For an economics teacher, sure. I'll give him that - his lectures are clear and concise. But when you're going into this class, don't bring your hopes up. UCLA Economics requires you to do a lot of self study and understand the material by yourself.

The "best" teacher I ever had is Ravetch. This guy does not belong in this league of teachers. When you mumble and recite from memory an insurmountable amount of information, I am not impressed. This guy is NOT as good as everyone else says he is.

Do not buy the lecture notes, take your own notes. You need all the help you can get internalizing the theory.

Short answer is not tough, but multiple choice questions (answer choices a-k) are pretty ridiculous sometimes.

Overall, it really doesn't matter what professor you take for any economics class, as it's going to be ridiculous and BS anyway.

- Despite this class being extremely tough, McDevitt is a very good lecturer and explains every concept very well. His style of teaching is whiteboard rather than slides, which IMO allowed me to follow along better and take better notes. He also provided notes which he followed in lectures and although they were kind of messy and confusing to follow, if you can deconstruct it, use it to study and for the exams.
- Exams make up 100% of the grade with two midterms and a final (25%, 30%, 55%) so there are no other graded assignments. Exams are multiple choice, true/false, with a couple FRQs, however, the multiple choice sometimes have choices A-G with only one right answer, but his recommendation was to treat them as a FRQ which sorta worked for me. Exams are open note/book which helped a lot especially because there was so much we needed to know, but for the midterms there is a huge time constraint so don't depend on them. I bombed the first exam, but got better with second and final which boosted my grade.
My advice to study for the exams:
- Go to lecture and then rewatch it (you don't even have to show up in person, but just watch it twice). He does record his lectures, and again he explained concepts very well, but I found it impossible to grasp onto the concepts after watching the lecture for the first time especially when I'm more focused on taking notes so all the understanding came while rewatching the lecture. And I rewatched it in 1.5 speed, plus he cuts his lecture short sometimes and it's really not that bad. Also, everything he tests us on he would teach in his lectures, he would sometimes also let us know exactly what would be on the exam so we can study for.
- Deconstruct his notes and make cheat sheets. His notes are very confusingly formatted and all over the place, but if you are able to deconstruct them they explain some of the concepts very well and very useful for exams.
- Do the study question and practice exam questions and understand them.
- Go to office hours, around exam times, he opens up more office hours at different dates and times to accommodate anyone that needs it.

Overall, this class wasn't easy but McDevitt is a very good lecturer (probably one of the best in the Econ dept.) and gave everything we need to know for exams.

- UCLA Economics is notoriously theory-heavy, and no class demonstrates this better than Econ 102 with Professor McDevitt. Some of the high-level ideas are interesting and relate well to general economic thinking, but all of the models are extremely simple (relative to the complex nature of national economies), full of what I call "voodoo math" (basically math in econ classes that is there just for the sake of being there), and ripe with key assumptions that are never true in the real world (such as prices being fixed in the short term). It's a true shame that we have to take classes like these that are a complete waste of students' time and mental energy.
- There are three exams that make up your entire grade (20% Midterm 1, 25% Midterm 2, 55% Final) and all exams are open-note (I slaughtered a small forest with the amount of notes I had for the final). There are a few free response questions, which are usually just variations of examples in lecture (just print out the lecture notes, and you'll be fine). The multiple choice have usually ~9 options that you can pick from, and the last 4 options are "Choose this one if you think 2 of the above are right", "Choose this one if you think 3 of the above are right", and "Choose this one if you think none of the above are right". Those tripped me up, as I usually was one the fence about one statement, and that determined which of the last 4 answers I chose.
- Lectures are boring, but a good introduction to the material. I stopped going to lecture after the second midterm and my final exam grade definitely reflected this. It is hard to focus (especially if the class is 3:30-4:45 pm, as ours was), and I was usually dozing off after 30 minutes.
- My strategy for the final was to not learn the material, but to print out all the practice questions and remember the questions, not the answers. Then, during the final, I would read the question and simply flip through my notes to see the similar question I had already printed out, and map that response to the question on the final. This worked remarkably well (especially considering I did not understand any of the material but rather just copied graphs) and honestly a strategy I highly recommend if you don't care enough to understand the useless material and your GPA could take the hit (I was at a 3.9 before this quarter and am now at a 3.8). My sanity was more important than my grade, and I'm so happy with my decision to prioritize a social life and better grades in my other classes than grinding on the pointless material of this class that would've been forgotten immediately after the final anyway.
- Overall, I'm very happy with my grade. I simply wanted to pass the class and did the bare minimum of studying to do well on the exams and not have to retake it. The curve was very generous and McDevitt was helpful with lots of office hours, though the nature of the material made the entire class boring, useless, and a complete waste of time. I learned more about macroeconomics in my high school AP Macroeconomics class and reading The Wealth of Nations than in this entire course.
- Good luck! Make sure you bring a pillow to lecture, as you're sure to fall asleep within the hour. :)

Tests make up 100% of the grade. Multiple choice, a-j in some cases, multiple may be true/false. No graded assignments. Teaching was mediocre and lack of graded assignments reeks of laziness or department being cheap. Because of how the "multiple choice" questions are designed and extreme time constraint on exams, your curved grade is a random number generator between 50 and 100. Lectures were also boring, essentially a read aloud of his posted notes. Overall, not engaging, boring, lazy teaching and would not recommend over watching YouTube on Macroeconomics.

He was a nice guy and all but his class honestly was something else. 2 Midterms and a final was your entire grade. The avg our first midterm was like a 60 and the second was a 75, and for these he will say that it is MC/Essay but the MC's are honestly the hardest part of the whole thing. The options basically go from a-g so take that as you will.

Pretty chill if you actually make sure to watch the lectures & take good notes. His exams allow a cheat sheet but you're really pressed for time on the midterms. His multiple choice isn't actually multiple choice so it's misleading and takes a lot longer than expected. Overall, I'd recommend taking this class with McDevitt but make sure not to lag on lectures

This class was not as hard as other professors make it seem. I did bad on the midterm (a mistake) but was able to do very well on the final which then got me a c+. His notes are very useful especially for exams. I would recommend him!

Professor Mcdevitt is a very nice and personable individual. He responded quickly to most of my emails, and was very helpful during office hours. He also holds extra office hours around midterms and final, which I heard were pretty helpful, though I did not attend.

As far as his class goes, it is a pretty standard econ class. Lots of graphs and note taking. The class is about an hour and fifteen minutes and professor mcdevitt knows how to use every last minute of it (not sure if that was always a good thing haha). Like most of the econ classes I have taken, the subject matter is kind of boring, but nevertheless, it is not too hard to grasp. I highly recommend buying his course reader as it is cheap ($15 dollars I think), very well organized, and great for using if you decide to miss any classes. I will be honest, I missed a lot of classes because I overslept, but i still felt prepared for his exams because I just memorized what was in the course reader. That being said, don't be one of those people that just stares at the course reader the whole class. It won't do a lot for you. I would highly recommend taking your own notes. It is great practice.

As far as the discussion sections go, like any econ major would know, you really do not have to attend. The TA just repeats what was said in class.

Umm, what else can I add? Oh yah, the important stuff lol! In this class, there are two midterms and a cumulative final. I know people love to complain on bruinwalk how crazy his mc questions are, but they really are not that bad. If you know the answer, you know the answer. If you don't know the answer, you don't know the answer. And his free response questions are pretty standard. I always found those a little bit easier than his mc questions. No curve balls there. As far as the curve goes, its not the most generous curve in the world, but its definitely fair. The bottom line is, just know ALL the notes before the exam and pace yourself and you will do fine. Good luck.

McDevitt is awesome for the fact that he does not use powerpoint slides in his class. He hand writes his notes on the board which makes it much more personable and easier to understand when he demonstrates the concepts/theories directly.

His exams are indeed rather insane. The multiple choice questions have choices a-j !!! He does test on the material he teaches though! memorize your notes/graphs, do the study questions, and you'll be fine.

There are no trick questions on his exams.

very discouraging professor. I give 1/10 overall rating.