Today was held the examination in Economics, the third course which I have taken for my MBA degree. As opposed to the previous exams which had been held in the Exhibition grounds of Tel Aviv, this exam was held in a posh hotel on the sea front. As I understand, this is going to be the new home for all future exams. For me, getting to the location was more problematic than before; in the past, I would take a train to the Tel Aviv University station and walk a few hundred metres. Yesterday, I took a train to an earlier Tel Aviv station, took a bus from there - and had to walk more than a few hundred metres. Coming back, I took a slightly different route which involved less walking.
Obviously the conditions inside the hotel were better than before: both cold and hot drinks were waiting outside the examination room, and there were also adjacent lounges facing the sea, where most of us relaxed for a few minutes before the exam started. But once the exam started, all the external conditions ceased to have any effect as 100% concentration was directed to the exam.
The exam was much harder than I had expected; as part of the preparation process, I had worked on several previous exams, and in the morning even went over once more the two practice exams given in the course's textbook. Maybe it was the familiarity, but none of them were as hard as this one. Our lecturer said that every now and then the exam is very difficult, but with luck we would miss the hard one. Our luck did not hold.
The exam consists of four parts: 30 multiple choice questions (2 marks each), one 'case study', which is normally a numerical exercise in micro-economics (20 marks), one essay on micro-economics (40 marks) and one essay on macro-economics (40 marks). This makes a total of 160 marks and one needs 80 in order to pass.
The multiple choice questions, as usual, were difficult and it's easy to make mistakes. In about half of the questions, there was a statement and four different answers; these are usually not too difficult to answer as normally two of the potential answers are obviously wrong. But this exam added a new wrinkle: there were several questions in which three statements were made, and then one has to choose (for example) whether the first is right, the second and third are right, all are right or all are wrong. My certainty on this type of question was lower.
Unfortunately, we didn't get, in the case study, a nice numerical question about a fishing company and how many people should go fishing every day. No, we had to get a question about a tennis player who endorses watches (why not tennis racquets?); she wants to get a percentage of the selling price whereas the manufacturers wish to maximise their profits. Write an essay explaining the situation - no numerical data provided. I thought that this section would bring an easy 15-20 marks, but instead I had to sweat in order to achieve maybe 15.
The micro-economics essay, as expected, was about economic efficiency and 'marginal efficiency conditions', but instead of linking this to market failures as per usual, it was connected to the labour market. This is a combination which we hadn't come across before, and again, a great deal of mental sweat was necessary.
In the macro-economics question, several data about a nation's economy over two years were presented, along with four statements saying that 'if x and y, then z would be expected'. The question was to explain why z did not happen.
I imagine that I passed the exam, but with a lower mark than I might have otherwise expected. I don't know how anyone else felt about the exam because no one left at the same time as I did, and anyway we are now on holiday - until August. Next up is Project Management, which is a subject which will definitely be useful in my daily life.
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