Crash Course in Economics

Economics is

• The study of money

• The study of wealth

• The study of business exchange

• The study of choices

The Opportunity Cost can best be described as

• How much money your product can be sold for

• The money you must pay to the government to produce goods

• The value lost of the next best alternative choice you could have made

• The money lost by purchasing something instead of making it yourself

Scarcity is the economic law that needs and wants are ________________ but resources are ________________.

• unlimited / limited

• limited / unlimited

• benefits / costs

• costs / benefits

Good economic decisions are made when the benefits of a choice are greater than the

• costs

• community

• needs

• desire

The opportunity cost of spending on the military are all of the following EXCEPT

• more schools

• improvements in wifi accessibility

• longer summer daylight hours

• lower cost public university education

In order to have everything we could ever want we would need

• Republican policies

• Democrat policies

• unlimited resources

• a strong religious base

In economics, incentives are used to

• insure government control of the people

• influence the choices people make

• insure the poor are taken care of

• drive a wedge between the rich and the poor

Incentives often backfire because they rely on predicting how people will behave. For example, an incentive to pay teachers based on the number of students who get A's would likely result in

• teachers giving all students A's

• students working harder

• teachers working harder

• students dropping out of school

A producer asking the question, "Should we use glass or interchangeable plastic on the face of our new phone?" is a

• microeconomic question

• macroeconomic question

• both a micro and macro economic question

• none of the above

Lawmakers asking the question "Will cutting taxes end the current recession?" is a

• microeconomic question

• macroeconomic question

• both a micro and macro economic question

• none of the above