One of the joys of summer for teachers is that we get to forget about stacks of student work and read whatever we want. One of the books I read during my Bali trip was one about food called The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan (the other was the classic and utterly cheesy mystery in which a Harvard professor uses economic theory to solve crimes, Murder at the Margins).

While The Omnivore’s Dilemma warrants several blog posts itself, one section stood out to me as relevant to what I was seeing in Bali firsthand. In discussing the different food chains humans participate in, Pollan discusses a concept called “artisinal economics”, which he describes as a system in which “the competitive strategy is based on selling something special rather than being the least-cost producer of a commodity.” Pollan goes on to point out that “this artisinal model works only so long as it doesn’t attempt to imitate the industrial model in any respect. It must not try to replace
skilled labor with capital; it shouldn’t invest capital to reach national markets but rather should focus on local markets, relying on reputation and word of mouth rather than on advertising…”

Touring around Bali, one cannot help but be awed by the seemingly endless selection of arts and crafts available not only to tourists but to Balinese for their houses, businesses and temples. Around the town of Ubud (famous as a center of artisanship),wood and stone carving workshops and painters studios stretch for kilometers in which truly talented artists can be observed creating unique (and some not so unique) pieces of traditional art (and some not so traditional, such as the Thai Buddhist monk paintings I’ve seen on sale in places like Bangkok and Phuket). It would seem that a large percentage of the island’s population is involved in the art business, and although I did see some African patterns such as giraffes and of course the Thai monk paintings, the majority of the art appeared to be in traditional Balinese styles and for the local market.

The market for art and crafts seems to fit Pollan’s description of an “artisanal economy” where quality and individuality are the goal of the economy’s output, as opposed to maximizing output and minimizing costs. To see young men and women working with their own hands and tools that haven’t changed in centuries was refreshing, representing a hope that I and I would guess many of you share regarding the desire to hold on to something from our society’s past even as the modern economy pushes us ever forward into a world of homogenization, increased output, increased mechanization and inevitably less and less beauty and quality defining and differentiating unique cultures from one another.

Discussion Questions:

1. Why do firms in developed and developing countries tend to replace workers with machines as their economies grow?
2. If the craftsmanship and artisanship of Bali belongs to an “artisanal economy”, what kind of economy do the factories, superhighways and giant container ships of the rich world belong to?
3. Do you think the artistic, labor intensive industries that employ so many Balinese will survive in the modern economy, or can artists be replaced by machines as easily as seamstresses and auto workers were in
   the 20th century?
4. Based on Pollan’s description of “artisinal economics” quoted above, what chances do you think exist that such an economy will reemerge and thrive sometime in the 21st century? What would it take for such an economy to thrive today?

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For six of our 16 days, my wife Liz and our friend Leah rented a jeep and circumnavigated the island. Our first stop was for two days of scuba diving in the northeast region of Ahmed. As we drove along the seven or so beaches near Ahmed, we observed there were around ten dive operators offering packages for the local dive spots (including one of Asia’s most famous dives, the WWII-era USS Liberty wreck). Based on our Lonely Planet recommendation, we settled on Eco-Dive, where we paid $60 a day for two dives and all our gear rental. We felt good about this rate and agreed that $60 was a fair and competitive price for a day of diving.

Our next stop, Pemuteran, a remote and relatively undeveloped area on the northwest coast just across the straits from Java, is also known for its great diving. Our first morning in Pemuteran, my wife and I strolled along the beach and found that there were only three dive operators to choose from! And guess what, they all charged between $95-$105 for a two-dive day with gear included! That’s around 60% more than the operators in Ahmed charged! In the end, we decided to do only one day of diving in Pemuteran, and elected to spend our second day there reading by the pool.

Discussion Questions:

1. What was the difference between the scuba diving markets in Ahmed and Pemuteran? Which market was more competitive?
2. What allowed operators in Pemuteran to charge 60% more than the operators in Ahmed? What kind of market structure best describes the diving market in Pemuteran?
3. What do you think is keeping one of the three dive operators in Pemuteran from lowering their price to, say, $60 for a day of diving? How would the other two operators respond? Would this be good or bad for the dive operators of Pemuteran? Would it be good or bad for scuba divers?
4. Assuming that the cost of opening a dive operation was relatively low, and there were no government or other barriers to doing so in Pemuteran, what do you suspect will happen in the Scuba diving market as the tourism industry continues to develop in the remote town of Pemuteran? Explain.

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IF you’ve visited this blog in the last two weeks, you’ve probably seen the picture below of a beautiful sunset, a distant island and a wispy palm. Turns out I stayed two nights on the beach that picture was taken from, Ahmed in Bali’s remote northwest corner! What a beautiful island Bali is! Unlike many touristy places in Southeast Asia such as Phuket and Samui in Thailand, Bali is an island paradise that has managed to develop a thriving tourist industry while simultaneously maintaining its distinct Hindu culture and traditions that awe visitors and help them understand why it’s called the “island of the gods”. Not only do most Balinese outside the one or two major cities still live in the traditional style houses, but they actively practice their unique form of Hinduism (imported from India via Java in the 11th century), maintain the traditional forms of dance and religious ritual, and sustain themselves by practicing any number of artistic trades rooted in the island’s rich and colorful history. Indeed, in most villages we passed through, it was hard to tell which buildings were temples and which were houses. As much of Indonesia and the rest of Asia have rushed head-on into the age of globalization (often meaning westernization), Bali has thankfully held on to and even fostered one very precious and all too rare commodity: its own history.

Certainly after a year in Shanghai, where the closest thing to religion among urban Chinese is the pursuit of wealth, a couple of weeks in the rich spiritual heart of an ancient Hindu island culture was just what I needed to remind myself what was important in life. But alas, once an economist always an economist, and even with a thousand years of rich cultural heritage to turn my attention from school and economics, I could not help but notice the intricacies of Bali’s economy and how tourism and globalization have affected this remote island culture. My next few posts will cover casual observations made during my 16 day trip to Bali about its local economy and how it has been shaped by the global economy and tourism.

A dismal introduction I know, but my first posting will have to be about exams, since I have been almost wholly occupied with grading both AP and IB papers over the past month. While I prefer teaching (economics and math), I have to admit that I am always thrilled to have the chance to mark external tests. I open each paper expectantly—never knowing what might be inside—and it’s interesting to compare and contrast responses.

Indeed I always learn a lot while I’m grading; at the risk of boring you, may I pass on the following few points:

1. Every word in a question is significant; nothing should be ignored.
2. Keep your answers straightforward: 1.If in doubt confine yourself to the short run (unless it’s an economic growth question); otherwise you are likely to end up with a convoluted response, which could go on for ever! 2. Don’t ever contradict yourself; the examiner will think that you’re hedging your bets. It’s preferable just to pursue a consistent line of reasoning.
3. Don’t use vague terms or statements that are unsupported. Words such as “productivity”, “profits” and “efficiency” are often used glibly and inappropriately. The test taker consequently appears to be gabbling. Make sure to cite actual policy tools, not just general strategies, such as “expansionary”.
4. When drawing graphs: a) Every axis and curve must be labeled. (If in doubt put P on the vertical axis and Q on the horizontal). b) Never indulge in double shifts of demand and supply unless two events have happened. c) Clearly show the old and new equilibrium points with the use of dotted lines to the axes.

I really should have waited until next year to write the above, but by then I might have forgotten what seemed most important while marking. In the meantime I will take to heart what I have learnt from reading many student responses to AP and IB question; in particular I will try not to gabble myself while teaching.

As those of you who are teachers know, summer is a time to detach yourself from school and learning, at least for a while, to rejuvenate in a place of beauty. My wife and I are off to Bali for two and a half weeks before we head home to Seattle and Idaho for the rest of the summer. It will probably be a few weeks before my next post, so please check back towards the end of June. Have a nice summer, wherever the wind and waves happen to take you! -Jason

Cuba libre | Free exchange | Economist.com

Here’s a piece from the Economist’s blog about whether America removing its embargoes on trade with Cuba would have all that big an impact on the lives of the average Cuban.

Trade is, it goes without saying, wonderful stuff. But trade with America isn’t that marvelous. Cuba is, right now, free to trade with just about every other country in the world, yet it’s still a pit of economic misery for most of its citizens. Yes, shipping costs would be higher, stopping some trade from happening. But China is much farther from America than Cuba is from Europe; it still manages to run an enormous trade surplus with that country.

According to the CIA World Factbook, Cuba exports roughly $3 billion a year. Even assuming that the American embargo is so effective that it has slashed Cuba’s exports in half, that would give Cuba new gains from trade of only another $3 billion, or $272 for each of its 11 million citizens. (We assume for the sake of argument that Cuba is so true to the Socialist Revolution that elites will not appropriate a single extra dollar of the surplus to themselves, or to wastefully showy political projects.) It should be obvious from descriptions of Cuba that this will not be enough to lift Cubans out of the grinding poverty in which they currently live.

Trade can only make countries better off if they make something worth selling; Cuba largely doesn’t. Opening up trade with America, but not opening up the sclerotic state owned economy to internal change, would result i a little extra income on the margin, but it has no prospect of transforming the economy. Without little things like relative changes in price signals to allow inputs to flow to their highest valued uses, free movement of capital to profit opportunity, and incentives for higher quality work, trade cannot work any economic miracles.

Discussion Questions:

1. Based on what you read above, how much freedom do you think exists in Cuba’s economy? What type of economic system does Cuba have?
2. Besides free trade, what else must Cuba do to help its citizens to escape poverty?
3. Explain and discuss the following passage: “Without little things like relative changes in price signals to allow inputs to flow to their highest valued uses, free movement of capital to profit opportunity, and incentives for higher quality work, trade cannot work any economic miracles.”

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Natural gas in Wyoming | Boom and doom | Economist.com

From the latest Economist: an article about the booming natural gas industry in rural Wyoming (as if there’s such a thing as urban Wyoming) and the impact it’s having on the economy of one small town.

You’d think a booming industry offering high wages for low-skilled workers would be a godsend for a remote Western town like Pinedale, Wyoming. Think again; this article points out some of the downsides resulting from the natural gas boom since 2000, when oil shortages led to an increase in the price of gas and lots of new drilling in Wyoming, America’s least populated state.

Pinedale is at the centre of a Rocky Mountain gas boom that began in 2000 and accelerated five years later after Hurricane Katrina knocked out Gulf supplies, forcing up prices. On a mesa south of Pinedale, Wyoming’s busiest field is laced with dirt roads and pock-marked with well-heads and drilling rigs.

The influx of gas workers has increased the population of the area by 40% since 2000. The new business has meant more tax revenues for the county, “In 2001 Sublette county raised $16m in sales and other taxes. Last year it took in $53m.” What does all this mean for residents of Pinedale and the surrounding county? Higher wages and low unemployment.

Next year Pinedale’s school district will pay newly qualified teachers a base salary of $43,000—about the same as in Chicago.Teachers nonetheless earn less than rig hands, most of whom have no more than a high-school education. They are paid at least $49,000 plus overtime, according to a survey last year. The ready availability of well-paid work, albeit hard and dangerous, means that unemployment has almost disappeared (see chart). So have seasonal fluctuations. Jobs used to disappear when the snow fell. But the gas rigs now keep going through the winter.

The wage hikes enjoyed by government employees and gas workers, while good for some, means doom for local businesses not directly linked to the gas business, for whom the tight labor market makes it increasingly difficult to operate. The housing market has also experienced a shock since the gas boom, as properties away from the gas fields have barely increased or even decreased in value.

The interesting connection I see in this article to our Economics course lies in the affect of low unemployment and high wages on the business environment. See if you can identify the connection through the questions below.

Discussion Questions:

1. What led to the increased drilling for natural gas in 2000? Which determinants of demand and supply led to the changes experienced in the oil and natural gas industries?
2. What kind of labor market is the Wyoming gas industry most like, perfectly competitive or monopsonistic? How do you know?
3. Are gas companies in Wyoming wage takers or wage makers? What’s the difference?
4. If low unemployment and high wages are assumed to be good, then why does the article indicate that they are actually bad for some in Pinedale?
5. Why has “the number of retail and entertainment outfits in Sublette county” fallen “even as disposable income soared”?

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Made in China - The Atlantic Monthly

Here’s a great slide show and narrative about the manufacturing industry in the industrial city of Shenzen. After viewing the slideshow, discuss some of the questions below.

Discussion Questions:

1. What does the narrator mean when he says “Shenzhen is more or less an invented city?”
2. Why does the word “scale” come to the narrator’s mind as he explores Shenzhen? What key concept from our economics class includes the world “scale”? How does the growth of Shenzhen relate to this concept?
3. What is exported from Shenzhen to the US? What is being sent back to Shenzhen from the US? What does this suggest about the Chinese/US balance of trade? Why do you think this is happening?
4. Where do Shenzhen’s factory workers come from? Why do you think young women make up such a large percentage of factories’ workforces? Are the wages paid factory workers in Shenzhen “fair” wages? Why or why not?
5. Is manufacturing in Shenzhen labor intensive or capital intensive? What’s the difference?
6. What’s the significance of the last line about how Liam Casey, whose office overlooks the headquarters of the Shenzen communist party, has never “met anybody who was in there”. What does this say about communism in China today?

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National Geographic News Photo Gallery: Week in Photos: Monster Hog

Near Delta, Alabama, May 3, 2007—Hogzilla may be headed for horror-movie heaven, but the massive swine that became an Internet sensation in 2004 may have been bested, size wise, by this reportedly wild pig killed May 3 by Jamison Stone, 11, and reported by the Associated Press on Wednesday.

From tip to tail, the newfound hog—dubbed “Monster Pig”—measures 9 feet, 4 inches (284 centimeters) and weighs in at 1,051 pounds (477 kilograms), according to Stone’s father.

At a 150-acre (60-hectare), fenced hunting range, Stone said, he shot the huge beast eight times with a revolver before tracking it with his father and guides for three hours. Finally, the boy shot the hog at point-blank range, killing the animal, the AP reported.

While hunting by children is legal in Alabama, officials are investigating whether anyone had transported and released the live feral pig into the hunting preserve, which would violate state law.

Okay, so maybe this one’s a stretch for a blog about economics, but sometimes when you see something in the news this amazing, you just have to share it with the world! Let’s see if I can come up with some questions about this one!

Discussion Questions:

1. What impact would “monster hog” have on the price of pork (assuming it goes to market)?
2. What will happen in the beef market once “monster hog’s” meat reaches the market? Explain.
3. Can you think of a product that might be a compliment to pork? Describe
   what will happen in that product’s market thanks to “monster hog”.

Looks like China could use a few monster pigs of its own to relax the steep increase in pork prices recently!

Tighter supplies lead to big price rises for pork, eggs-21food.com

THE prices of pork and eggs have soared in past weeks across China due largely to tighter supplies and increasing production costs…Food products account for 33 percent of the CPI in China with meat, poultry and related products making up about 20 percent.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, live pigs nationwide were 71.3 percent more expensive than a month earlier, and pork, 29.3 percent higher.

In Beijing, the price of slaughtered pigs went up more than 30 percent in recent days…

An outbreak of blue ear disease, also known as Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome, among pigs in Guangdong Province and the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, causing many deaths and a large amount of pigs to be culled, according to the National Development and Reform Commission…

“This sent a strong signal for distributors to jack up prices,” said Xu, adding that this exacerbated the unbalanced supply and demand.

“Pig raisers have lost money in the past couple years and they are reluctant to raise pigs. This led to a marginal decline in live pigs this year.”

Still worse, edible oil and grain prices rose at the beginning of this year, and feed prices followed suit.

Grain prices have risen largely due to an anticipated decline in output this summer and will continue to increase slightly in the coming weeks, boosting the prices of pork

Discussion Questions:

1. What is the “CPI” and why has it risen in China recently?
2. Does this article discuss the determinants of demand or the determinants of supply? Which determinant is being affected in the pork market?
3. What is happening in the market for pork in China? Which curve is shifting, supply or demand?
4. What “strong signal” led pork distributors to “jack up prices”?
5. If the price of pork continues to rise, what should happen to the supply of pork? Explain.

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Freakonomics: Monkey Business: Keith Chen’s Monkey Research

No I’m not talking about the latest freshman class at an Ivy League school… rather a group of monkeys at Yale that have been taught how to use money:

The essential idea was to give a monkey a dollar and see what it did with it. The currency Chen settled on was a silver disc, one inch in diameter, with a hole in the middle — ”kind of like Chinese money,” he says. It took several months of rudimentary repetition to teach the monkeys that these tokens were valuable as a means of exchange for a treat and would be similarly valuable the next day. Having gained that understanding, a capuchin would then be presented with 12 tokens on a tray and have to decide how many to surrender for, say, Jell-O cubes versus grapes. This first step allowed each capuchin to reveal its preferences and to grasp the concept of budgeting.

Turns out the law of Demand is not only true for humans but for monkeys too. When Chen “lowered the price of grapes”, monkeys would buy more grapes and less Jell-O, following the basic rule of utility maximization. Interestingly, the introduction of money led to more than just the simple exchanges of currency for candy and cucumber; the monkeys were also taught to gamble. Through their observations of several gambling scenarios, the researchers found monkeys tended to display “loss averse” behavior in games of chance, leading to an amusing conclusion:

The data generated by the capuchin monkeys, Chen says, ”make them statistically indistinguishable from most stock-market investors.”

Sadly, gambling was not the only vice that accompanied the introduction of money in to monkey society:

Then there is the stealing. Santos has observed that the monkeys never deliberately save any money, but they do sometimes purloin a token or two during an experiment.

But the debauchery does not stop with gambling and theft:

Perhaps the most distinguishing characteristic of money, after all, is its fungibility, the fact that it can be used to buy not just food but anything. During the chaos in the monkey cage, Chen saw something out of the corner of his eye that he would later try to play down but in his heart of hearts he knew to be true. What he witnessed was probably the first observed exchange of money for sex in the history of monkeykind. (Further proof that the monkeys truly understood money: the monkey who was paid for sex immediately traded the token in for a grape.)

As if we needed any proof beyond the widespread immorality and loss of values that distinguish many rich human societies, the steep decline of monkey morality observed at Yale can only be attributed to the introduction of currency! The implications of the Yale study on economics are clear: humans are not necessarily unique in our understanding of currency as a means of exchange. As long as money has imbued human societies, the wont to enrich ourselves through immoral means such as gambling, theft and prostitution has stained civilizations from ancient Mesopotamia to modern America.

When taught to use money, a group of capuchin monkeys responded quite rationally to simple incentives; responded irrationally to risky gambles; failed to save; stole when they could; used money for food and, on occasion, sex. In other words, they behaved a good bit like the creature that most of Chen’s more traditional colleagues study: Homo sapiens.

To make a more poignant observation, one thing is clear and disturbing, among the human societies today, Americans are most like monkeys when it comes to saving.

Discussion Questions:

1. Of the various functions of money, which role does money play for monkeys?
2. What gives the money used by the monkeys its value?
3. Discuss the evidence from this article suggesting that monkeys follow the law of demand.
4. What is the utility maximization rule and what evidence from this article supports the suggestion that monkeys follow this rule?
5. How are monkeys more similar to American consumers than to, say, Japanese or Chinese consumers?

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What I didn’t know about myself was that I was a “libertarian leftist”. I had always considered myself a liberal, which I had been told meant I was so-called “left of center”. Where the terms left and right came from, I really didn’t know before now. It’s always bothered me that we describe our politicians, our economists, our professors, our teachers, our historic figures as either “left wing” or “right wing”; is the socioeconomic spectrum really only one dimension? Turns out it’s not, and now there’s a new tool for measuring your social/economic position in two dimensions.

Welcome to the Political Compass

According to the homepage of the Political Compass:

The old one-dimensional categories of ‘right’ and ‘left’, established for the seating arrangement of the French National Assembly of 1789, are overly simplistic for today’s complex political landscape. For example, who are the ‘conservatives’ in today’s Russia? Are they the unreconstructed Stalinists, or the reformers who have adopted the right-wing views of conservatives like Margaret Thatcher?

On the standard left-right scale, how do you distinguish leftists like Stalin and Gandhi? It’s not sufficient to say that Stalin was simply more left than Gandhi. There are fundamental political differences between them that the old categories on their own can’t explain. Similarly, we generally describe social reactionaries as ‘right-wingers’, yet that leaves left-wing reactionaries like Robert Mugabe and Pol Pot off the hook.

Take this test, see where you fall in the social and economic spectra. Personally, I thought that as a teacher of Economics, a science dominated by a neo-classical, free market perspective, that I would have ended up in the quadrant of the libertarian right. I guess those old left-wing ideals of my college years are more ingrained than I thought!

Hat tip to Gregory Mankiw for the link!

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You can’t have one without the other.

Will schools be able to provide the level of education needed for American workers to keep up with the rapidly advancing technology of the modern economy? Tyler Cowen, an economics professor at George Mason University, looks at the
challenge America faces to provide the level of education needed to produce workers capable of dealing with a dynamic, technologically advanced economy.

Why Is Income Inequality in America So Pronounced? Consider Education - New York Times

Cowen suggests that the rising inequality in Americans’ incomes is not because of some corrupt failure of capitalism, rather it’s a simple problem of supply and demand. The new economy demands high skilled, well-educated workers, and at the same time our schools system has failed to produce such workers. In places like Silicon Valley, firms are turning to India and China for high skilled workers today; not because of cheap wages, rather because these countries are producing workers equipped with the skills to maneuver the technologically dynamic workplace of the 21st century.

The result of America’s schools’ failure to prepare students for the demanding university programs required to compete in this high tech economy: wages for highly educated individuals with an education in a technical field are rising, while wages of the majority of high school and college graduates are stagnating or even declining. Simply stated, the 21st century economy requires workers with 21st century skills. The problem is, schools are simply not preparing children to excel in such a technologically driven economy. According to Cowen:

…the evidence suggests that when additional higher education becomes available, it offers returns in the range of 10 to 14 percent per year of college, at least for the first newcomers to enroll.

Nonetheless it will, sooner or later, become increasingly difficult to deliver the gains from college — not to mention postgraduate study — to the entire population. Technology is advancing faster than our ability to educate. So even if inequality declines today, it may well intensify in the future. Even if American education improves at every level, the largely not-for-profit educational sector may simply be less dynamic than the progress of new technologies.

A pessimistic view, perhaps, but the message seems clear enough. Technology and education must go hand in hand now and in the future if our students are to be prepared for a career in the dynamic, technology driven environment that is our 21st century economy.

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The Columbus Dispatch : Pot growers hid on 2 acres of state land

Okay, so maybe my headline is a bit of a stretch… but man, how did these guys almost get away with this? Two Mexicans on two acres of land in the middle of Ohio, growing $10.5 million worth of pot!?

Officers from four agencies descended on Mackey Ford Wildlife Area on Rt. 762 in Pickaway County yesterday morning to bag more than 10,000 immature marijuana plants. The crop would have been worth an estimated $10.5 million on the street if harvested.

What’s unusual about the operation, besides its size, is that the growers were living in the woods with the plants. And they appear to have been from Mexico.

“This is common on the West Coast,” said Scott Duff, an agent with the Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation. “But we’ve never seen this here. It’s new territory for us.”

John Whitehead at Environmental Economics thinks there may be another example of the Coase bargaining theorem here… if only these guys weren’t off to federal prison:

Environmental Economics: Well it is public land afterall!

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Promotional Fax Mistaken for Bomb Threat - washingtonpost.com

I don’t know, but I would say the American people are a little on edge these days. What does it say about our society when a paranoid bank employee receives a fax and calls in the bomb squad? The arrival of the threatening fax coincided with the arrival of a “suspicious” package, escalating the fears of the terrified bank staff. Turns out the fax was from the corporate office, and the package contained some paper files, but by the time police figured it out 15 local businesses and a nearby day care’s 30 children had been evacuated from the area!

Okay, so this story may not appear to have much to do with our Econ course… or does it?

Discussion questions*:

1. What impact might mass paranoia about terrorism have on the macro economy? Explain.
2. Would the free market provide the security and protection needed to ensure a healthy and safe environment for investment? Why or why not?
3. What is the term for a service or product that provides spillover benefits for society but which is under-provided by the free market (such as a police force)?
4. Do you think the bank employees were right to be frightened by the threatening fax? Is their fear rational or irrational given the political and social climate in America today?

*From now on, most of the posts on this blog will include discussion questions. These are meant to help students start their own discussion about the issues raised in the posts and how they connect to our economics course. Posts like this one are tagged with a category, and next year when we get to a particular topic in our Econ course, students will be asked to find a past post from that category on the blog, read it and post their comments. This will become a part of students’ grades. To see how the blog will graded, click here.

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