism. National macroeconomics. Neoclassical (Keynesian-neoclassical) synthesis. " New classic". Stock and flow variables. Positive and normative macroeconomics. Subject of macroeconomics. Mixed economy. Standard and country-specific factors. The structure of economic theory. Leaks and injections. Endogenous and exogenous variables.
After studying this chapter, the bachelor student should:
know
- the content of the subject of macroeconomics as an integral part of economic theory;
- a set of methods of macroeconomic study;
- basic categories and main relationships in the field of macroeconomics;
- the main directions of macroeconomic theory in their general form;
be able to
- determine the space and boundaries of the scope of macroeconomic analysis;
- identify the most common problems of macroeconomics;
- correlate macroeconomic theory and economic policy;
- analyze the nature of relationships in macroeconomics;
own
- main methods of macroeconomic analysis;
- methods of collecting, processing and interpreting macroeconomic data;
- skills of aggregation of economic values;
- basic approach to building macroeconomic models.
Macroeconomics as a branch of economic theory. Subject of macroeconomics
Macroeconomics is an integral part of modern economic theory. In the most common form, the modern theory of economics acts as a unity of microeconomic (microeconomics) and macroeconomic theory (macroeconomics). This structure was formed at the turn of the 1940s and 1950s. 20th century based on a concept developed by an American economist, future laureate Nobel Prize in economics by Paul Samuelson and called "neoclassical synthesis". In the previous economic theory, which describes the emerging and functioning market order of relations and represented by such scientific areas as mercantilism, physiocracy, classical and Marxist political economy, marginalism and neoclassicism, there was no such division, as well as the very concept of "macroeconomics". This was explained by the simplified structure of market economic relations of that time, the relatively weak role of the state as a subject of economic regulation, and the underdevelopment of the forms and methods of the state's economic policy. The Great Economic Depression of 1929-1933, which particularly affected the United States and other developed countries of that time (to this we can add the global social upheavals of the early 20th century) and became a convincing manifestation of "market failures", showed the need to strengthen the role of the state in economic life, expansion of state regulation of the market economy. The "New Deal" of President F. Roosevelt in the USA in the 1930s. was the most concentrated expression of practical actions in this direction. The theoretical reaction was the emergence and subsequent active spread of a new scientific direction, called Keynesianism, after the name of the most famous in the 20th century, Keynesianism. English economist John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946). His fundamental work was the book "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money", published in 1936. After its release, even the expression "Keynesian revolution" arose, reflecting the break with the prevailing belief in the all-powerful "invisible hand of the market". The new direction emphasized the processes in the economy as a whole, suggesting a different, more active and constructive role of the state and its economic policy.
In fact, it has become a reflection mixed economy, combining market-competitive and state-regulated methods of economic coordination ("market + state"). There was a transition from a free market economy to a regulated market (in other words, mixed) economy, and Keynesianism theoretically recorded this change.
At the same time, the economic system retained the market foundation, and economic entities retained market behavior based on the dominance of private property and competition.
As a result, the new economic system appeared as a two-layer structure, in which the first (grassroots) level reflects the market behavior of specific economic entities (households and firms), and the second level - ensuring the functioning of the country's economy as a whole with the active participation of the state in economic life. The first level was called microeconomics, the second - macroeconomics. In the educational and scientific structure, they were fixed as different levels (spheres, sides) of economic theory. As already mentioned, this construction was first implemented by P. Samuelson, whose "Economics" appeared as a combination of two parts: microeconomics and macroeconomics. Moreover, each of them was based on different theoretical foundations: microeconomic theory - on neoclassical theory (A. Marshall is considered its founder), macroeconomic theory - mainly on Keynesianism. Since then, for more than 60 years, it is this structure that has become the main expression ("mainstream") of economic theory.
Within this framework subject "Macroeconomics" as an academic and scientific discipline is the economy as a whole, or, more precisely, the patterns and mechanisms of functioning of the economy as a whole. This integrity of the economy finds its expression in aggregate or aggregated indicators. As the reader knows from the previously studied training course, the subject of microeconomics - another component of modern economic theory - is the behavior of individual economic entities (specific business units), the objective conditions for them to make rational decisions about the production, exchange and consumption of economic goods.
As for aggregate macro indicators, among them are not only such obvious, "mass-like" indicators as GDP - gross domestic product (i.e. the product created in the country as a whole), money supply (i.e. the total amount of money in the country ), etc., but also such indicators as employment and unemployment, investment and others, known from the sections of "Microeconomics" devoted to the markets of production factors (in this case, labor and capital markets): but in macroeconomics they are taken as expressions the functioning of the economy as a whole, and not just a reflection of the functioning of individual markets and the behavior of economic entities. The same metamorphosis occurs with price, one of the key concepts of microeconomics: at the macroeconomic level, we are talking about the general price level, which is formed not in individual commodity and resource markets, but in the economic space of the country as a whole. Consequently, inflation as an increase in the general price level also becomes an aggregate macro-indicator. As the reader progresses through macroeconomics, he will become familiar with many other aggregates.
Thus, macroeconomics, within the framework of the established structure of economic theory, acts as its component part, which has its own special subject.
At the same time, it is worth asking the following question: is the general space of economic theory exhausted only by macro- and microeconomics? In the broadest sense of the word, no, since historically there have been and still are other directions, despite their less widespread use. The main reason for this is the real diversity of the modern economy, economic system. In it, one can single out (if we take a new classification) several angles (slices). Firstly, the modern economic system can be represented as a set of functional links that are formed at the micro and macro levels: in fact, this was discussed above (this is the "mainstream"). Secondly, it can also be fixed as a set of socio-economic relations, in the center of which is the method of socio-economic appropriation, the nature of the socio-economic system, and the genetically subordinated relations themselves act as a social form of productive forces and their development. Thirdly, it can also be represented as a set of institutions (formal: laws, contracts; informal: traditions, values, etc.) that have established themselves in economic life.
Thus, the economy is a truly multilateral system, and the theoretical understanding of it should be multidimensional, contain different angles of scientific analysis. And therefore, modern economic theory, which claims to be an adequate and large-scale scientific reflection of economic reality, in a broad sense should include a set of theoretical directions related to common subject- economic relations, despite the fact that each of these areas has its own direct subject. In accordance with this approach, the following can be conditionally distinguished as the main structural parts of modern economic theory: functional economic theory or the theory of rational use of resources and macroeconomic stability (microeconomics and macroeconomics in their established form), socio-economic theory (political economy), institutional economic theory (institutionalism). To them one can also add a nationally oriented direction (the study of the national economic system as a system that incorporates all the national identity of the country and its economy), a post-industrial oriented direction (the study of the characteristics of the information society, the knowledge economy and innovation, etc.). You can find other, less well-known or more private directions and approaches. A broad, comprehensive theoretical understanding of the economic system can only be obtained as a result of studying all of these areas. However, in this case, one must proceed from the dominance of the first of these directions, which has been established in modern economic theory. It is within its framework that macroeconomic theory is studied, the boundaries of the subject of which were outlined above.
The first macroeconomic concepts were already present among economists of the early stages of the development of economic science. It is generally accepted that the fundamentals of macroanalysis were developed in the 1930s. of the twentieth century, that the foundations of macroeconomics and macroanalysis were developed by the outstanding English economist of the last century, John Maynard Keynes (1883 - 1946). It was then that the conditional division of economic theory into micro- and macroeconomics took place. In 1936, Keynes published his main work, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, which marked the beginning of modern macroanalysis. J. Keynes substantiated the theory explaining the patterns of movement of the economy as a macro market. He studied the quantitative functional dependencies of the reproduction process, the relationship of such phenomena as capital investments and national income, investment and employment, consumption and savings, price levels, wages, profits and interest. There are three main ideas of J. Keynes.
- 1. Stimulation of aggregate demand (AD). To have a fully developing economy, it is necessary to constantly maintain a certain level AD. Keynes believed that AD was determined by three factors: household consumption, business investment, and government spending.
- 2. The decisive role of investments (J) in the country's economy, they play a big role in achieving economic growth.
- 3. State regulation of the market economy or interventionism.
Thanks to the teachings of John. Keynes, the inability of the neoclassical direction to answer the question about the causes of the Great Depression (1929-1933) and ways to stabilize the economy was revealed. It was one of the deepest global economic crises of the 20th century. Keynesian recipes were put in the basis of economic policy and helped to get the world economy out of the crisis. Since then, two main economic schools have competed in economics - neoclassical and Keynesian with their many branches.
Macroeconomics as a branch of economic theory is a body of knowledge, concepts and ideas that explain the behavior of the economy within the framework of the entire social reproduction. In macroeconomics, the study of the role of the state and methods of state regulation of the economy (GRE) is of particular importance. The object of study of macroeconomics is extremely mobile and is subject to the influence of scientific and technical progress, internal and external factors. It is presented aggregated, i.e. aggregate scores. The identification of patterns and dependencies between these indicators is the subject of interconnected markets in which various economic agents interact - households, firms and the state. The role of the latter is greatly increasing and changing. Relying on state property and the corresponding sector of the economy, the state essentially turns into an aggregate entrepreneur, at the same time performing one of the main functions - state regulation social reproduction. The subject of macroeconomics can be represented by the following problems: employment, gross domestic income, business cycle dynamics, price level, inflation, unemployment, economic growth, world economy. In macroeconomics, a number of concepts are widely used that also define its subject: flows and stocks, investment, savings and wealth, budget deficit and public debt, interest rate, expectations of economic agents, international economic relations. With regard to flows, these are economic variables that can only be measured as turnover per period. These are income from securities, the state budget deficit and other reserves, that is, economic variables measured at a particular point in time. For example: the country's public debt, its gold and foreign exchange reserves, etc.
Macroeconomics is applied in nature, responding to the economic problems of our time. The main method of macroeconomic research is economic and mathematical modeling. Macroeconomic models are formalized descriptions of various socio-economic phenomena and processes in order to identify the relationships and dependencies between them. Since real economic relations in the economy are extremely complex and diverse, contradictory and constantly evolving, modeling is designed to clarify, sometimes in a simplified form, the essence of these phenomena that are under the influence of endogenous (internal) and exogenous (external) factors.
The macroeconomic analysis is based on the simplest model of circular flows or the model of the circulation of the gross national product (GNP), income and expenditure of society. It is considered in a closed economy, where only two economic agents operate - households and firms, and in an open economy, where all economic agents operate. Real and cash flows are carried out without hindrance, provided that the total costs of economic agents are equal to the total volume of production. Aggregate spending boosts employment, output, and income. From the income received, the expenses of economic agents are formed, which are returned from it as income to the owners of production factors. Cause and effect are reversed, and the model takes the form of a circuit. He, in turn, shows that each participant in management simultaneously acts as a seller and a buyer.
Rice. 1.
When characterizing the model, it should be noted that if the total costs that determine the aggregate demand (AD) of economic agents decrease, then this leads to a decrease in employment and output. Therefore, an important task of macroeconomic policy in a market economy is to achieve stabilization of aggregate demand (AD). The circular flow model in an open economy becomes more complicated, since participation in economic activity accepted by all economic agents. The movement of income and expenses is expanding.
Topic 6. Main macroeconomic indicators.
- Macroeconomics as a branch of economic theory
- Structure of the national economy
- Gross domestic product, its forms and methods of measurement
- national wealth, ways to increase it
MACROECONOMICS AS A SECTION OF ECONOMIC THEORY
Macroeconomics, its subject and object of analysis. The goal of economic theory is to study the interaction of people in the process of finding efficient ways to use limited production resources in order to meet the needs of society. Unlike microeconomics, which studies mainly the behavior of an individual economic entity, macroeconomics studies the system as a whole and its most important constituent elements, such as aggregate production, the general price level, goals and problems of economic policy, foreign trade, unemployment, inflation, the functioning of the state sectors, etc.
The most important feature macroeconomics is the use of aggregated parameters. The very concept of "aggregation" is a combination, the summation of homogeneous economic indicators on a certain basis in order to obtain more general values. This approach allows us to consider only four economic entities: the household, the business sector, the public sector and the foreign one. Obviously, each of these economic agents is a set of real subjects.
Household sector includes all private national cells whose activities are related to the satisfaction of their own needs. A distinctive feature of this economic agent is that he acts as a private owner of all factors of production. As a result of investing resources in certain activities, households receive income, which, in the process of its distribution, is divided into consumed and saved parts. Thus, three types of economic activity of this sector of the economy are implemented: firstly, the supply of production factors to the relevant markets; secondly, consumption; thirdly, saving a part of the income received.
Entrepreneurial sector represents a set of all firms registered in the territory of the state. A characteristic feature of this sector is production activity, the purpose of which is to obtain a finished product. To achieve it, and, firstly, all the necessary resources are acquired in the market for factors of production; secondly, the manufactured products are offered in the relevant market; thirdly, for the implementation of the process of reproduction, investment of funds is organized.
Government sector includes all state institutions and institutions. This economic entity is a producer of public goods, which include national defense and the defense industry, education, basic sciences, etc. To implement this kind of benefits, the state is forced to acquire goods produced by the business sector as means of production. Their costs, together with salaries of employees, constitute public expenditure. Their source is taxes that are levied on households and businesses. Government spending also includes payments to both households (pensions and benefits) and the business sector (subsidies). A necessary condition for the functioning of the public sector is the equality of expenditures with incomes. If the former exceed the latter, then you will have to resort to loans to cover the existing deficit. Thus, the economic activity of the state is manifested through government purchases in the market of products, net taxes (the difference between tax revenues and transfer payments) and government loans.
Foreign sector includes all economic entities located abroad in conjunction with foreign state institutions. Its accounting allows you to analyze two types of economic activity - export and import of goods and services and financial transactions.
The aggregation process extends to markets as well. As you know, market economy is a system consisting of four main elements: the market for goods, factors of production, money and securities. On goods market there is a sale and purchase of goods and services, the producer here is the business sector, and the consumers are households, the state and firms. money market characterizes the supply and demand of the national currency, the seller here is the state, and the consumer is the rest of economic agents. Labor market represents a form of movement of labor force, the supply is carried out by households, and all other subjects present a demand for this resource. On the securities market two groups interact: on the one hand, the state and firms, on the other hand, the state, firms and households. All the specified set of markets is aggregated into the concept of "macro-market", the microeconomic concept of the price of a good disappears, and the absolute price level becomes the subject of study and it is changed by the
Methods analysis. A distinctive feature of macroeconomic analysis is modeling, which allows you to explore economic phenomena and processes by building their conditional images. Since the specificity of macroeconomics as a whole excludes the possibility of experimental modeling, theoretical modeling is mainly used. The most important for macroeconomics are three methods: mathematical, 6a lance, static and dynamic modeling.
Math modeling is based on the fact that the main parameters of the economy are commensurable, and establishes qualitative and quantitative dependencies of variables describing the economic process. When building a model, the method of scientific abstraction is used - the most significant relationships between variables are reproduced, and the researcher abstracts from minor ones.
Macroeconomic Models are based on the balance method, since it is assumed that in all markets the equality of income and expenses, production and sales, aggregate demand and aggregate supply is ensured. And although in reality such a balance is practically unattainable, it is the desire for it that allows us to solve the macroeconomic problems of employment, economic growth, inflation, etc.
The models used in macroeconomics can be static or dynamic. Static analyze the economic system in a certain period of time. Dynamic Models based on the initial data, they give a forecast for the development of the economic system. A feature of static modeling is the use of the system of national accounts, which makes it possible to determine the values of macroeconomic parameters for a period in order to obtain information about the results of the functioning of the economy. Dynamic models represent predictive modeling of economic phenomena and processes based on certain theoretical developments.