Microeconomics is the study of economic behavior of individual consumers, producers, workers, and suppliers. It analyzes how these individual economic units reach equilibrium and covers topics like consumer behavior, product pricing, and firm behavior. Microeconomics considers individual markets in isolation and makes simplifying assumptions. Macroeconomics studies aggregates for the whole economy like total output, employment, prices, and growth. It considers how disturbances in one market can affect others and covers topics like national income, prices, trade balances, and fiscal policy. Micro and macroeconomics are complementary as concepts from micro like consumption behavior form the basis of macro concepts and micro depends on understanding of macro aggregates.

1. Divisions of Economics Foundation Economics June 2009