Week 5 HW

Over the last couple of weeks, we learned about the four different economic systems (traditional, where everything is ruled by tradition. The free market, where the people control everything. A command system, where the government controls everything. And a mixed government, where both the people and the government control everything) and how they play into the world. For example, America has a mixed economic system, North Korea has a command system, the Amish run a traditional system, and Hong Kong has the closest thing to a free market system. We also learned about the invisible hand, which is the idea that society uses competition and self interest (selfishness) to make things better. We learned the difference between Communism (government chooses how you live life) and Socialism (The community chooses how to live your life). On block day, we learned about incentives (something that influences a person's behavior through either punishment or reward) and how how an incentive affects people's lives. On the same day, we experienced incentive first hand through a quiz where if you got everything right, you failed, and how that same incentive had been used throughout our years in schooling and life. One Finance Friday, we learned about how to properly read a paycheck, how to file taxes, and how important our first job is.

1) To fly to either Europe or Israel, but to only carry one bag.
2) To fly to Brazil to have your bags not checked.
3) To carry only two bags anywhere.

Everything was rather easy to grasp. The most enjoyable thing to learn was the law of diminishing marginal value.

Week 4 HW

Over the course of the week, we learned about how voluntary exchange (the understanding that people will only trade if they feel that they will benefit from the trade) makes everybody wealthy, not necessarily rich. We also learned about the factors of production, which are Land (anything that comes from the Earth), Labor (the worker's/ people) and Capital (Physical capital: anything of inherent value. Human capital: the skills any person has). We learned the seven economic goals (Economic Equity, Economic Freedom, Economic Security, Economic Efficiency, Economic Growth, Full Employment, and Price Stability) and the two types of economic systems: Free Market (Freedom and efficiency) and Command (Equity and security) and that we can't have both types. America has a free Market. We learned about the Candy Bar idea (Get a credit card, buy a candy bar every day/every month, and pay it off immediately) and why we should all have credit cards, how they work, and why they work.

Land: You need the food to make the burrito (tortilla...)
Labor: You need workers to make the burrito.
Physical Capitol: Tin foil to wrap around the burrito to keep it warm/together.
Human Capitol: You need somebody who is good at cooking to prepare the food for the burrito.

My preferred methods of making somebody like me is to compliment them, or to ask them something personal (such as favorite color).

Week 3 HW

Over the past week in Economics, we learned quite a few things. For example, on the first day we learned what opportunity cost was (where you give up the second best option after making a choice) and how it related to Trade off (where you make a decision based off of many options, and it's related because opportunity cost -- what you give up -- is the result of a trade off -- what you choose). We also learned why we should go to college and how the decision of going to college or not will affect us in the future. For example, if we worked a job making $7/hr (about the average of what you can make if you don't go to college) and worked even up to 40 hours a week, you'd still only be bringing in about 70,000 every 5 years. If you went to college, tuition could be from $90,000 and up, and you add on the opportunity cost of not making $70,000 over the course of 5 years, that makes $160,000 for 5 years. But, if you go to college, then you could be making far more than that $90,000 a year. We also learned about PPC (the production possibility curve, or the maximum amount of two products you can make at the same time) and Marginal Analysis (through Reeces), which is basically that the more you have of something, the less you're going to want it, and nothing is immune to it. The golden rule is to always keep doing something until the cost outweighs the benefit. On finance Friday, we all learned that we're not ready to live on our own, and that budgeting is more complicated than we first assumed. Plus, we learned about how much our parents do to take care of us.

Every choice has an opportunity cost. One that I've made in high school thus far that has yielded the highest opportunity cost was choosing what I want to do with my life, AKA go to college to be a journalist. The thing I'll have to give up is getting a full time job to pay for everything. If I had to do it over again, I wouldn't change a thing.

One skill I would love to learn is how to not let other people influence my opinions/decisions. My desire to do things right and make other people happy is stopping me. Still, I don't just say what people want to hear just because I know it's what they want to hear.

Week 2 HW

On Monday, we learned, about scarcity (which has two meanings. 1: A situation where we want more than what we have. 2: When a resource has more than one VALUABLE use). We also learned that Economics isn't about money but the study of choices made by humans. On Tuesday, we learned about gangs and why people (especially the youth) are so interested in joining gangs despite knowing how dangerous it could be. We learned things such as how gangs make so much money (delving a tiny bit into the history of drugs and how drugs such as crack, cocaine, and heroin affect gangs), and how gang members/leaders get kids involved in gangs through making offers to the children (offer one thing in exchange for something to the member, and as the kid wants more, the gang member makes increasing desires. For example, offering a PS3 in exchange for washing the member's car every day for a month, and so on until the kid practically becomes a part of the gang). On Wednesday, we learned about the black rhinos and how people's choices and how poachers are affecting their decreasing population, and how economists and people around the world are coming up with ideas to try to save these rhinos. During Finance Friday, we learned about how we can all become millionaires if we use our money wisely, and we learned the difference between being rich and being wealthy (which is that if you're rich, it only takes a couple severe incidents and you could go broke, but being wealthy makes it very hard to go broke).

The impact scarcity has on the Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks is that it has more than one valuable use (making money for Starbucks, satisfying the people...), and there is also a limited time to get it. So people will be eager to get it.

I think that water is more valuable because water not only has multiple uses (bathing, hydrating, relaxing, exercise...) but is also a limited resource.