Professor Harrigan is an expert in the field of Economic Inequality and it shows. This class is very difficult, but each week you learn a lot of really interesting material. Harrigan does a great job of keeping the focus on economics and away political opinions/judgements about inequality. There are weekly HW problem sets that takes about 2-3 hours, 3 midterms, and 1 Final Paper. Overall, one of my top 3 courses ever taken at the university in terms of engaging material and amount learned. Everyone who's an Econ major should take this class before they graduate. Only danger is the final paper. It is graded ridiculously hard.

This course is great. As the subject matter is obviously controversial, it is easy to stay engaged throughout the semester. Harrigan is one of my favorite Econ professors I've had at UVA - very sharp, nerdy without being geeky, and a straightforward lecturer. While there are obvious political dimensions to the subject matter, Harrigan does a great job of staying rather objective and scientific. This course is an honest exploration into a controversial area of economics. The subject matter is pretty well balanced between being quantitative and qualitative. The course is split into three units: measurement; theory; and policy. Each unit is concluded with an exam, for which Harrigan allows you to bring in a two-sided cheat sheet. None of the exams were particularly difficult. In fact, Harrigan always complained that the class was exceeding his expectations on exams. The course also requires a final research paper, which entails original data collection and analysis. The paper is not too difficult, as you spend the entire semester reading the sort of academic papers that you are supposed to imitate, and Harrigan essentially holds your hand most of the way. You can choose to complete the paper with a partner. This also applies to the homework assignments. These homework assignments were due about every week or two, and usually involved a combination of algebraic and STATA calculations. This course is a good opportunity to build STATA skills after 3720. As for the TA, Yubo is probably the best Econ TA I've had at UVA. He is very smart, very helpful, good at making himself available to students, and he does not grade too harshly. Overall, this is an interesting and fun course. The professor is great, the TA is great, and the work is both challenging and rewarding. Highly recommended!