economic paper

A guideline for the research term paper

1. The content

The research is about a specific industry. The term paper is meant to provide information to an

investor who is considering whether or not to invest in the industry. To this end, the term paper

must include the following items: a brief history of the industry, the major players (firms) in the

industry, the market structure and how the firms compete (on pricing, quantity, quality,

product differentiation, research and development, advertisement, and so on). Is there a clear

leader or a group of leaders? Why are they leaders? If firms have market power, what are the

main reasons for it? Are there barriers to entry? If yes, what give rise to the barriers? Have

there been any merger and acquisition activities in the past ten years or so and how did they

affect the market structure of the industry? Is the industry expanding or contracting? What is

the likely future of the industry, say, ten years from now?

2. Structure

The term paper should be organized into sections. Starting with the introduction section

introducing the research topic – what the main research question or questions are? How are

you going to conduct your research? Why are the questions important? What are the main

findings of the research?

Section 2 should focus on the discussion of the history of the industry – how has it evolved over

time? Who are the major players, and their market shares? What are the major products? How

frequent are new products introduced? Discussing any other important characteristics of the

industry.

Section 3 contains the main analyses. Here you can talk about the market structure and

strategic interactions among firms. Who are the leaders and what do they do to maintain their

position? Is it building barriers to entry? Or is it aggressive pricing or new product introduction?

Or do they resort to other means to be ahead of competitions? What is the role of government

regulations? The main objective here is to explain, in the context of what we learned in class,

why some firms are leaders or dominant firms or more profitable? You should try to collect as

much data as possible for the analyses.

Section 4 concludes the term paper with a summary of the main findings. You can also discuss

the likely future development of the industry here.

At the end of the term paper, you should provide a list of articles, data sources, and any other

documents you have cited or used in your research.

3. Length of the term paper

The term paper should be around 8 to 10 double-spaced pages typed in 12 point font, excluding

the bibliography section.

4. Grading policy

The term paper will be given a grade first. The grade awarded to each group members may or

may not be the same as the overall grade, depending on the evaluation of other group

members as well as the instructor’s evaluation through presentation and talking with students

(if necessary). At the end of the semester, you will be asked to evaluate the contribution of

each group member to the group research and term paper.

5. Presentation

Each group will present their research in class. All members should take part in the presentation,

presenting a part of the project. Please prepare PPT for the presentation and submit it to the

instructor after the presentation. PPT will be graded as part of the presentation.

6. Plagiarism

Your paper will be run through ithenticate to check for plagiarism issues. If plagiarism is

determined to be substantial, all group members will receive zero for the term paper.