Ebenstein is a pretty chill guy but his class is pretty disorganized. Most of his lectures are just him talking for an hour and he seems to get off topic a lot. His assignments are vague but they're not too hard.
He's a chill prof, accessible after the lecture if you want to discuss with him. Weekly 2 page paper and two-term papers so the workload is not terrible. Lot's of interesting ideas and his book is very accessible to those that do not read many econ books. Can sometimes be disorganized, but who isn't during the 'rona? Great for non-mathy econ peeps
Lectures are very disorganized over zoom. He's very smart but sometimes rambles on about a particular topic. We get weekly writing assignments the TA's barely grade. Every week I get the same exact grade no matter how much work I put in. Definitely would not recommend during rona as the class is very disorganized
If you are a "normal" econ student (likes math, numbers, equations), DO NOT TAKE THIS CLASS. If you're someone like me who hates Econ as it's normally taught and wants to know about policy, history, and how econ has actually developed and works in the real world, TAKE THIS CLASS. Ebenstein is a weird, eccentric breath of fresh air. Love this guy.
40 pages of writing thru quarter, so f you aren't good at writing, don't take. Lectures are incoherent, rambling, tangential, and he jumps around between time periods so you're left confused ( no slides, just him talking to the camera). Also, some things he lectures aren't even historically accurate. Easy class but extremely boring.
Ebenstein is the most boring lecturer I've ever had to listen to. He just rambles for an hour straight with no structure to his lectures. To make it worse, his lectures have nothing to do with the 2200 word research essayS we have to write for him. He just makes us tune in to indoctrinate us with his unfounded beliefs about random stuf. Don't take.
Took 113B in person with him last quarter, it was pretty interesting and an easy-ish A. If classes are still via zoom DO NOT TAKE HIM unless you like to write. He replaced his attendance grade with a weekly paper. Not a super hard class, but not interesting at all and lots of busy work. There are much better econ classes, especially online.
Really boring class especially because his teaching style is super old school! Hes a really nice guy and is always willing to talk to you but the class is just way too boring. Its not as hard as other econ classes but if you need an econ elective I would personally take 106 with Benelli
Ebenstein presents a unique, valuable, and applicable perspective on economics while also remaining open minded to considering opposing views in class or office hours. Unfortunately, his lectures can sometimes be a bit poorly organized or repetitive.
This is the most useless class I've ever taken. He held lectures that weren't useful at all, but then forced everyone to come because he'd pass around an attendance sheet in an entire lecture hall. He would lecture on a book and get things wrong, and his "slides" were just his hand-written outline projected onto a screen.
MWF at 8am was rough, especially with pop quizzes. Pretty predictable when they will come, often Fridays. Just skim the readings and you will be fine. Doesn't grade too hard and is a nice guy
this professor is so hard. do not take. Really hard.
If you are an econ major at ucsb and you see any history of econ class by ebenstein, TAKE THE CLASS. Ebenstein is a friendly, forgiving, easy grader and you learn a lot from the course too! There are random pop quizzes based on readings that have obvious answers, not meant to trick you. There is 1 midterm, 1 final (non-cum), and 1 final paper.
His "Economic Thought" class is really interesting. There's a decidely libertarian bent to the class, but it's centered around primary sources, so it's not pervasive. The class has two midterms, a term paper, and a final, and it's paced in a way that isn't rushed. It's best when there's a lot of discussion in the class. He's a visiting professor.
