Revolutions upon revolutions…
ECONOMIC DECISION MAKING
The Problem:
 How to provide a high standard of living for
all members of society.
The Solution:
Economics
 Economics:
 The study of the way in which societies make
decisions about the goods and services they will
produce to meet the wants and needs of their
citizens
Standard of Living
 A measure of the consumption of goods and
services that individuals and groups privately
and or collectively can achieve
Factors that define standard
of living:
 Income levels
 Diets
 Medical care
 Safe water supply
 Educational levels
 Choice available to people
 Life expectancy
Compare:
 Democratic Industrial Societies:
 Material well being
 Social mobility
 Individual autonomy
 Aboriginal Societies




Sacred respect for the land
Kinship with all living beings
Sharing of economic wealth
Opportunity to contribute to the groups well
being
Standard of Living
 Maintaining a high standard of living means:
 Deciding what a high standard of living is
 How to organize society so that the necessary
goods and services to support the standard of
living can be produced
 How to distribute the goods and services to all
who want them
So what is essential to a
high standard of living?
So what is essential to a
high standard of living?
 Infrastructure
Infrastructure:
 Industrial societies are based on a complex
system of political and economic
organizations known as an infrastructure
which make possible the production of goods
and services
Will beliefs and values
influence a nations
infrastructure and economic
organization? How?