Micro Econ AP 2nd Semester 2019

     Why is soccer, or football as it is known by the rest of the world become the most popular sport by an overwhelming margin? Simply put, you can attribute the popularity to the economics of playing soccer.      Looking at the map, I can already infer why some sports are the most popular in certain countries. Ice hockey is likely so popular in Canada, Latvia, and Finland because both are very icy countries, and modern ice hockey was invented in Canda. British sports like rugby and cricket are so popular in Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh due to their colonial legacies. American sports are popular for likewise reasons in many Latin American countries, Japan and the Philippines. Yet why is soccer so prolific in so many countries that have almost nothing in common? Select two countries at random where soccer is the most popular and unlike other sports, they will more likely than not, have different climates, histories, cultures, and lang

In class, numerous clips described the phenomenon of average NBA teams who, unable to make the playoffs, decided to trade off good players and "tank" to the bottom. Their motive? To gain a high position in the following year's draft and draft a superstar player who could turn their losing record around and make the team a champion. However, Akira Motomura, an economics professor, says tanking to the top and building a team from a draft isn't really helpful for improving the overall trajectory of a team. The reason for this is that even if a team has the worst record in the entire NBA season that year, they still have a chance of not getting the top pick. The draft is set up so each team ranked between the worst 1-4 each have proportionally higher chances of being first pick, but the worst 1 team still has a chance of picking say, fourth. And this is bad because studies have shown that while the number 1 pick of a draft season may be a superstar, the difference in s

It is currently the morning of April 26th, the day the blog posts are due in class. I have completed 7 of the required 8 blog posts, with the 8th being this one right here. I wanted to explore the opportunity cost of writing this blog post at the very last second. Was the procrastination worth it? If not now, when could the blog have been completed? I think back to last week when I came home from school and took a 4-hour nap instead of doing any work. Had I been more on top of things, I could have easily written a blog post and a multitude of comments that afternoon. Instead, I chose to enjoy, might I say, a thoroughly wonderful nap. Conversely, I am currently using my last “late start” of the week to munch on cereal while writing this last blog post. I would’ve liked to use this morning to do something of my choosing like, go to the gym or play some video games. Instead, because I chose not to write the post last week, I’m forced to write it now. It’s difficult to quantify which s

There has been talk for many years around raising the minimum age requirement for purchasing tobacco products like cigarettes and vaping devices nationwide. However, just recently, Rite Aid and Walgreens both increased the age for purchasing cigarettes from 18 to 21. But why is this? Even though I don't agree with this logic, having a larger consumer base would create more profits, especially for users between the ages of 18-21 who might use cigarettes very frequently. If I were interested in making profits, I would not have made this decision. So why did it happen? Do these drugstores just have bad economists? According to the article, the drugstores have received "more than 1,550 warning letters from the FDA and has been hit with 240 financial penalties since 2010." In addition, Walgreens has been under a lot of pressure ever since the FDA called them the "top violator" among pharmacy chains for selling tobacco products to minors. After knowing thi

We're very fortunate to live in a society where we can simply request any medicines we want, whenever we want. Have a headache? Simply get some over-the-counter painkillers! There's a ton of different over-the-counter drugs. However, what about drugs that treat rare diseases? How do these affect the economy and how are they priced? Oftentimes, large companies that produce these drugs simply stop producing them because they don't feel it's making them any profits, and instead focus on making drugs that benefit the majority of people. The opportunity cost of producing these drugs was too high for the companies. However, in the 1980s, an act was passed by the government because they saw this issue and how it affected people. It was called the Orphan Drug Act, and it did a few things, like providing a 50% tax credit for clinical testing expenses related to drug development, waiving some regulatory fees for drug companies, and providing grants to drug companies for re

How many times have you ever wished you could visit a different place in the world. If you were lucky enough you actually even got to visit this place you hoped to visit, but have you ever really thought about the interconnected network behind tourism itself. The tourism industry is the world's largest and most complicated industry and this complexity is due to the interworkings of social, cultural, political, and environmental issues. The accelerated growth of ecotourism is dependent on many factors. Natural attractions such as oceans, mountains, rivers, etc. are all common commodities to attract people to different parts of the world. Recently life has become more comfortable for many of the developed countries. With the aid of technology, life has become easier, people have lived longer, and therefore it has become an effort to explore more and enjoy life. The accelerate growth has caused many scholars of the 20th century to call it the century of tourism. As the amount of

"How US can justify spending even more on defense ‘when we can’t manage to turn the lights on in Puerto Rico’" It's a good question. Donald Trump signed a $1.3 trillion budget for the 2019 year, more than the next 10 nations combined. This is an absurd amount of money, especially if there are domestic problems that most would consider a better use of tax payer money. Stephen Miles, director of the Washington DC-based Win Without War advocacy group, mentions healthcare and the opioid crisis in particular, stating that, "when we can’t help those suffering from opioid addiction get treatment, and when we can’t ensure education and healthcare to all of our citizens, how is it possible we can justify spending billions more on weapons...?" Democratic 2020 Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders believes that this is exactly what needs to change. He proposes using the over-inflated military budget for more useful governmental programs such as healthcare, public educa

The root cause of the lack of affordable housing in the bay area is a basic law of supply and demand in economics, people want to live here, and there aren’t enough homes to go around. The abundance of sunshine, relatively easy access to bustling cities, endless coastline, and exposure to a variety of cultures makes the Bay Area incredibly alluring. This combined with the draw of the highly prestigious and opportunity rich Silicon Valley causes housing in the Bay Area to be in high demand. Thirtysix of the Fortune 500 companies are headquartered in the Bay Area, which is greater than any other metropolitan area except New York City. In 2017, the combined revenue generated by these companies was $1.3 Trillion Dollars. “As of September 2017, of the 216 start-ups worldwide with a $1billion valuation, 56 were from the Bay Area, versus 52 from the balance of the rest of the US”. The lack of supply of housing the Bay Area contributes greatly to the crisis and is caused by interest

Calabasas may be one of the richest and most popular neighborhoods in America. Los Altos Hills in fact is among some of the wealthiest. These neighborhoods continue to grow in wealth and attract more wealthy families willing to buy multimillion dollar homes to be right in the heart of the silicon valley.  However, as these neighborhoods grow, so do the price of everything around it. Homes, transportation, rent not just for apartments but also stores also increase tremendously. There is already a huge problem with teachers and the housing crisis. Many of them drive a couple hours each day just to get to school. This is definitely the case for gas station clerks and other people that make even less than our teachers.  If prices continue to raise around the area, these people will have to move further and further away. This will make it hard for a community to be built if the essential people like teachers can't live around the area and service it. The effects of this m

The makeup/beauty industry has been around for ages. Apparently, historians can trace the industry back to 4000 BC to when Egyptians used to use kohl to create a smoky eye look. Today, it is estimated that the makeup industry is worth about $6.5 billion. You may wonder... how did the industry grow this powerful? Well, there are many factors. One of the highest driving factors has to be the influence of marketing. One of the most noteworthy marketing platforms of today would have to be Instagram. Instagram started in 2010 and has now become the hub for celebrities and netizens to interact with each other at the convenience of their phones. How do you ask? I'm sure you've seen it before! Companies often pay artists and other highly regarded individuals to advertise their products. A representative at Lashify, a company selling products such as false eyelashes, speaks on the costs of hiring these celebrities to advertise their products. It wasn't cheap. She was told to

Baseball was once the most popular sport in our country, back in the 1920’s when we had only radios to listen to, and not mobile apps that would update us every second of the scores or the high-definition televisions that we have today. When TVs came into existence, this popularity shifted over to football and basketball, which was faster paced and much more exciting to watch on a TV screen. And it’s been that way ever since, with these two sports leading as the number one and number two sports in the US. But sports analytics are becoming increasingly popular, and baseball is a game of stats and numbers. It's very interesting to see the type of analytics that can be applied to baseball, which may take it to another level as part of the fan experience. In the present day, we can take massive amounts of data, up to millions or billions of data values, structured or unstructured, and organize it to pick out detailed information and generate statistics. With all the data at our

As a consumer of eyeglasses myself, I know that buying glasses is quite pricey. Many glasses range from $200-$500 in price at stores. At LensCrafters, the average pair of glasses is about $300. In reality, the glasses cost $25 or even less to produce! Consumer prices for frames and lenses are so astronomically high, with markups often approaching 1,000%. You may be wondering why you're paying the price of an extreme mark up. It is simply, a monopoly. There are many companies dominating the eyeglass industry. To mention some are: Sunglasses Hut, LensCrafters, Oliver Peoples, Pearle Vision, Target Optical, and Sears Optical. Most of the lenses are produced by a company named Luxottica. It currently controls about 80% of the $28 billion global eyeglasses industry. The demand for eyeglasses remains constant. There will always be a demand for 2020 vision because there is no "cure" to poor eyesight (unless you do lasik!). Having control over the pricing of a huge variet

Following Marvel's successful film, Avengers: Infinity War, it left in the audience in disbelief and demanded the next sequel immediately. Marvel indeed does that but they did such a way in an effective manner. Opening weekend for Endgame estimates an $850 million to $900 million global box office. Endgame is reported to spend over $200 million of promotional cost which was $50 million more than Infinity war. Many argued that even without spectacular promotional efforts, Endgame would still break its box office records. However, Marvel's tactics were to expand the demographic of fans and build more anticipation through their smart advertising. By keeping its trailers to the minimum and not revealing much, it made fans more engaged for the movie to release. Ticket sales began this month and demand had been so great that is had crashed sites like AMC. What Marvel is doing with Endgame is like no other. They have been able to invest in the audience over the past several years

In class, we learned about the history of the NBA draft system and the #1 overall draft pick, which started with the last place team getting #1, to eventually seven teams competing for this player. In the current day, as another blogger mentioned, the last three teams in the standings have the same chance at getting the #1 draft pick, while this chance decreases as we move up the standings: Team 1 > 14.0% Team 2 > 14.0% Team 3 >14.0% Team 4 > 12.5% Team 5 > 10.5% Team 6 > 9.0% Team 7 > 7.5% Team 8 > 6.0% Team 9 > 4.5% Team 10 > 3.0% Team 11 > 2.0% Team 12 > 1.5% Team 13 > 1.0% Team 14 > 0.5% How does it work in other sports? In the MLB draft, teams are assigned a draft order based on their record in the previous season, as per the Mariners blog page. The first ten draft picks are reserved for the last 10 teams, and cannot be changed. The rest of the picks are also based purely on the standings from the previous season meaning the worse y

Fantasy sports are online games where participants compose virtual team made up of professional athletes and compete for in-game points or even real life money. The number of fantasy players has quickly risen from 500,000 in 1988 to over 30 million in 2010. Social Media has played a great impact on that number as it influences people to explore the fantasy world. Fantasy sports has been an economic impact tallied over $2 billion dollars. Along with fantasy sports, comes fantasy football. More than 70% of fantasy sports players play fantasy football. Fantasy football has been described as addicting and players seem to be attached to their teams come football season, but how much impact does fantasy football have on the NFL? NFL revenues had grown each and every year. According to NFL.com, about 59% of Americans follow the NFL.  With people wanting to follow their fantasy team, the NFL had partnered with DirecTV to broadcast out-of-market games for $500 million more than their pre

Before the start of the 2019 MLB season, it was about just 4 weeks prior big stars such as Bryce Harper and Manny Machado had even signed contracts and as of today, two all-star pitchers, Dallas Keuchel and Craig Kimbrel have yet to sign. MLB fans were upset as they continued on waiting and guessing whether or not these key players were on their way to joining their teams. In baseball, there is no salary cap. The MLB has still implied the luxury tax which dates back from 1994 which avoids the implementation of a salary cap. Although big-name baseball players are making big bucks, it is argued that they are getting underpaid under the MLB free agency system. Players make a minimum of $545,000 as a rookie in 2018. Teams are able to hold on to players for their first 6 years of playing time. The average age of MLB debuts in 2018 was 24 years old. For the average MLB player who debuted, they won't become a free agent until they are 30 years old. With training and technology advanc

    During class, one of the many intricacies of the NCAA that we discussed is the One and Done Rule. The rule prevents players from entering the NBA straight out of high school to try and give players at least some high level education should they not succeed in the NBA. One thing that was touched upon but never fully discussed is how injuries and player eligibility can affect this process.     One idea that was brought up by both a student and the documentary was the health of a player after they are drafted. If a player becomes injured immediately after being drafted, they are more likely to have teams take a chance on them, increasing their chances of falling out of the NBA. This is an argument used by the NBA and NCAA to force at least one year of college on upcoming players. However, one point to be made against the One and Done Rule, other than the insignificance of that year of college, is if a player is injured before they are drafted. If a NCAA athlete gets injured b

Unions in the workforce have always been a point of contention. while many laborers see it as a necessity for job security, companies have numerous concerns, some valid and some not. One issue that has come up is the conflict of interest between the states and actual companies. A lot of the time, the workers are gaining money off of the losses of the state. This argument leads to the idea that when unions have less power, people actually get reduced taxes because the state loses less money on bureaucratic issues. For teachers specifically, unions are especially important not just for job security but also for education freedom. Because teachers are funded by the state, without job security they will be compelled to follow the agenda and rules of states even if it may be harmful for the education of students. With a union, they are able to better teach the curriculum without the reaching effects of state agendas. Employers, including both governments and corporation who are against

Recycling is a much-needed thing with the current way our environment is headed. As CO2 emissions rise, and the amount of trash and plastic in places they don't belong, recycling can help some of our environmental issues. Not only does recycling benefit our environment in a positive way, but it also has a large impact on our economy. Each year, recycling companies generate $200 billion for the U.S. economy, although this number fluctuates up and down this is still quite a large number in of itself. Although it might seem as if the U.S. was profiting off of recycling due to crushing cans and selling them to recycling plants, that is not true. First of all the recycling industry bring in many jobs. According to the EPA, recycling accounts for 757,000 jobs and $36.6 billion in wages across America. Think of every single green garbage can waiting outside of a house to be picked up by trash collectors. Then think of all the facilities this recycled material needs to be brought to a

The Deep Web is a critical portion of the web that is not indexed by popular search engines such as Google, Bing, etc. The Deep Web consists of almost 90% of the internet, and this portion is inaccessible using the general public domain. In order to access the Deep Web, users must use the TOR browser, which allows them to access the deep web through an anonymous connection. The Dark Web is a part of the deep web that has both legal and illegal portions. Many tor websites are available on this portion of the web, some of them being very informative and others storing illegal products and services within it. Despite having very similar names, the Dark and Deep Webs are very different from one another. The deep web is the entire web that is not accessible by general search engines, whereas the dark web consists of certain websites within the deep web that are linked to criminal activity and illegal market places. The dark web is known for hosting various illegal markets, includi

Fashion these days is a really big deal worldwide. As we watch cultures influence the style we wear, we also seem to follow it on a global scale. Things such as New York fashion week, and who wore what dress to the golden globes have become a really large part of mainstream media. However, fashion wasn't always sought after, especially not in the U.S. Before the 1900's clothing was hand-made. Fashion and clothing as a whole was not an activity in which you could go shopping at the mall for a new look. People made clothes so that they would have something to wear. It was done out of a practical sense. However, by the beginning of the 20th century there was the rise of the Industrial Revolution, and with that thousands of new inventions to make one's life easier. These new technologies, such as the sewing machine, led to the rise of Capitalism in our country. Factories began sprouting up quickly through the country, and assembly lines became more common because people wa

Warning: this post contains spoilers for the movie "Avengers: Infinity War." Thanos, the space warlord titan of the Avengers universe had a supposedly perfect plan to bring balance to the universe. With all of the Infinity Stones in his possession, his single snap at the end of the movie eliminated half of all sentient life in the Marvel Universe. While this outcome did not "feel so good" for those eliminated by the snap, the real balance of the universe still was unachieved because of the economics behind this half extinction. This curiosity led me to something surprisingly quite established: Thanosian Economics or Thanosnomics.  The rationale behind Thanos' plan draws heavily from the economist Robert Malthus who proposed the idea that the human populations grows exponentially while food supply sees linear growth. As a result, the finite resources will result in a decline in economy, otherwise known as the Malthusian Trap. This occurs when suppl

Uber has been one of the frontrunners of the self driving car industry, investing almost 20 million dollars a month for the past 3 years. While this is very costly, if the self driving car technology is able to work, Uber will dominate the ride sharing market that is growing at an unprecedented rate. As of right now, Lyft is Uber's greatest competitors, and has a much better public image than Uber, as they treat employees much better, are more transparent about their policies to employees, and have comparable rates. However, if Uber is able to use self driving cars, their profit will increase dramatically, as they no longer have to pay drivers, and can turn the majority of their revenue into profit.  As of right now, there are many issues with self driving cars, as there are many safety issues, and sometimes they go out of control. The earliest operational self driving cars are projected to come out at around 2022. If a self driving car operated by Uber crashes and kills some

Creativity's kind of weird in that it's quite human-exclusive. Penguin prostitutes, monkey handymen, and insect menial labourers all exist, but no other species has anything quite like the creative industries. This is further supported by the fact that animals (probably) don't have gods, spirits, cults, religions, or legends like we do. At first, creativity was a by-product of our intelligence and manifested in religion, cooperation, and problem-solving. In other words, it was just another survival mechanism. But once humans figured out how to trade shells and mint coins, humans also figured out how to assign values to things. And then how to assign values to actions. So how much is a thought worth? A creative endeavour? Can you put a dollar sign on Plato's The Republic , or the theory of relativity, or Fermat's last theorem, or the fundamental theorem of calculus, or Beethoven's fifth symphony? Well, I'm cheating a little. It's a lot easier to put a v

Broadway theatre has produced many outstanding shows in the past few years, a couple being Hamilton and Les Miserables. The amount of creativity and effort that goes into these shows is huge and that is why people are always craving more for them. For tourists on a trip to New York, a Broadway musical is surely to be on their list of things to do. Seeing as these plays are so popular, I researched into how much influence Broadway has on our economy. In the year of 2016, Broadway musicals contributed approximately $12 billion dollars to New York's economy, with almost 50,000 tickets sold each day for every day of the year. Because there are 41 theaters accessible all around the city, profits stay pretty high on a consistent basis. But research indicates that the top ten most popular plays of all shows that go on during the time generate the majority of the revenue - around 52%. This is not surprising as people are inclined to attend the more interesting plays. Many Broadway sho

When one hears of “the silk road,” many may jump to the name of the trade network that spanned China about 2000 years ago. However, with the widespread usage of companies like Fedex and UPS, which deliver goods via airplanes and a network of trucks, the horse-drawn carts of that time have become extinct. As shopping moves to the internet, in a wave known as e-commerce, people use websites like Amazon and Ebay to market and purchase goods. A lesser known, and more infamous website borrowed the “Silk Road” name and created a blackmarket goods ecommerce website. The creator is Ross Ulbricht, or known as Dread Pirate Roberts on the internet. The website has now been taken down for its trading of illegal goods, but prior to, it was only accessible via Tor. It’s called a “dark web” website, as it’s not indexed by Google or search engines, and must be accessed in a special way that “normal” internet users don’t do. The website was wildly popular for its anonymity, yet was secure in a way

      If one were to mention the popularity of the NBA, the first teams to come to one's mind would be large market teams, such as the New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers. Despite not having any regular or post-season success, they are continually brought up in talk shows discussing everything that comes to mind: possible free agents, TV ratings and revenue, etc. In order for smaller teams to become relevant in the media, they first have to become successful in the league, such as the Milwaukee Bucks who have made headlines as the #1 record from seemingly out of nowhere.       However, what happens to small market teams who are not as successful? This is where the NBA has met a lot of criticism. In order for small market teams to compete, it becomes necessary to have some level of talent, preferably young players who are projected to have a future promoting the team. As a result, many teams who have less talent turn to the annual draft to pick up new talent. However, th

If you've watched the movie Ready Player One, you might remember that one scene where the villain explains that gaining control over the Oasis means that he'll be able to pretty much cover the visual field in advertisements. If you've been on any video streaming website (e.g. Kissanime, 123movies), you might've experienced the most annoying pop-up and banner ads that cover as much of your screen as possible. If you've watched videos on platforms like Twitch and YouTube, you've definitely had to sit through 30 second ads that they won't let you skip. They even buffer sometimes. Advertisements are just one product that try to get you to pay attention, and for good reason, too. For every second that your eyes are on the ad, the company behind it might  just convince you to buy their product, whether it's a really weird Old Spice advertisement or a really sick Smash Ultimate trailer (the latter actually worked on me). Here's the interesting thing: you