ECF5560

Winter term, 2023

Session 2: Excel skillz

Cost benefit analysis & economic decision making

Dr. Emilia Tjernstrom

1. Data

2. Charts

3. Formulas

1. Data

  1. Document your data sources!
  2. Save raw data 
  3. Link data, don't copy!
  4. Do everything with formulas

How to not hate your past self

2. Charts

The time cost of college

Source:  Babcock, P. and Marks, M., 2011. The falling time cost of college: Evidence from half a century of time use data. Review of Economics and Statistics, 93(2), pp.468-478.

The time cost of college

The time cost of college

  1. Open the sheet called StudyTime
  2. Select the data
  3. Choose a chart type (scatter/line)
  4. Clean up the chart
  • NO smoothed lines
  • NO legend (esp. for a single data series)

The time cost of college

The time cost of college

  1. Open the sheet called StudyTime
  2. Select the data
  3. Choose a chart type (scatter/line)
  4. Clean up the chart
  5. Switch the axes!

=SERIES(legend text, x axis data, y axis data, series number)

Chart checklist

Check for...

  • a descriptive title?

  • well-labelled axes?

  • reasonable axis range?

  • is the legend text correct?

  • is the legend text needed?