IGCSE Economics Tutoring, Cambridge and Pearson Edexcel
IGCSE Economics looks like common sense until the exam asks a student to prove it: the right curve shifted on a diagram, a calculation from an unfamiliar table, a chain of reasoning that does not skip a step. It is also more numerical and more diagram-heavy than many students expect when they choose it.
Short answer
IGCSE Economics is offered online, one-to-one.
A private lesson runs 90 minutes and starts at USD 95 per lesson; lessons are booked singly or in packages.
No group class runs for this exam.
From USD 95 per lesson
- Structure shown for Cambridge International, Pearson Edexcel
- Live online lessons of 90 minutes
- From USD 95 per lesson
How IGCSE Economics is assessed, board by board
2 awarding bodies examine this subject, and they do not examine it the same way: different papers, different weightings, different practical arrangements. Find your board — it is printed on your school's timetable and on past papers — and read that block. Nothing on this page describes one board's paper as though it applied to all of them.
Cambridge International
Cambridge IGCSE Economics (0455)
| Component | Share of grade | Length | Marks | Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Paper 1: Multiple Choice | 30% | 1 hour | 40 marks | multiple choice |
| Paper 2: Structured Questions | 70% | 2 hours | 80 marks | structured questions, data response and essay |
Checked on 22 September 2026
Pearson Edexcel
Pearson Edexcel International GCSE Economics (4EC1)
| Component | Share of grade | Length | Marks | Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Paper 1: Microeconomics and Business Economics — Four compulsory questions of 20 marks each | 50% | 1 hour 30 min | 80 marks | structured questions and data response |
| Paper 2: Macroeconomics and the Global Economy — Four compulsory questions of 20 marks each | 50% | 1 hour 30 min | 80 marks | structured questions and data response |
- Pearson does not tier this subject: every candidate sits the same papers and every grade is reachable from them. That removes the entry-tier decision entirely, which is one of the practical differences between the two boards.
- No multiple-choice paper here, where Cambridge gives 30% of the grade to one. Two evenly weighted structured papers instead, which rewards written precision earlier than the Cambridge route does.
Checked on 22 September 2026
Cambridge International and Pearson Edexcel are the two IGCSE boards covered here. Some schools use OxfordAQA International GCSEs, which are examined differently again; if that is your board, tell us on the intro call and we will confirm tutor availability for your specification before you book.
What IGCSE Economics covers
The syllabus areas most boards share. Which ones appear, in what order and on which paper differs by board and by specification code — your own specification is the final word. Topic names are left in English, as they appear on the paper.
The basic economic problem
Scarcity and the economic problem · Factors of production · Opportunity cost · Production possibility curve diagrams
Markets and the allocation of resources
Demand, supply and price determination · Price elasticity of demand and of supply · The market system and the mixed economy · Market failure and externalities · Government intervention in markets
Firms, workers and markets
Production and productivity · Costs, revenue and profit · Competition, market structure and monopoly · Economies of scale · The labour market and wages
Government and the macroeconomy
Economic growth · Employment and unemployment · Inflation · Fiscal, monetary and supply-side policies · Poverty, inequality and redistribution · Conflicts between macroeconomic objectives
International trade and globalisation
Specialisation and free trade · Globalisation and multinational companies · Trade restrictions and protection · Exchange rates · The current account of the balance of payments
Where IGCSE Economics marks are usually lost
The wrong curve on the move
A demand and supply diagram helps only when it is fully labelled and the right curve moves in the right direction. A rise in costs shifts supply, not demand; a change in price is a movement along a curve, not a shift of it. Students who learn diagrams as pictures rather than as reasoning mix these up under pressure, and a diagram that contradicts the written answer weakens both.
Explanations that skip the middle link
Questions on why higher interest rates might reduce inflation, or how a weaker currency affects exporters, reward a chain: cause, mechanism, effect. Students jump from the first link to the last — “interest rates rise, so inflation falls” — and leave out what earns the analysis: borrowing becomes dearer, spending falls, pressure on prices eases. Every step has to be written down, not assumed.
Advantages listed, no verdict reached
Questions that ask students to discuss or evaluate — whether a minimum wage helps workers, whether protection saves jobs, whether growth is always good — reward both sides and a judgement. Weak answers list advantages and disadvantages and stop. Strong ones say what the outcome depends on — the elasticity, the size of the change, the state of the economy — and reach a view that follows from it.
How we teach IGCSE Economics
A tutor first establishes the board. For Cambridge, lessons follow the syllabus revised for the 2027 exams, which removed some topics — trade unions as a topic of their own, fixed exchange rates, deflation — and added others, such as scarcity, sustainability throughout and the terms perfectly elastic, perfectly inelastic and unitary elastic. Diagrams are taught as arguments: the student says what changes, which curve moves and why before drawing anything. Calculations — percentage changes, elasticity, costs and revenue — are practised until they are quick and reliable, and Cambridge candidates work through multiple-choice sets that test exactly that. Data questions use unseen extracts, and extended answers are built as explicit chains of reasoning ending in a judgement. Pearson candidates practise for both the microeconomics and the macroeconomics paper, and anyone sitting on screen rehearses in that format.
There is no separate diagnostic, because there is no single test that stands in for two years of a school syllabus. The first lesson is the assessment: the tutor works through your recent marked work, past-paper questions from your own specification, and the units your school has already covered, and reads current level, gaps, exam technique and where school work stands. It is a normal paid lesson and it teaches as it assesses.
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IGCSE prices
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