This 7 minute video will explain how comparative advantage works when workers specialize and rearranging what / who produces to increase trade. This video will aid in the mastery of EPF. 9 (a) (b) and (g).

In the Comparative Advantage courses, students meet Jack Of All Trades, a most awesome superhero. In all tasks, Jack can do everything better and faster (he has absolute advantage), but does that mean he must do everything while the rest of the people stand around helplessly? Find out if justice is served when a formerly idle citizen, Andy, wades through the depths of opportunity cost and the benefits of comparative advantage.

Most people are interested in seeing workers earn a decent wage. But how does that happen? Is forcing employers to be more generous the key to rising standards of living? To find out how to raise livng standards, this video looks at big differences in wages: from 100 years ago to today; and between poor countries and the US. Through these examples, economists identify productivity and output as the key to increasing living standards.

People are passionate about professional sports—they give people pride and a sense of community. And they create economic benefits for the community. But should tax dollars be used to subsidize sports stadiums? The May 2017 issue of Page One Economics describes some pros and cons.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Researchers at the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science have developed a new genetic pathway that can be used to co-opt E. coli bacteria to produce maleate, one of the most important industrial chemicals in use today. A chief component in the coatings of substances like nylon and galvanized steel and an important stabilizing agent in pharmaceuticals, maleate is typically produced through harsh treatments of crude oil. But by using genetically engineered microorganisms to produce maleate, the researchers have developed a much more sustainable approach. Maleate is the end product of a complex chemical reaction. Bacteria don’t normally come equipped with machinery to power this reaction, so the researchers had to design a ground-up approach before they could start harvesting maleate. This required careful analysis of the intermediates needed for maleate synthesis and the identification of genes that could help E. coli make each of these molecules..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Exploring Movie Construction and Production contains eight chapters of the major areas of film construction and production. The discussion covers theme, genre, narrative structure, character portrayal, story, plot, directing style, cinematography, and editing. Important terminology is defined and types of analysis are discussed and demonstrated. An extended example of how a movie description reflects the setting, narrative structure, or directing style is used throughout the book to illustrate building blocks of each theme. This approach to film instruction and analysis has proved beneficial to increasing students’ learning, while enhancing the creativity and critical thinking of the student.

Introdution into Economic thinking.  Learn about the Factors of Production and Production Possibilities.

Oil prices affect the U.S. economy in many ways. For example, fluctuations in the price of oil can influence inflation, unemployment, and disposable income. Some local economies with close ties to the oil industry, however, are affected even more directly in both positive and negative ways. The May 2015 issue covers one recent example of the local impact of oil prices.

Students become “experts” and make creative presentations about the different ecological roles of producers, consumers, and decomposers at local and global scales.

Students learn about consumers and producers and give examples from the book The Little Red Hen Makes a Pizza. They become producers by making bookmarks. The students draw pictures on their bookmarks of something that happened at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end of the story. They become consumers when they use their bookmarks to mark a page in a book they are reading.

This collection uses primary sources to explore the Bracero Program. Digital Public Library of America Primary Source Sets are designed to help students develop their critical thinking skills and draw diverse material from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States. Each set includes an overview, ten to fifteen primary sources, links to related resources, and a teaching guide. These sets were created and reviewed by the teachers on the DPLA's Education Advisory Committee.

Students learn about life-cycle assessment and how engineers use this technique to determine the environmental impact of everyday products and processes. As they examine what’s involved in making and consuming cupcakes, a snack enjoyed by millions of people every year, students learn about the production, use and disposal phases of an object’s life cycle. With the class organized into six teams, students calculate data for each phase of a cupcake’s life cycle—wet ingredients, dry ingredients, baking materials, oven baking, frosting, liner disposal—and calculate energy usage and greenhouse gases emitted from making one cupcake. They use ratios and fractions, and compare options for some of the life-cycle stages, such as different paper wrapper endings (disposal to landfills or composting) in order to make a life-cycle plan with a lower environmental impact. This activity opens students’ eyes to see the energy use in the cradle-to-grave lives of everyday products. Pre/post-quizzes, worksheets, activity cards, Excel® workbook and visual aids are provided.

Students develop the production possibilities frontier model while discussing the value of models in general in explaining complex ideas. They see what movement along the production possibilities curve entails on both the constant-cost curve and a bowed curve indicating increasing costs. They discuss ways a society can consume beyond the limits of its production possibilities through specialization and trade, as well as through an increase in resources, capital investment, and technological advance.

          In economics, a production function relates physical output of a production process to physical inputs or factors of production. Firms use the production function to determine how much output they should produce given the price of a good, and what combination of inputs they should use to produce given the price of capital and labor. The production function also gives information about increasing or decreasing returns to scale and the marginal products of labor and capital.

Are many products made in the United States anymore? As it turns out, yes. In fact, U.S. manufacturing output is near its highest level ever—and with fewer workers. How is that possible? Productivity growth. The March 2017 issue of Page One Economics describes what affects productivity, why economists are concerned about its recent slowdown, and what can be done about it.

Students observe the teacher produce a paper taco and then produce their own paper tacos. Students learn about the productive resources and intermediate goods used to make final goods and services. They listen to the book Tortilla Factory and identify the productive resources and intermediate goods used to produce corn tortillas. Students classify the resources used to produce their paper tacos.

Over 200 years ago, Adam Smith attempted to explain why some nations are wealthier than others. Today, the gap between rich and poor countries is even larger. The September 2017 issue of Page One Economics describes how total factor productivity contributes to economic growth and how growth leads to a rising standard of living.