Chapter 8 Lecture Notes - Introduction to Economic Growth and Instability
- Economic Growth
- Outward shift in the PPC Curve and results from
- Increase in resources/technology
- Increase in real output per capita
- Measuring tool for the potential and living standards
- Growth as a Goal
- Allows a nation to satisfy its populations wants/needs
- Lessens the burden of scarcity
- Arithmetic of Growth
- When dealing with billions and trillions of dollars, small percentages add up quickly
- Rule of 70
- Main Sources of growth
- 2 Fundamental ways society can increase real output/income
- increasing its inputs of resources
- increasing productivity of its resources
- found by dividing output by hours worked
- Growth in the U.S.
- Growth in things other than GDP
- Improved products and services
- Things that can be done at grocery stores – Publix
- Added leisure
- average work week has gone down from 50 hours to 35 hours
- Other Impacts
- Stress to physical and work environment
- Business Cycle
- Define – alternating rises and declines of the economy over time
- Peak
- Recession
- Trough
- Recovery
- Causation
- New technology
- Productivity levels
- Spending habits
- Cyclical Impact
- Capital and Durable goods affects the most
- Unemployment
- Labor force consists of
- 16 or older and not institutionalized
- Employed
- including part time workers
- Unemployed and seeking employed employment
- not discouraged workers
- Formula
- Types
- Frictional
- time it takes to find a new job from usually being laid or fresh out of school
- you have the skills but just need to find a job
- Structural
- lack the skills needed to perform jobs today
- vcr repairman – must get retrained
- Cyclical
- result of insufficient spending or a recession
- leads to loss of self respect, morale, social and political unrest, family trouble
- Full Employment
- “Natural Rate of Unemployment” = 4-6%
- Job seekers = vacancies
- GDP Gap and Okun’s Law
- Happens when the economy fails to provide jobs for everyone who is looking for them
- GDP Gap
- defined difference between actual and potential GDP
- when the unemployment rate is above the NRU a negative gdp gap is formed because the gdp is falling short of where it should be
- Arthur Okun’s Law
- for every 1% above the NRU, there will be a negative 2% gdp gap
- this helps economist discover what the loss in revenue/output will be
- Inflation
- Measurement
- CPI
- Types
- Demand-Pull Inflation
- Stems from excess spending
- Explain the Aggregate Supply Curve
- Illustration:
- Cost-Push Inflation
- Stems from rising per-unit production costs – meaning input/resource costs, thus decreasing supply
- Main source of this are “supply shocks”
- Redistribution Effects of Inflation
- Depends on anticipation – if anticipated than adjustments will be previously implemented to adjusts for the inflation
- Unanticipated:
- Who is hurt?
- Fixed income receivers
- Salaries
- Pensions
- Rent recipients
- Savers
- CD that gains 6% interest annually will hope that inflation is less than 6% or else they will be losing money
- Creditors
- Who is helped?
- Flexible income receivers
- Social Security
- Individuals with COLAs
- Debtors
- Anticipating Inflation in Rates
- Nominal Interest Rate
- NIR = real interest rate + inflation premium (expected rate of inflation
- Illustration:
- Hyperinflation
- Speculative measure are taken to counter inflation that leas to further inflation
- I perceive inflation is coming so I spend more to not feel the effects of inflation as much and this leads to further inflation not to mention potential devastating effects on the redistribution of finances
- Illustrate
- Stagflation
- Higher rates of inflation accompanied by lower output higher rates of unemployment – thus yielding higher prices and nobody able to pay for them and ultimately leading to a downward cycle that is difficult to recover from