Chapter 6 Blog Post

Despite struggling to grasp the concept of elasticity until the near end, I am happy to move on. I found that chapter 5 required a little too much calculating for my liking which brings me to why I thoroughly enjoyed chapter 6. This chapter discussed the effect that the government has on demand and supply. It reiterates one of the ten principles again (government can benefit the market) to show just how well the government can effect the quantity demanded of supplied for goods. I thought that this chapter for the most part was easier to follow, because there were real life examples with every term. Not only does this show the practically/ real world application of the idea, but also helps me personally understand the term(s).

Overall I think the policy making and theoretical aspect of economics is a lot easier, and I think that this chapter was much easier to digest. I actually really found the bit on taxes and who ends up paying the most from that system. I hope to talk more about the elastic and inelastic properties of this section though, because that was definitely one portion that confused me.

Crisis Actors Review

This articles basically spoke to the idea that we have these people that speak whenever disasters happen. These "actors" then go on to blow certain situations out of proportion thus making the public freak out unnecessarily, by appealing to the general public's emotions. The article did however talk about how so much of what goes on is a lie, how public speaking is a "lying game" and how we as human beings have the ability to either take these events with a grain of salt, or play along. This idea actually reminded me of an episode of 30 Rock where the producers of the tv stations (CNN) were trying to sway viewers' emotions by making up false tragedies. While it was meant to be comedic I feel as though the message aligned perfectly with that of this article.

This topic was admittedly a lot more content heavy than what I was expecting when I was preparing to complete the assignment. I found myself re- reading sections either because I wan't too clear on the content, or simply out of shock that the writer was saying such things. Overall I found the topic of crisis actors and other conspiracy theories truly interesting, however the I found the tone of the piece fairly dark.

Chapter 5 Blog Post

When I began to read this chapter I became very excited. After reading Chapter 2 I figured that economist function much like scientist. This however left me wondering if there was a way that they measure human response to the law of supply and demand. I knew that there had to be some practical way of plotting response and this chapter essentially answers most if not all of my questions pertaining to the matter.

I however didn't think that there would have been so many conditions when determining whether the market was elastic or not. The idea of incorporating revenue into the idea of supply and demand made perfect sense, yet I failed to understand that the term 'elastic' could be applied to everything. I think I will most likely get tripped up on questions on the chapter test relating to calculating prices such as the  cross price of demand and price of supply, due to all of the equations however I know all it requires is a little more practice/ studying. Overall I am actually pretty ecstatic about this chapter because it includes so many basic algebra concepts, and I find it cool that the disciplines are mixing.

Chapter 4 Blog Post

Chapter 4

I found this chapter to particularly interesting, because I immediately made the connection back to the ten principles introduced in Chapter 1. While the sixth principle skimmed the idea that interests controlled the market economy, this chapter fully explained the phenomenon that is Supply and Demand. While I thought that I actually had a good idea of what Supply and Demand was, I found myself learning new concepts and ideals such as supply schedules or inferior goods. I have never taken into account the many external factors that may effect the demand curve, however this chapter expressed these catalyst in a way that was easy to understand.

Question(s):

Can supply and demand really be graphed in such a linear fashion (as shown on pg. 78)? As the price becomes exceedingly expensive I assumed that the demand might drop exponentially, so this surprised.

Is there an industry that can afford to stay at a constant equilibrium quantity (an example)?