My Economics class is finally finished with all that dull vocabulary that infuses the assumed advantages of the free enterprise system into the curriculum.
So now we are on to just studying the free enterprise system and thus onto supply and demand. Now we'll start off that the book as one chapter on demand, one chapter on supply, and one chapter on supply and demand and how they create an equilibrium price. There is a full four pages on the fact that the demand curve is slanted this way \ and that the law of demand states that the quantity demanded is the inversely related to the price. This little nutshell is nested in four pages of relevant but oh so unnecessary text.
So we did a little lab. Given that it is Valentine's Day tomorrow (the most annoying of holidays for high school teachers see what one student is giving his girlfriend of two weeks) and I teach the entrepreneurs of Lee we did a little self study of what we could sell over the next couple days at Lee High School. The described their chocolates, their teddy bears, and their rose delivery; they established potential prices and then they surveyed each other to see what they could sell for... all very organic, ya know?
My example: A box of twelve chocolate covered cherries.
At $12.00 none would buy it; at $9.00 two would; at $6.00 five would; at $3.00 nine would but if I gave them away for free none of them would take it. Not one. They told me my candy was tainted. They did the same for each of their own products, assuming that if it was being given away for free there must be something wrong with it; that or they didn't want to give their Valentine stuff they got for free.
So the demand curve now looks like a fishhook (>) ; and it isnt' the thought that counts. Oh, and my candy is tainted.
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Yes, that fishhook part is where the psychology of "too good to be true" comes in. In similar fashion, dishonest people are more likely to get ripped off in scams, because they fall for the idea that the world really works by these tricks and loopholes.
Trivia question thought: do they often ask what the first published book by a famous author is? I would think there would be mileage in that.
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