4. The role that the FDA plays in setting food safety requirements is inherently costly to the economy. The function is not based on economic concerns but rather public health concerns -- the FDA's mandate dates to Congressional concern about the Elixir sulfanilamide disaster and traces its roots to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, which documented meat production in Chicago at the turn of the 20th century (FDA.gov, 2009). Thus, decisions about FDA regulations are not made on the basis of economic good, but rather public good. Increased regulations would impose increased costs on business. In classical economics, these costs would act as a form of tax, increasing risk and discouraging investment. Eliminating these requirements would lower these costs, which would allow for an expansion of the food business. It could be argued that the threat of litigation today would counterbalance the need for regulations, but that claim has not been proven. Moreover, the risk such a situation would put on Congress and the FDA would be politically untenable.
Hot dogs may not be healthy, but reducing regulations on their content would carry significant irony in light of The Jungle being the impetus for the original Food and Drugs Act that founded the...
There are many potential actions that could have been taken to help prevent the closing of GM and the job losses, plant closings, and economic catastrophe that is likely to occur as the once unstoppable giant collapses (Wolff, 2009). The UAW won above subsistence level wages for GM employees, which should have theoretically had the same effect as an economic stimulus in the traditional Keynesian sense. However, rather than being
(Major Schools of Economic Thought) This theory was born from the crucible of a Great Depression and a World War. Chicago theorists vehemently disagreed. They made the argument that the wealth of nation's increase when the market is allowed to naturally price goods and services. Spending would unnaturally change the prices of these goods, thus changing the reaction of the market to the goods, causing a misallocation of wealth
Keynesian Theory Neoclassical economists are naturally more reluctant than Keynesians to concede that capitalism as a system might be dysfunctional or that markets might be irrational and inefficient, leading to cycles of boom and bust, mass poverty and unemployment, which happened in the 1930s and is happening again today. One of the main assumptions in the classical model is 'full employed equilibrium' or in other words 'absence of involuntary unemployment.' The
Economics The Keynesian economic theorists follow an economic model that considers three factors in macroeconomic growth. These are income distribution, savings, and investment functions. These factors are derived from the theory's determination of equilibrium in the economy as determined by the relationship between employment, prices, and gross-domestic-product (Padalkina 18). The theory suggests that the economy does not have full employment, autonomous demand-component affect rate of growth, and investment decisions are not
The moral of the story is that even though sticky prices are in no one's interest, prices can be sticky simply because price setters expect them to be" (para. 18). This real life scenario is what Wolfgang Munchau suggests is leading to the global economic crisis. Munchau argues that the world leaders' failure to act has resulted in a global coordination failure, and the global recession that is currently
Keynesian Revolution: Analysis and Criticism believe myself to be writing a book on economic theory which will largely revolutionize -- not, I suppose, at once, but in the course of the next ten years -- the way the world thinks about economic problems" John Maynard (Keynes, Letter to G.B. Shaw, January 1, 1935) Prior to the Keynesian Revolution, may economists and politicians viewed economics from a "micro" perspective. They saw factors such
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now