This blog is the seventh blog in the “How I got a 50″ series. If you got a 50 in a particular subject and would like to contribute, please email [email protected].

This particular blog features Michael, who scored a 50 in Economics in 2015.

Hey there, and good on you for choosing VCE Economics! A truly rewarding subject, Economics is also really, really competitive (but we all know that perfect competition is the most efficient market structure, right? Ok no more lame jokes, I promise) – so here’s how I got ahead of the game. Q&A style.

How would you describe your approach to studying Economics?

I’m lucky in that I really enjoy economics, meaning that I’m able to spend a lot of my spare time reading on stuff to do with economics, be it news articles, university tutorials or Wikipedia pages. As such, my approach was really inquisitive and immersive, for want of better words – I’d latch onto a concept I wasn’t really familiar with, and spend 1-2 hours looking at all these different explanations and mulling through the logic until I totally got my head around it.

Because of this, I was able to gain a really thorough understanding of the content, that’s stuck in my long-term memory ever since. Rather than cursorily rote-learning definitions and whatnot, I made sure I understood why externalities lead to market failure, or why the transmission mechanisms of monetary policy work as they do. This meant that come exam time, I didn’t have to re-learn any content because it was all there. I had the luxury of being able to spend all my time getting on top of my statistics and budget policies, for that extra edge in the exam (see below – ‘Do I need to know statistics?’).

Another key aspect of my approach was going through stuff with others in my cohort, all the time. Research shows that while retention rates of what you read are somewhere around 5%, you tend to remember 90% of what you teach others. Therefore, rather than fighting amongst ourselves for a higher SAC ranking, we’d all work for the greater good. Before each SAC, we’d quiz each other, and explain things if someone needed help. This really helped with my understanding of economics.

All in all, I really think that you can’t rote learn your way to success in Economics. There is simply too much raw content to store and regurgitate. But if you really understand what you’re learning, then you’re set.

How many hours did you study each night?

Not a lot, if you’re asking about literal and direct study for VCE Economics itself. However, as above, I spent a lot of time getting to understand Economics as a general interest. I was also lucky in that I did Extension Economics (first-year level) at the University of Melbourne, which gave me another 3 hours per week of formal economics education, as well as an opportunity to investigate economic models quite deeply for assignments.

What do you think it was that got you ahead of everyone else?

Ultimately, I think my natural curiosity for things played a huge part. Economics is a subject where it’s good to be curious, because there’s always something more to learn, and the more you learn, the further ahead you are in the pack. The VCE Economics study design is a pretty limited – and cursory – drop on the surface of the secondary that is Economics, so to speak. For me, getting to know only what the study design asked for wasn’t enough. It only left unanswered questions, which I’m still getting to the bottom of. While one year is nowhere near enough time to know everything about economics, constantly asking questions and getting to understand things at a higher level is a sure way to get ahead in VCE Economics.

I know I’ve harped on this idea of understanding things a lot by now, but I definitely believe that understanding economics is absolutely vital to doing well in it.

Were you always gunning for that 50, or did it come as a nice surprise?

Both. Economics is a great passion of mine, so I really wanted to make it show in VCE. 50 was my aim in the subject. But overshadowing this was a huge feeling of self-doubt that lingered from my Unit 1/2 days, all the way up to results day. This was largely due to me knowing how competitive VCE Economics is, and moreover not knowing anyone from my school, or outside of school for that matter, who had gotten a 50 in the subject. So there was no real personal inspiration to model myself on, or to seek help from, unlike Revs the year before (PS – I’ll be writing a Revs blog soon. For those of you awesome enough to do both Eco and Revs – stay posted!).

During the exam period, I was never really sure whether the way I wrote things would be consistent with the marks I wanted to get. Come results day though, and I realised that doing well in Economics is all about showing that you understand your stuff. With the help of my uni course, I was able to slip in the odd comment linking market failure to deadweight loss here and there, which gave me the edge that got me where it did. At the time, I thought I may have neglected VCE particularities in my responses – the assessors report sample responses can be pretty demoralising. But again, if you understand your stuff, and answer the questions accurately and comprehensively, you should be fine.

Did you ever get stuck on any concepts?

Yes – Economics isn’t an easy subject, and there will always be room for questions. But, as I said before, when I did I get stuck, I’d pursue the issue until I got my head around it. Getting stuck can definitely be demoralising, but the key is to keep persisting.

If I needed clarification on anything, I’d ask my teacher. Your teacher is there to help you, so don’t be shy! Even if you still don’t get how the asset prices channel works after the fourth time it’s been explained to you, keep asking. Your teacher will want to help you, because what good does their student being in the dark do for them at the end of the year?

If your teacher’s way of explaining things is still unhelpful, and you can’t find anything particularly useful online, ask around or consider getting a tutor. It might be that you need a concept explained from another angle, for it to click. Whatever you do though, don’t sweep what seems too hard under the rug, especially if you want to do well. Where there’s a will, there’s a way.

Did you have a writing scaffold / a formula for your responses?

Sort of. VCE Economics is a tad annoying in that the mark allocation isn’t explicitly laid out. So most of the time, you have to make an educated guess about how that 4-marker will be assessed. As the number of marks increase, this ambiguity becomes more prevalent. By the time you get to questions worth 5 marks and above, the assessment starts becoming a tad subjective – meaning that the assessor will start making personal judgements about whether your response is a 5-mark quality response, alongside assessing it against a mark allocation.

In general, for questions that were worth 2 or more marks, I gave a definition if an economic term or concept was raised. Often, there is a mark allocated to this definition, even if it isn’t explicitly asked for in the question. Then, I would try and answer the question as directly and comprehensively as I could, making sure I didn’t miss anything but also fitting the length of my response to what was appropriate for the number of marks.

For example, I might have responded to the following question this way:

  1. a) Explain how the Australian Government may intervene to correct the market failure of negative externalities (5 marks)

A negative externality is a cost of a transaction, production or consumption that is unpriced (not accounted for in the market price), and affects a third party who is not involved in the transaction and is not compensated. For example, the emission of atmospheric pollutants by coal-fired power stations creates a cost on society by contributing to climate change and reducing air quality, yet it is not accounted for in the costs of generating coal-powered electricity. This is a market failure, or an inefficient allocation of resources by the free market, as the failure to account for the external cost (externality) results in overproduction of coal-fired electricity above the efficient level. To correct this, the government may levy a tax on producers of coal-fired electricity so that the external cost (i.e. the externality) is factored into the costs of production. With higher costs of production, meaning a reduction in profits, producers should lower output, leading to a decrease in supply and decrease in the quantity of coal-fired electricity produced to an efficient level. Hence, through taxation, the government may correct the market failure of negative externalities.

I found it helpful to overwrite for my responses and give slightly more than what the number of marks suggested, especially for larger questions where the mark allocation became more ambiguous. You shouldn’t be penalised for giving extra information beyond what is required (unless what you’ve said is incorrect), so it doesn’t hurt to write on the safe side. That said, according to the examiner’s report, many students overwrote early on in the paper and didn’t finish their exam, which is really tragic. So make sure that you don’t overwrite at the expense of finishing!

Another thing: you ‘should’ avoid using absolute verbs in your responses. Assessors like seeing this, because it’s more accurate. There’s no guarantee that a lower cash rate WILL increase aggregate demand. It’s just theory, which SHOULD play out in the real world, but doesn’t have to.

What about multiple choice?

Practice, practice, practice. Each lesson, our teacher would start by giving us a sheet of 15 multis – which I’m now really thankful for. As you probably know, multis are worth two marks each in the exam, meaning that you can’t afford to drop too many. So, by the end of the year, we were all aiming for 15/15.

Practice multis are another really great way of studying, because they really help you to hone in on particularities. There’s always that question where you’ve eliminated A and C, but just can’t decide between B and D. And, when you get it wrong, you investigate why it was D and not B. More than once, there’d be a question that split our whole class, and we’d debate the answer for about 5 minutes. At the end of the process, we’d all wind up with a much clearer understanding about that the question was asking, and about the precise little qualification that made B less correct than D.

If you do end up with two really similar answers, go with the most correct one. Even though you might be able to make a case for the other answer, multi choice is ultimately about choosing the best answer.

For example:

Which of the following is most likely to lead to a decrease in the target cash rate by the RBA?

  1. An increase in inventories

  2. An increase in the size of the budget deficit

  3. An increase in the Gini Coefficient

  4. An appreciation of the Australian Dollar

While you could make a case for b, c or d (I deliberately made this a tough question), a would be the most direct reason for the RBA to adopt a more expansionary monetary policy. An increase in inventories* is the direct result of weakened AD growth, which would warrant a lower cash rate target to stimulate AD. With the others, you’d be drawing a longer bow. As there is only one ‘best’ answer for you to choose, you should pick A.

*Inventories = unsold stock. Less spending = more unsold stock, given constant levels of production. It’s technically not in the study design, but VCAA have asked about inventories in multi choice before, so be on your toes. This is also where knowing more doesn’t hurt.

Do I need to know statistics?

This is an interesting question, and one which I honestly didn’t know the answer to for most of the year. Every VCE economics study aid, lecturer, teacher or whatnot will say that you need to know statistics. This is true – sort of. The study design requires you to know economic trends spanning the last four years (two as of next year, with the new study design). However, most past questions in this area – if not all – have been worded in a way that lets you answer them in general terms.

However, this does not falsify what the experts of VCE Economics have been saying. Firstly, you will need to know aspects of the Budget, including specific information. Your exam will probably have a question that is worded something along these lines:

‘Outline how one aggregate supply policy from the 2015/16 budget is designed to ensure long-term economic prosperity’ (4 marks)

One mark will be for specific information about the policy – including statistics. For the above question, I would have started by saying:

One aggregate supply policy from the 2015/16 budget is the $5.5bn ‘Growing Jobs and Small Business’ package, which includes a reduction in the company tax rate from 30% to 28.5% for businesses whose annual turnover is less than $2mn/year.

So, knowing your statistics about the budget is important if you want to score the marks for this section.

With other economics statistics, it’s a bit more ambiguous. I reckon that it’s helpful to drop them in passing as you answer questions about recent economic trends, to improve the quality of your response, which might get you that final mark – especially for larger questions. However, it’s theoretically possible to score high marks without statistics – they just give the extra edge on your responses. If you’re aiming for top marks, I’d recommend being on top of your stats. But I’d also prioritise other aspects of the course first.

For me, as I said earlier, I focused a lot on statistics in the final weeks. But that was only because I felt on top of everything else, and had the luxury of doing so. Statistics are probably the only part of the course you will need to rote-learn, because let’s face it: without getting too deep here, what real meaning does the number $321.20 or $177.3 million really have in itself that you can attach to? Because of this, my final ‘notes’ for economics was essentially a stat sheet – the rest of it was in my head.

TL;DR – In summary, you should know your stats if you’re aiming for top marks – especially the ones to do with the budget. However, other stuff, like the basic ideas, come first. If you’re a bit overwhelmed, don’t make every last statistic your priority, because the likelihood is that you may get away without it.

Any other advice you’d give to anyone looking to do well?

Don’t give up. Economics is a big subject, and if you’re stuck on something it can feel really overwhelming. I know, because I’ve been through the pain of just not being able to get my head around that one thing so many times. But while you may think that you are wasting your time, you really aren’t. By looking for the answer through all these different avenues, you’re not only immersing yourself in economics and embedding your understanding of it, you’re also building up invaluable critical thinking skills which are the core bedrock of economics. At the end of the day, economics is predicated entirely on logic, so exercising the logics of your thinking makes you, well, an economist.

In terms of staying motivated – and this is linked to what I just said – I find that it’s really helpful to reflect on what you’ve achieved, even if it isn’t tangible. I’m a pretty idealistic guy, often against my better judgement, meaning that I often set pretty ambitious goals. For example, I’d tell myself that I’d finish the weekly questions set in class by Tuesday, so that Wednesday onwards can be used for other things. But somewhere in the questions, I’d get stuck on a concept, and lose an hour to thinking and trying to get my head around it. And so by bedtime on Tuesday, I might only be 1/3 of the way through my questions, which can be pretty demoralising. It can leave me feeling like I’ve underachieved and wasted my time. But, if I focus on all the knowledge I have gained in thinking through and getting to the bottom of that annoying concept – if I focus on what I’ve learned – I’m consoled that I’ve achieved something.

Finally, don’t work against your peers. Yes, VCE is competitive, and your SACs amount to a ranking – but don’t let the competition fool you! Helping your cohort helps you in three ways:

– A stronger cohort at the end of the year means more favourable statistical moderation (SAC scores being pulled up), and higher study scores for all;

– Helping others is the best way to learn yourself, especially in Economics where understanding the content is important;

– You’ll be a better person in general, and win friends rather than enemies. Remember, life isn’t all about VCE.

If you ever need any help, and want to talk to someone you haven’t already talked to, feel free to shoot me a message! I’m on ATAR Notes – my username is michaelxing – and you can email me at [email protected]. Or, you can find me on Facebook!

All the best with your studies!