Economics with Emphasis on the Free Enterprise System

Economics with Emphasis on the Free Enterprise System and Its Benefits is the culmination of the economic content and concepts studied from Kindergarten through required secondary courses. The focus is on the basic principles concerning production, consumption, and distribution of goods and services in the United States and a comparison with those in other countries around the world. Students examine the rights and responsibilities of consumers and businesses. Students analyze the interaction of supply, demand, and price and study the role of financial institutions in a free enterprise system. Types of business ownership and market structures are discussed, as are basic concepts of consumer economics.

The impact of a variety of factors including geography, the federal government, economic ideas from important philosophers and historic documents, societal values, and scientific discoveries and technological innovations on the national economy and economic policy is an integral part of the course. Students apply critical-thinking skills to create economic models and to evaluate economic-activity patterns:

IDENTIFY basic economic concepts.

a. Define scarcity, opportunity cost, trade-offs, productivity, inflation, deflation, monopoly, free enterprise, oligarchy.
b. Construct and graph demand and supply schedules.
c. Determine equilibrium price on demand and supply schedules and curves.
d. Describe how the laws of supply and demand interact.
e. Analyze the importance of imports and exports.
f. Compare the relationship of microeconomics and macroeconomics.

EXPLAIN how people organize for the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and service.
a. Explain how the scarcity of productive resources (e.g., human, capital, technological and natural) require the development of economic systems to make decisions about how goods and services are produced and distributed.
b. Identify basic business organizations, include advantages and disadvantages of each.

DISCUSS relationships among the various economic systems such as households, business firms, banks, government agencies, labor unions, and corporations.
a. Analyze the behavior of the consumer and the producer in a market economy and their impact on price.
b. Evaluate the role of organized labor on the United States economy.
c. Interpret the phases of the business cycle.
d. Explain the American banking system.
e. Explain the operation of the stock market.
f. Discuss government controls on our economy (e.g., monetary policy, fiscal policy, federal reserve, etc.).

UNDERSTAND global connections, conflicts, and geographic interdependence.

a. Distinguish between domestic and global economic systems and explain their interaction.
b. Apply economic concepts and reasoning when evaluating historic and contemporary social developments and issues.
c. Evaluate the domestic and international impact of various economic agreements (e.g., NAFTA, EEC, GATT, etc.).
d. Recognize economic trends.

COMPARE how values and beliefs influence economic decisions in different societies.
a. Compare cultural and religious differences that affect economic decisions.
b. Contrast the public assistance systems of the United States and other nations (e.g., Japan, Germany, etc.).
c. Contrast the United States’s free-enterprise system and European socialism.

The Economics curriculum encompasses five units of study, each focusing on major points, projects, and skills:

UNIT I: ECONOMIC VOCABULARY

- Identify the economic dimension of common English words used daily in the news or in the newspaper.
- Make posters showing land, labor, and capital. Draw or use magazine art to indicate understanding of the concepts.

UNIT II: CHARTS & GRAPHS

- Use charts and graphs to help illustrate the condition of the economy (e.g., local, state, national).
- Use data to help compare the condition of multiple states or nations in our global economy.
- Discuss opportunity cost and scarcity of how our time is spent.

UNIT III: THE COST OF DECISIONS (OPPORTUNITIES)

- Develop a school or personal budget to spend $2,500 per month. consider opportunity costs of each item. include all resources (e.g., capital, natural resources, time, etc.).
- Determine the "costs" and "benefits" in saving money.

UNIT IV: PHYSICAL SYSTEMS

- Research and write an essay on the effect of physical events on human settlement on different regions (e.g., earthquake, hurricane, tornado, etc.).
- Research and create a class map of different types of climate regions.
- Develop a chart identifying the physical system of the oceans (e.g., currents, etc.).
- Analyze different ecosystems and create a presentation.

UNIT V: SCARCITY

- Analyze the ways in which economic systems seek to resolve the three (3) basic economic problems of choice (determining what, how, and for whom to produce) created by scarcity.
- Create a diagram, graph, illustration, etc., to reflect the concept of scarcity.

Back to the Social Studies Department