I would not recommend taking this class with Liao, mainly because of the grade scheme. His lectures are useless to go to, so just focus on the homework, the discussion, and the slides he posts. The final is either 100% of your grade or 70% (if you do better on the final the midterm is dropped) and as mentioned the grading is purely competitive. Our final average was a 63% or so, and an 80% got me an A- (my midterm was dropped). I think if you spend a lot of time on the practice exams you will be fine, but if you want to save yourself the stress try and take someone else.

i would say liao is a pretty good teacher to have for econ 41 compared to the others. he does have a very strong accent so it is difficult to understand him in class or over his recordings. he posts his lecture slides on canvas and the TAs post their discussions as well so i mainly did this class remotely and had no issue. liao creates reasonable, multiple-choice exams, unlike what i experienced in econ 11. the midterm was 30% and the final was 70%. his midterm was very easy and almost exactly like the practice midterm, if easier. it is 30 questions in 1 hour and 15 minutes, and i had time to triple check my answers and still turn it in early. the final was 51 questions and 2 hours, which was a huge time crunch, but still very similar to the practice final. the worst thing about this class is that he follows a grading structure of 25% A’s, 35% B’s, 25% C’s, and 15% fail, so no matter how good you do on the exams, you’re just competing against how well you did against your classmates. as long as you study and know how to do the practice finals you'll be good.

Ill go straight to the point: do not take this guy. If you can do yourself a favor of just taking 11 or 101 if there is no other professors the quarter you plan on taking 41. He's english is horrible so you wont understand anything, he only reads his slides which mostly have useless information for the class, you will only learn from viewing the office hours where he teaches how to solve the homework but not even with that you will learn the concepts. In this class you mainly learn only how to solve some of his problems, which even thought I spent over 1 month studying for the final, he gave us some new problems which with the little time (51 questions in 2 hours) is impossible to think how to solve this problems. I do not understand what is the point of doing this in order for most students to literally only answer half of the exam and getting your grade based on the curve. I had the final today, and the curve situation is that bad that my final grade can be between an F or an A as I can only hope that the rest of the class did horrible (which most likely they did as almost everyone had to guess at least 14 questions). If you say that this class is good, either you are an extreme nerd with no life or you just are kissing his a*s idk why. At least they say the curve is insane for this class.

I am both a native English and Mandarin speaker yet his accent was so difficult to understand. He does not explain much unless you ask and mostly reads off his slides and answer keys (when going through homework questions). My only saving grace was my TA, HanYan. The mid term was extremely easy, but the final was horrid. I did not know how to even approach at least 7 questions, and towards the end I was just estimating answers because of the time crunch. Do yourself a favour and look for a different class or professor to save yourself the stress.

Avoid at all cost. Good luck understanding his "ENGLISH". Only reads off from slides

-- Professor Liao suffers from the classic UCLA professor curse of having wonderful lecture notes but terrible lecturing skills. He has a strong accent and just reads off the slides, so I stopped going after the first lecture because it was a waste of my time.
-- The lecture slides were very detailed, and this class is basically a dumbed-down version of Math 170E (or its equivalents). I took 170E this quarter as well (for the Data Engineering Minor) so I learned the material more rigorously in that lecture and carried it over to this class. I had no issues on either exam (there is one midterm and one final), which were both averaged around a C. The final grade is 30% midterm, 70% final. I got a 100 and 90 on the midterm and final, respectively. The final was significantly more difficult than the midterm. You do not get any lecture notes, only a janky calculator that he provides for students (and your wits). There was optional homework (for no credit) each week, with answers posted as well. It was great practice for the exams! He also posts a practice midterm and practice final before each real exam, and the topics are VERY similar to the real exam. Understand them well, and you'll do great!
-- Also, this class is graded on a pure curve (which I have many disagreements with since it discourages collaboration significantly), with 25% getting As, 35% Bs, 25% Cs, and 15% failing. I had a few friends in the class who I studied with for the exams and it was pretty smooth sailing for me.
-- Overall, this class wasn't too bad for me, though I know many that struggled. It isn't bad, nor is it good. Ok overall. Good luck!

This class was difficult. Significantly harder than 11 imo. The lectures are not helpful. Midterm was easy but the final was significantly harder. Midterm av was like 80 and final av was like 64%. Make sure you study or hire a tutor for this class. Midterm 30% and Final 70%.

Idk, this class just has the midterm and final and that's it. The midterm was easy compared to the final, the avg was like a 78%, while the final average was like a 60%. The entire class grade is based on ranking and only 25% of the class gets A- or better which is kinda tuff. Just be prepared to put in the work the week leading up to his tests and you'll be fine. At least he has a sense of humor at times!

A fair class...Contents can be a bit confusing if you don't go to the lectures at all or they are completely new to you because there is more width than depth in this course. But just because of that, once you are able to comprehend the core concepts, it would be an fairly easy course.

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