Economics HL - Jacob Solomon's group - Year 1

Hello, In this article it talks about how the shares for GE fell in response to a lower revenue than expected. The fall in revenue of General Electric was caused by a slower than expected growth in the European credit crisis. It says even though GE was making a profit, the slower European market causes them to have a decrease in revenue. They say that because if the credit crisis sales in Europe are not as high and even though people are still purchasing products, the growth at which sales in Europe should have increased are increasing less than what GE wants them to. GE claimed that they are going to change their market footprint through new products and technology in order to increase their revenue and thus increase their shares. From Tim

This article concerns the fact that "China's fiscal revenue soared 25% to record in 2011". This is related to our study of revenue. This means that its is an abnormal profit.

Sirius XM Radio was once saved the "January Effect" thanks to their merger several years ago. They experienced the benefits of economies of scale as a much larger organization, which brought the two previous companies back up in stock. However, they are still facing many challenges because economies of scale do not solve all problems. Some of the issues: "A low profit margin of 9.2 percent, and an astronomical Total/Debt to Equity of 492. Also, the rapid change in broadcasting technologies, and the Internet radio gaining ground, it is a matter of time before satellite-radio becomes obsolete. Satellite subscriptions are part of consumer spending that is usually negatively affected by a weak economy, consumers will not spend excessive money on this."

As many of us know, Canada has a great healthcare program that is provided by the government. The US, on the other hand, has opted in the past to keep healthcare a private good. The American goverment is now seeing negative repercussions of this decision, and this article outlines how they are thinking of modelling their healthcare system after Canada's by introducing government healthcare insurance. Although this may not completely eliminate private healthcare companies, it may discourage them for the reasons we learned in Week 12. This idea of reforming the current policies has stemmed from stories of families who have gone broke after needing emergency surgeries while not being able to afford insurance.

because of the the high debts of europe, US export will mostly rise in 2012. In addition to this, the declining dollar index and rising wages of emerging economies has made U.S. goods cheaper abroad.

Hello, This article talks about problem and the negative externality an 5,000 gallon oil spill has caused in a local river, which covered over two miles. The article talks about the clean up act and how some fish are dying. The article does not talk about how the dying fish will affect local trade, however, I think it should not affect it that greatly due to the fact there are other rivers and seas from which to fish in and the river was quiet small. However, the oil could get into people's drinking supply and it could make people ill. From, Tim

This article relates to government intervention in the form of increasing the minimum wage in some states. However, this increase was met with an increase in unemployment; which we also looked at. This unemployment is caused by a high price where supply is greater than demand, and the need for workers therefore decreases (increasing unemployment).

A government sponsored agency currently controls the prices for dairy products in Canada. This was implemented because the government wanted to regulate the prices paid to dairy farmers and the amount of milk they could produce, in order to protect the farmers. However, problems have begun to arise because of these price controls, mostly due to the fact that the market price is much higher than it should be (which hurts consumers) and it is costing billions of dollars each year.

This is pretty neat considering it relates to people our age living in Canada (aka me!). The Canadian government, who have set a minimum wage of $9.60/h for youths and $10.50/h for those older than 18, have decided to subsidize part or all of the payroll given out by small business to their student employees. The purpose is to try and invest in student employees so that they get the work experience they need. Although not mentioned much in the article, minimum wage plays a big roll, as now it is the government paying for the wage they set themselves... perhaps there is a chance it will be changed in the future for this reason.

Are individuals having the chance to control their payment by using direct debit or is it Direct debit controlling each individuals payment schedule (watch only 1st part of the video) Money is still withdrawn from an individuals account even if there is nothing there. They could face fees from their bank (and sometimes their supplier) if they don't have sufficient funds to cover the payments. Because fixed direct debit payments are calculated using previous consumption figures, some payment amounts will not be exactly equal to the individuals actual usage. This means they may end up paying too much or too little to their supplier. The individual would also lose some flexibility in the way they manage their finances.

This article shows an importance of price control on goods. Because of the high diesel and gas prices, people's life are being affected, in a negative way. First of all, people who own cars will fell the financial pinch, because now they spend a lot more on diesel. And lives will not keep running, in some contexts, without cars. And diesel is a fuel for heating too. Canada's winter is freezing cold, without heating, life will be miserable. To ensure people's welfare is protected, a price ceiling for diesel, in this case $1.44 cents per litre.

This article is about how the Indian government is going to end its drug control policy. By keeping the "anti-competitive" policy, the Indian government has been artificially keeping the supply of drugs low.

This is an example of an excise tax because it is a tax on products that aren't environmentally friendly and the article mentions that there is political pressure to put the ecotax "on the shelf" so consumers can make better decisions. 

Hello, In this video it talks about how the fuel prices have tripled over the last 20 years. It says that most of it has come from taxation and how in January the tax will increase by 3p a liter. This will translate that the average price will in by $1.50, however, if the government decided not in impose the tax then they would lose out of $1.5 billion of much needed revenue. Today, people spend a lot of their income on fuel and for people who own their own businesses they need have as much burden as possible because they will lose their demand. All in all, the government can keep the drivers and motorists happy by not increasing the tax or increase there revenue to help themselves out of the European economic crisis. From Tim

Farmers are angry at the loss of subsidy provided by the government. Household income has been higher than ever, therefore less subsidy was provided.

This article discusses the current issue in the United States when it comes to the price controls for sugar. Not only has it cost a lot of people their jobs, it is also eliminating the possibility for the growth of more jobs. And the problem isn't just with the jobs...the price control for sugar has caused an increase inprice in many goods that use to make their products...such as breakfast cereal....so even thought the price control is meant as a normative economic action...it may negatively impact the market.

A market failure occurs when the transaction between a buyer and seller imposes costs on a third party and these costs are not included in the price paid. The third party impact is called an externality. When the externality is negative, like in this scenario, then we should try to limit the consumption, thus raise the price, however this has evidently not happened.