Econ Caveats
I know. I shouldn't rag on econ. It is extremely complicated at higher levels—like everything else. But I can't help it. Problems for intermediate micro- and macro-economics involve manipulating a pair of equations. How trivial compared to the massive systems I've had to deal with in my integrated circuits classes.
Today's midterms did little to sway my thoughts. The Econ 100B midterm was a 25-question, multiple-choice exam. Not even a hard multiple-choice exam like the CS 61B monster 3 years ago (a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j). There were questions that could have been correctly answered without even using economics. One of them provided this year's capital and some parameters and asked for next year's capital and the capital growth rate. Only one of the answers had a value and growth rate that matched! The Econ 100A midterm wasn't as unbelievably easy, but it still posed little challenge.
The day's observation is the majors of the early finishers. In Econ 100B, at least two of the first three to finish the test were EECS majors (Jay and I). In Econ 100A, at least four of the first five to finish the test were EECS majors (Mehdi, this guy that showed up for tutoring but I don't know his name, Chris, and I). Don't read into that too much. EECS majors just know how to handle equations.