Naked Economics Essay

Charles states in this chapter of the book that the government being the only provider for a good or service is extremely inefficient. He uses examples such as the postal system. The only reason the government should take sole responsibility for goods and services if the private companies won’t be efficient in doing so. Like the Department of Motor Vehicles, if other private companies start giving out licenses they may give them to people that shouldn’t receive them. The government, however, can give the responsibilities of the postal service and that in return will give them to develop in other areas. Charles also states that the government doesn’t always have to do the work. For example, the government just writes out plans and then hires bidding contractor companies to construct projects like highways, buildings, and shopping complexes.

Answer four (4) questions. Maximum of 400 words for each question. These are questions which require short answers to a series of issues relating to economic principles and concepts.

READ: Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science, Charles Wheeland, W.W. Norton, 2003. Completely- cover to cover.

12. What advice about investing in the stock market did you find most interesting and/or useful?

The main point of chapter two is to explain why economies do not have a fixed number of jobs regardless of manpower. This is a common misconception whereas an increase in the manpower of an economy will increase the unemployment rate. However, due to large numbers of migrations that have occurred recently, real world experiments can be observed to understand the impacts. What has been learned from these events is that a reactive economy can handle fluctuations in the size of the workforce satisfactorily. The Mariel boatlift is a good real world example of a large migration from Cuba to Miami had little impact on employment and wages in Miami. The economic explanation for this illogical occurrence is due the ability the Miami economy was

Freakonomics is a humorous and intriguing book about taking off the top layer of a situation and understanding what is happening underneath. Through everyday examples Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner take perspectives that are unheard of in any other writing while simultaneously comparing the most unique and uncommon ideas to each other. As they study everyday life, readers see insight to the ways in which the world really functions and runs. As they study the world the authors continue to ask questions, thus continuing to challenge the reader to seek for a deeper answer. Through these highly untypical questions, Levitt and Dubner are able to display that the root of economics itself is incentives.

In the eyes of the authors, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, economics is not seen as a monetary subject but rather a subject with the ability to gain answers through the utilization of interesting, yet out of the ordinary questions. These “out of the ordinary questions” can be seen as the backbone from which the collaboration was written. Levitt and Dubner structured the novel in this way to explore and reveal “the hidden side of everything.” They focus on the incentives behind people’s motives in all different aspects of society—from sumo wrestlers to crack dealers—and connect the surprising similarities with each other. After reading what Levitt and Dubner had to say, I established that the authors’ goal in creating such a novel was

6. If you have a private-ownership right to something, what does this mean? Does private ownership give you the right to do anything you want with the things that you own? Explain. How does private ownership influence the incentive of individuals to (a) take care of things, (b) conserve resources for the future, and (c) develop and modify things in ways that are beneficial to others? Explain.

This chapter basically says that government is good to a certain extent, but like most things, too much of anything isn’t good. The author states that all people play a role in the economy including the government. Wheelan explains the there are some things the government has to do and has to get involved in if they believe a private sector will fail in that role, such as the role it has on the Department of Motor Vehicles (pg. 82). Wheelan states that government should not be running the postal service due to technology but I disagree. I believe that within the next century the world is going to be overrun and ultimately dominated by everything technology. Until there is a secure and financially stable element that can sustain the United States

Through out the entire book Freakonomics, Levitt and Dubner, emphasize how people are constantly responding to incentives, and how these incentives motivate and affect people’s decision making in their daily lives. The authors of this book talk about economics from a different perspective, and they do it by relating unusual and unasked questions to the field of economics. Levitt and Dubner define an incentive as the “means of urging people to do more of a good thing and less of a bad thing” (Levitt and Dubner 17). These incentives are usually what drive people to get what they want or need especially when resources are scarce and others want the same things. In this book, the authors define three types of incentives – economic, social, and moral – which are measured by people’s responses (Levitt and Dubner).

When I was first given this assignment I was extremely perplexed at how I would even begin to finish it. I had no idea how economics related to my life in anyway. I hadn’t thought about it critically and I struggling terribly. Thanks to some much needed help from a fellow classmate, he allowed me to get an idea of things from his own essay. After reading not one, but two other essays, I was so surprised at how oblivious I had been. I never realized that just about everything that goes on in my daily life is, in fact, economics. I never realized that from the things I buy to the money I earn from working is all economics. The things I miss out of while working or going to school is a complete opportunity cost. Or even

In the United States economy, the market experiences the highs and lows of economic patterns. Nature disasters, government intervention and the influences caused by investment trends in the market signal these economic patterns. Many recognize Coca-Cola as an important part of American culture. Coca Cola displays its image on hats, T-Shirts, newspapers, public places, and advertisements. This common recognition proves that Coca-Cola has significant strengths. To enter a market successfully, a company must be aware of the product cycle of items it intends to sell. Today Coca-Cola is the world’s leading manufacturer in the

. Through the process of reading, I learned many things about the economy. First of all, I learned that it is a much more difficult decision to come to in regards of how much government involvement in the nation’s economy is enough, how much is too little, and how much is not enough. I also learned that trying to keep the economy stable and productive is a constant and difficult struggle, and that it is often difficult to even know what needs to or can be done in order to stabilize it. While I find economics to be somewhat boring (I am a music major and largely emotionally driven, which means that my entertainment is usually emotionally involving somehow), I actually enjoyed how Wheelan explained economics in this book. While I would not read it for fun, reading this book as an assignment was not painful.

2- Essential Principles of Economics: A Hypermedia Tex, 1998,r A. McCain, http://william-king.www.drexel.edu/top/prin/txt/EcoToC.html, Accessed on 22/04/2005.

We are in an age often referred to as the information age. In this information age, we believe that information leads to power and success. We have been collecting tremendous amounts of data.