Mr. Aroune's Economics

Research Project: Assignment 1

Good day to all of you economic bloggers. I hope your level of frustration has not reached the boiling point yet. I am very excited to have the opportunity to experiment and promote these important internet tools. I know we are entering into a new and unfamiliar academic area for many of you. Please have patience with me and with yourself. The benefits one can gain from such an endeavor will hopefully change your academic and intellectual future for ever.

Task: You are charged with choosing a sector of the market and formulating a hypothesis as to which product in that market will fair the best during the holiday season. The objective of the assignment is to introduce you to several very important tools of technology that will aid you in your research. These tools include several social bookmarking sites (delicious, etc), several collaborative online sites, and blogging your experience.

Your assignment for the weekend is to complete the following.

(****This is an optional function. This assignment can be completed without utilizing Firefox) Down load fire fox as your web browser and make that your primary internet research vehicle. http://www.firefox.com/
Look over the extensions under the tools tab on fire fox. These are going to be some of the tools we utilize in our project. Internet explorer also has extensions. See me in class and I will guide you through this process.
Download the delicious website from the following site http://del.icio.us/
Once you have downloaded the site, begin to follow the tutorial.
Open up blogger.com and begin to blog a new post that identifies the following information. You must introduce your assignment with some background. Discuss the market and sector of the market you are going to target. Discuss your hypothesis and why you choose that particular market and statement.

Classwork and Homework Hotline

Welcome to our Economics Hotline.

Students can access all of the current classroom assignments by clicking on the hotline to the left.

The Puzzling Economics of the World of Sports

Societies Values and Norms and

the Laws of Supply and Demand:

Students are asked to read the following blog and complete the assignment.
Allen R. Sanderson, associate chair of the Department of Economics at the University of Chicago, teaches a course on the economics of sports and does research on competitive balance, sports labor markets, and economic impact analyses.

In the following article, Mr. Sanderson begins to ask the question, why are professional athletes vilified about their salaries, when many other industries make much more?

http://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2004/Sandersonsports.html

Assignment: In a blog, no less than 400 words, give your opinion as to the questions brought about by Mr. Sanderson. Take into consideration the concepts and and ideas of economics previously discussed in class and the importance of understanding human behavior.

Assignment 1

Assignment 1:

The following letter was received by the U.S. Department of Agriculture April 1, 1982. Read the letter and answer the questions on your blog, using complete sentences.

Dear Sirs,

My wife Molly and I are interested in getting into the "NOT RAISING HOGS" business. Out next door neighbor Horace Buntley has been raising hogs for the past 25 years and the most he ever made was $11,000. Last year he said you fellas paid him $15,000 not to raise hogs. Now this sounds like a pretty good deal to me so Molly said I should write you people and find out how to get stated not raising hogs.

First off, are there any particular type hogs you fellas preferred we didn't raise. Not that it matters to us much, but we would prefer not to raise razorbacks (ornery little suckers) but if you people in Washington would rather we didn't raise Blues or Poland Chinas that's O.K. with us. Now we thought we would start on a small scale by not raising 10,000 hogs next year, but we've got no objection to say - - 20 or even 30,000 if you fellas rather we not raise that many. Our places here is kind of small so I don't think we would have the room to not raise any more unless we bought Horace's place. By the way, Molly and I had another thought. Now these here 10,000 hogs we won't be raising won't be eating 100,000 bushels of corn. We understand you fellas pay people for not raising corn also. So what Molly and I want to know, will you pay us for the 100,000 bushels of corn that we won't be feeding to the 10,000 hogs we won't be raising.
Since Molly and me would like to get started in the not raising hogs business as soon as possible we would appreciate you sending us any free pamphlets you have on the subject.

Yours truly,
Homer Plowright,
Omaha, Nebraska

Contact Discussion Questions:
1. What is the basic irony or dilemma expressed by this letter?
2. What is the government attempting to do by paying people not to raise hogs, etc.?
3. What literary tool did the critics of big government use?
4. What social value does this story convey?

Students should write their responses on their individual blogs.

Supply and Demand According to You

Wouldn't it be great if you as an individual could tailor your learning to your greatest passion in life? Whether that passion being snow boarding, dance, sports, reading, etc. Once and for all, you as an individual would be able to pursue your education down a path that interests and engages you.

Well, now is the time. Our Economics class has been discussing the concepts of demand, supply, and supply and demand. These economics principles are historically two of the more difficult principles to understand. In this assignment, students will need to identify a subject of interest. That one "thing" that is a passion in life. Mind you, only appropriate "passions", as previously defined in classroom discussions, are acceptable in this school assignment.

Students will take their passion and construct an economic analysis of that passion, focusing on how the principles of demand, supply, and suply and demand play a role in their particular passion. While constructing this economic analysis, students need to fulfill a content requirement. They must incorporate into their writing, several economic terms and principles. This incorporation needs to be a part of the bigger analysis of their particular passion. In otherwords, do not simply identify the principle and discuss its relationship to the passion in an isolated manner.

Students will then blog their analysis and post these blogs on the internet.

Here are the economic terms and principles that must be incorporated into the blog.

Demand, Quantity Demanded, Market, Demand Schedule, Law of Demand, Normal Good, Inferior Good, Substitute, Neutral Good, Complement, Elastic Demand, Inelastic Demand, Supply, Law of Supply, Quantity Supplied, Supply Curve, Supply Schedule, Elastic Supply, Inelastic Supply, Shortage, Surplus, Equilibrium, Equilibrium Quantity, Equilibrium Price.

Whenever you incorporate these principles, your blog needs to change the color of the font, or underline the princples, in order to allow these principles to stand out.

Good luck and enjoy.