This session provided you with a brief context and gave you an overview of economics.
- You learnt that economics is all about the efficient allocation of scarce resources to satisfy human wants:
- Scarce resources are limited in supply
- Scarce resources are used to produce goods and services
- Economics can be better understood through economic models, which can be analysed to gather insights. Economic models can be:
- Simple, with few factors
- Complex, with many factors
Economics and economic models assume the following:
- Behavioural assumption: Human beings make rational and utility maximising decisions
- Institutional assumptions: A functioning government allows healthy economic activity
- Ceteris paribus: All other conditions (apart from the one being analysed) remain constant or unchanged