Economics exam tips:

Edexcel requires you to:

- Be critical
- Understand the economic concepts and be able to apply them to various situations.
- Understand the theories and ideologies.
- Be able to draw on real-world examples, knowing a few relevant case studies.
- Make connections and links across all the topics in each theme relevant to the exam.

Paper 1: Markets and business behaviour Paper 2: The national and global economy

100 Marks 100 Marks

35% weighting 35% weighting
Two hours Two hours
Theme 1: Theme 2:
1.1 The nature of economics 2.1 Measures of economic performance
1.2 How markets work 2.2 Aggregate demand
1.3 Market failure 2.3 Aggregate supply
1.4 Government intervention 2.4 National income
2.5 Economic growth
2.6 Macroeconomic objectives and policy
Theme 3: Theme 4:
3.1 Business growth 4.1 International economics
3.2 Business objectives 4.2 Poverty and inequality
3,3 Revenues, costs and profit. 4.3 Emerging and developing economies
3.4 Market structures 4.4 The financial sector
3.5 The labour market 4.5 Role of the state in the macroeconomy
3.6 Government intervention

Section A: Includes both multiple-choice questions and short-answer questions. This section tests a
broad spectrum of your microeconomic/macroeconomic knowledge. Questions focus on your
knowledge (A01) and application (AO2), also a few marks available for analysis (AO3).

Section B: Use of real-world examples and provides data for you to analyse articles, graphs, tables,
etc. There is one question which is broken down into sub-questions. This section requires more in-
depth knowledge and the ability to use higher order skills (such as evaluating, comparing and
contrasting, analysing data, etc.). For this section, you should focus on providing not only AO1 and
AO2, but also AO3- and AO4-level answers.

Section C: Provides two questions; you have a choice as to which one you answer. They are open
response questions, which means they require an essay-style answer. These questions are usually in
the form of evaluating a topic or point, or to what extent do you agree with a given statement. This
question will require an AO1 and AO2 response, but do not focus too highly on this level, the
markets will mainly be looking at higher-order skills and AO3- and AO4-level answers.
 Paper 3: Microeconomics and macroeconomics
100 marks
30% weighting
Two hours
Theme 1:
1.1 The nature of economics
1.2 How markets work
1.3 Market failure
1.4 Government intervention

Theme 2:
2.1 Measures of economic performance
2.2 Aggregate demand
2.3 Aggregate supply
2.4 National income
2.5 Economic growth
2.6 Macroeconomic objectives and policy
Theme 3:
3.1 Business growth
3.2 Business objectives
3,3 Revenues, costs and profit.
3.4 Market structures
3.5 The labour market
3.6 Government intervention

Theme 4:
4.1 International economics
4.2 Poverty and inequality
4.3 Emerging and developing economies
4.4 The financial sector
4.5 Role of the state in the macroeconomy

Split into two sections, and answer questions from both. In each section there will be a data-
response question which will be split into sub-sections. Also in each section, there will be two
open-response questions and you can choice which one you answer. Each section begins with a
large amount of data, which you should remember to analyse and refer to in your answers, as
required by each question.

Assessment objectives:
AO1: Knowledge- Identify and explain concepts, theories and models.
AO2: Application- Explain how the concepts work in relation to the situation or example provided.
AO3: Analysis- Inspect and examine the pros and cons of the relevant concepts and the possible
outcome with regards to the situation and example provided.
AO4: Evaluation- Explain the for and against, and weigh up the importance of these pros and cons.
Use the information provided to support your arguments, and give your judgement and decision on
the topic.

Command words:
Examine This kind of question is looking for you to answer, why does the topic of the question
occur?. It will require an informed judgement, which is a chance for you as a student to express
your economically educated opinion, but you will not need to give a decision.

Assess - This kind of question wants you to give both sides of the topic. You will need to consider all
the theories, points and concepts but identify which are most relevant. Provide your judgement, but
not necessarily a decision.

Discuss This question will require you to identify the topic in question, consider and explain all
sides and concepts, then debate the relevance or importance of these ideas. Again, you will need to
make a judgement but a decision is not needed.

Evaluate For this question, you will need to consider the information provided, then debate the
pros and cons of the relevant concepts and the provided data. You should give your judgement and a
decision of the qualities of the topic in question, in all-inclusive conclusion.

How to tackle a question:

- Underline the key words in the question, to focus your mind on the key points and skills the
question is testing.
- Essay-style and long-answer questions will require an answer that is succinct, structured and easy
to read. Therefore, you should plan your answer.

Things to always check before finishing:

- Each axis on your graph is labelled, and labelled correctly.
- Lines/curves on diagrams are labelled, and labelled correctly.
- Micro concepts are kept for micro questions.
- Macro concepts are kept for macro questions.
- Calculations are correct.
- You have answer all the questions you need to answer.