Hi all
I'll be starting an advanced microeconomics course next semester using
the Microeconomic theory book by Andreu Mas-Colell

I want to brush up on the math needed to do this course, however I
have no clue what topics in math (or where to find them) are needed
for this course.
(I havent recieved the the textbook yet either, I have completed
calculus courses previously, so im familliar with calc)

So if anyone who has done a similar course can provide me the topics
of math to study and possible links to examples or lessons on the web,
i would be most appreciative!!!!

Thanks!

Hi Buddy80, 

I see from a previous question of yours that you are a third year econ
student.  I hope it's going well for you.

Advanced Micro is a difficult course, there's no denying it.  In the
econ program I was in it was considered to be the hardest course in
the degree.  It's not really an issue of the difficulty of the math,
but more one of figuring out how to apply it to the models you know
already.

While I'm not familiar with that particular text I have briefly looked
through the table of contents and a few of the pages and it looks
quite similar to the one I used.  You shouldn't encounter anything
more than what you would know from a couple of basic calculus courses,
and maybe some linear algebra would be useful.  A large part of the
course will involve constrained optimizations using Lagrangians, so
you may want to brush up on that.  Once you have the hang of them it's
really quite easy.  You will probably also do some analysis of risk
and uncertainty but this shouldn't require anything more than you
already know.

There are some comments specific to this book at Amazon.com here:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0195073401/ref=pd_cart_beg/searchengin07-20/103-2772523-6923848?v=glance&hmac=eYlZmASL/Ay+b3V4uTuOxIwQM98=&dev-t=D3640U3GS53SRF
that basically agree with my view that the math you need isn't hard. 
There is a huge amount of math in the course, so it's not easy, but
it's really the application part that's hardest, not the math itself. 
I took the course with a group of math majors and they had a hard time
because they couldn't figure out how to apply the math to the
problems.  Once the problems were laid out for them they breezed
through them.

I wish you the best of luck with the course.  I hope you have an
easier time of things than I did!

Hibiscus

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Request for Answer Clarification by buddy80-ga on 14 Dec 2003 09:58 PST

okay so it would be

multivariate calculus 
is this what i should know for multivariable calc?
http://www.math.gatech.edu/~cain/notes/calculus.html
im looking for a bit more of an explanation since its a big subject

linear algebra 
set theory 
Kuhn-Tucker theorem

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Clarification of Answer by hibiscus-ga on 14 Dec 2003 15:43 PST

The things you need for Advanced Micro are nothing like as complicated
as what are listed on the link you provided.  Basically you need to
know differentiation, both full and partial, optimization, and maybe
some simple integration.  You are unlikely to need more than that.  If
you've done first year calculus you won't have any trouble.

As I say, the one thing that may be new to you are constrained
optimizations using Lagrangians.  If you've taken a Math Econ course
you're probably familiar with this already, but a brief explanation
can be found here: http://www.ex.ac.uk/~dgbalken/micro/imen8.pdf

I hope this helps you out.

Hibiscus