Entrance Ticket
• How do you decide how you spend your
money?
• Do you ever second-guess yourself and wish
you had spent your money differently?
Explain.
Agenda
• Go Over HW
• Notes
• Skit Activity
• Exit Ticket
Going over the HW
• What are the positive and normative analyses
of the federal minimum wage debate?
Positive vs. Normative Economics
• Positive Economics: an analysis limited to statements that are
testable [SUPPORTED BY RESEARCH]
• Normative Economics: an analysis based on value judgments
[OPINION]
***Often, these
analyses conflict when
discussing social or
economic policy
Positive or Normative?
What is economics?
• the study of how society
chooses to allocate its
scarce resources to the
production of goods and
services in order to satisfy
unlimited wants
• In other words, the study
of scarcity and choice
Source: Survey of Economics
Scarcity and Wants vs. Needs
• Scarcity is the condition in which human wants
are forever greater than the available supply of
time, goods, and resources
• So…if we say happiness = having everything you
want, money cannot buy happiness because of
scarcity
Opportunity Costs
• the value of the best alternative use of that resource
• Ex) If you spend time and money going to a movie, you cannot
spend that time at home reading a book, and you cannot
spend the money on something else
• Ex)
Skit Activity
• Using your knowledge of
opportunity costs, create
at least TWO brief skits
that illustrate alternatives
to a given scenario
• For full credit, everyone
must have a speaking role
in at least one skit
Group 1
What are the opportunity costs of
skipping school?
Group 2
What are the opportunity costs of
going to school?
Group 3
What are the opportunity costs of
sleeping in on the weekend?
Group 4
What are the opportunity costs of
spending your whole
allowance/paycheck on one item?
Group 5
What are the opportunity costs of
eating only junk food?
Exit Ticket
• How might considering opportunity costs
make you a better decision maker?
• How might they also make you unhappy?