Economics General Senior Syllabus 2025 v1.4 (for completion in 2026 or later)
The three internal assessments contribute 75% and the QCAA external examination contributes 25%. The 2026 external specification covers Unit 4 Topic 1 and Topic 3, with 15 minutes planning and 120 minutes working time. It may include multiple choice, short and extended responses, calculations, diagrams and unseen stimulus. Unit 3 remains part of the course and internal assessment; it is not within the specified 2026 external content. Historical paper totals and topic patterns do not define the current examination.
Past papers on this subject span more than one syllabus. Papers written under an older one still work as practice, but the units and topics they test have changed — the index labels every paper with the syllabus it was set under.
Economics 2019 syllabus · 2020–2025Economics 2025 syllabus (v1.4) · 2026–present
The units and topics, one by one
Each area below lists the concepts named in the syllabus, what the QCAA exam asks of them, and the mistake that most often costs marks.
- Unit 3: International economics (course and internal assessment)
- Unit 4: Contemporary macroeconomics (EA: Topics 1 and 3)
- Unit 1: Markets and models (foundational — IA only, not EA-examinable)
- Unit 2: Modified markets (foundational — IA only, not EA-examinable)
Area 1 of 4
Unit 3: International economics (course and internal assessment)
Unit 3 covers Australia's economic relationship with the rest of the world. It opens on the global economy — patterns of trade, absolute and comparative advantage, and the terms of trade, which for Australia swing on commodity prices. Trade liberalisation and protection follow: tariffs, quotas and subsidies, who gains and who loses under each, and the role of free trade agreements. Exchange rates are the analytical core — how a floating rate is determined by demand for and supply of the currency, how that differs from a fixed system, and which factors move the Australian dollar, from interest rate differentials to commodity prices and capital flows. The unit closes on the balance of payments, separating the current account from the capital and financial account and testing whether a persistent deficit is sustainable, plus globalisation and international development issues.
What the exam asks
Unit 3 is part of the course and internal assessment. The 2026 external examination instead specifies Unit 4 Topic 1 and Topic 3. Revise international economics for its course purpose and as relevant background; do not treat every Unit 3 archive question as current external scope.
Where marks go missing
Stopping at the first-round effect of a currency movement. A depreciation does not simply help exporters — the answer has to follow the chain through import prices, inflation, the current account and the lag before volumes respond, which is where the analysis marks sit.
Area 2 of 4
Unit 4: Contemporary macroeconomics (EA: Topics 1 and 3)
Unit 4 turns inward to the management of the Australian economy. It opens with measurement: GDP, the unemployment rate and its limitations, inflation and the consumer price index, and the phases of the economic cycle. The aggregate demand and aggregate supply model is the workhorse, used in both short-run and long-run form to explain output, employment and the price level. Against that model sit the domestic macroeconomic objectives — full employment, price stability, external stability and sustainable growth — and the conflicts between them. Fiscal policy covers the budget, government spending and taxation, and the difference between automatic stabilisers and discretionary measures. Monetary policy covers the Reserve Bank's cash rate decision and the transmission mechanism reaching spending, investment and the exchange rate. Contemporary issues and policy trade-offs close the unit. The current syllabus explicitly includes average propensities to consume and save and structural deficit.
What the exam asks
External assessment specifies Topic 1, Macroeconomic objectives and theory, and Topic 3, Economic management. Topic 2, Economic indicators and past budget stances, supports IA3 with Topic 1. Use the current syllabus to distinguish these assessment purposes rather than labelling all Unit 4 content as externally examinable.
Where marks go missing
Drawing an aggregate demand and supply diagram and never referring to it. Marks require the shift named, the new equilibrium identified, and the change in output and price level stated in the written answer — an unexplained diagram counts as decoration.
Area 3 of 4
Unit 1: Markets and models (foundational — IA only, not EA-examinable)
Unit 1 is the Year 11 foundation. It is not examinable in the external assessment, but it supplies the machinery the Year 12 units run on. It begins with the basic economic problem — scarcity, choice and opportunity cost — and the models economists use to represent it: the circular flow of income, which returns in Unit 4 underpinning aggregate demand, and the production possibility curve. Demand and supply are then developed properly, covering the determinants of each, the price mechanism as a signalling and rationing device, and how market equilibrium is reached and restored after a shock. Elasticity closes the unit, and it is the concept that most often decides later answers: who actually bears a tax, who benefits from a subsidy, and how sharply quantities respond to a price change.
What the syllabus lists under this area · 4 points
- The basic economic problem — scarcity, choice, opportunity cost
- Economic models — circular flow of income, production possibility curve
- Demand, supply and the price mechanism
- Market equilibrium and elasticity
What the exam asks
Unit 1 is assessed only within the school, typically by an examination and a data-response task. What matters afterwards is fluency: accurate, fully labelled demand and supply diagrams, correct handling of a shift versus a movement along a curve, and elasticity reasoning — all assumed knowledge in the Unit 3 and Unit 4 external questions.
Where marks go missing
Confusing a shift of a curve with a movement along it. A change in the good's own price moves you along the curve; anything else shifts it. The error carries straight into Unit 3 exchange rate diagrams and Unit 4 macroeconomic answers, where it costs external marks.
Area 4 of 4
Unit 2: Modified markets (foundational — IA only, not EA-examinable)
Unit 2 examines markets that do not deliver efficient outcomes on their own. It compares market structures and the degree of competition within them, from many small price-taking firms through to concentrated markets with real pricing power. Market failure is the central idea: negative and positive externalities, where private costs and benefits diverge from social ones; public goods, which are non-rival and non-excludable and therefore undersupplied; and information failure, where one side of a transaction cannot judge what it is trading. Government intervention follows — taxation, subsidies, regulation, direct provision and tradeable permits — each evaluated on how well it corrects the failure and what it costs. Labour markets close the unit, applying demand and supply to wages and employment alongside the institutions that modify that outcome.
What the syllabus lists under this area · 4 points
- Market structures and competition
- Market failure — externalities, public goods, information failure
- Government intervention in markets
- Labour markets
What the exam asks
Unit 2 is internally assessed only. School tasks usually require you to identify a market failure in a real case, illustrate it with an externality or welfare diagram, and evaluate an intervention. The evaluative habit built here — costs, benefits and who bears them — is exactly what the Unit 4 external policy questions demand.
Where marks go missing
Labelling every unwanted outcome a market failure. A failure needs its mechanism named — the external cost, the missing information, the non-excludability — and shown as a divergence between private and social outcomes, or the evaluation has nothing concrete to correct.