Economics 499
Dr. Reed Olsen
Spring 1999
Assignment 6
The purpose of assignment 6 is to
write a summary report on a specific industry. You should
prepare and write your summary report following the outline that
we discussed in class and that is presented in chapter 6 of the
textbook. You should do the following:
- I will pass around a sign-up
sheet. Select one of the following industries and put
your name down with the industry on the sign-up sheet. Only
one person may sign-up for each specific industry. If
you wish to do a summary report on an industry that is
not listed, you may do so provided you first get
permission from the instructor. The industries include:
Automotive,
housing/construction, entertainment, pharmaceutical,
computers, airlines, telecommunications, education, banking,
health care, and agriculture.
- Collect current/historical
information about the industry. You can search on-line to
locate articles published about the industry in the past
few years (op-ed articles from the Wall Street Journal
and similar publications would be especially useful.)
Additional information can be found in the U.S.
Industrial Outlook, the Statistical Abstract, the Survey
of Current Business, plus a number of other useful
sources, many of them on-line.
- Follow the 7-step procedure
discussed in class to do the summary report, paying
particular attention to organization. Recall that
you want to be able to tell a story about the industry
via your summary report. The story you tell will depend
upon the information you collect and the organization.
Organizing diverse information in a meaningful way,
telling a story, is the critical aspect of a
summary report.
- You should be prepared to
turn in a 1,000 word, approximately 4 typed pages,
report. You must follow the organization we discussed in
class and presented in Exhibit 6-2 in the text. You may
use tables of data, where appropriate. Remember to
provide sources for all data presented in your summary
article. (You cannot simply photocopy tables from other
sources, but must construct your own tables.)
The Assignment is due in class,
Wednesday, March 24th.
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