Assignment Guidelines and Grading Rubric for Data Exercise and Short Essay 3

Data Exercise 3

In Data Exercise 3, you will collect data and provide an analysis of one or both of the components of the money supply, which are M1 (currency in circulation, the value of checking account deposits at banks, and the value of traveler’s checks) and M2 (M1, savings account balances, small-denomination time deposits, balances in money market deposit accounts, and non-institutional money market fund shares). Your study may focus on either or both of these components for theUnited States at as granular a level as you see fit and for any 10-year period of time that you choose. Therefore, your research will lead to a time series (one country over time) analysis of the data.

To gather data, begin with Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System Economic Research & Data . If you follow the links under Money Stock and Reserve Balances > Money Stock Measures – H.6 > Historical Data, you will find the Monthly Historical Money Stock Tables from which you will pull data for this exercise.

You will present your findings in no less than five paragraphs and no more than two double-spaced pages using Times New Roman font with one-inch margins. Your paper should have a title page (not included in the page count), an introduction, a body, a conclusion, a references page (not included in the page count), and an appendix (also not included in the page count); and should be formatted as follows:

• Title Page – Provide a title for your research. Your name and the assignment name must be included in your research.

• Introduction – Explain the variable of interest and the type of analysis chosen (either time-series or cross-sectional. Explain the importance of the presented data and analysis. This section should be very brief (about a paragraph to a half a page).

• Body – The body of the paper should be about three paragraphs to one page in length.

• Data – Provide a description of the data. Are there any trends? Does the data show much variation across time or across countries? Specifically, this section of the paper provides a description of what is believed to be happening in the data. How does the variable of interest behave over time? How does the variable of interest compare across countries?

• Analysis – Provide an analysis of the data. This should be the meat of the paper. What did you expect to see? Does what you observe greatly differ from what was expected? Provide explanation for any trends or for any variation in a variable over time and/or across countries. Specifically, this section of the paper provides explanation for why you believe the data looks the way it does. What is believed to be the reason why the data behaves as it does? You should use additional resources to gain insight into the behavior of the variable for the chosen country or countries. Are there any historical social or political events that may be related to the trend in the economic data?

• Conclusion – Recap the importance of the presented data and analysis. This section should be brief (about a paragraph to a half a page).

• References – You must include two references in addition to your data source and/or the textbook for this course. At least one in-text citation must be appropriately incorporated in the paper. You must properly list all references on the references page according to the APA style format.

• Appendix – You must include an appropriately labeled graph of the data presented in the appendix of the paper.

Grading Rubric

Data Exercise 3 is worth 5% of your final grade. The grading scale for this assignment, based on 100 points, is as follows:

Grading Criteria

The criteria graded fall into the categories of format, content, and quality and are weighted as follows:

Originality and Authenticity

If the essay is identified as not being original or not being the work of the student submitting it, the instructor has the right to grade the assignment with the grade of F and to pursue further punitive response by the school. Please see UMUC’s Policy on Academic Dishonesty and Plagiarism.