ECON 244 - The Auto Industry: Economics, Society, Culture

Planned Offering: Spring. Offered when interest is expressed and departmental resources exist.
Credits: 4

Prerequisite: ECON 101 and instructor consent. Additional course fee required, for which the student is responsible after Friday of the 7th week of winter term. This course investigates the automobile industry from an interdisciplinary perspective, including a visit to factories and R&D facilities in Detroit. Why did GM file bankruptcy? Why do we have 600-plus new passenger vehicles available in the US – isn’t such diversity wasteful? How and why has the automobile shifted the rhythm of daily life, including the growth of suburbs and decline of cities? What of safety and the environment – electric vehicles? The course also considers cars themselves, the subject of two Tom Wolfe stories in The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby. Smitka.