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A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
Lesson Objectives
Understand that economics is a social science
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
What is Economics?
Come up with as many keywords which you think
represent ECONOMICS
When tackling the question What is economics? the best
starting point is the fact that economics is a social science
Why do people generally buy more of something when the price falls?
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
Forming a hypothesis to
explain how consumers
spend their money
Developing predictions
from the hypothesis
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
New or revised
hypothesis
The evidence does not
support the predictions, so
the hypothesis is amended
or rejected
Further Tests
Economists respond to this so-called criticism by arguing that they are only concerned
with positive economics, which is based on quite strict use of scientific methodology
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
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Positive Statements
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Normative Statements
Normative statements can be expressed as what should or ought to be
A normative statement expresses a judgment about whether a situation
is desirable or undesirable
"The world would be a better place if the moon were made of green
cheese" is a normative statement because it expresses a judgment
about what ought to be
Notice that there is no way of disproving this statement
If you disagree with it, you have no sure way of convincing someone
who believes the statement that he is wrong
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
Over to you
Decide whether each statement is either a positive or normative
statement
Come up with 5 positive and 5 normative statements about The Kings Academy
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
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Summary
Economic methodology involves applying tested theories to
help explain real-world economic behaviour
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS
Looking ahead
In preparation for the next section of work find working definitions of the following economic terms
A-LEVEL ECONOMICS