Kobe Bryant is an Economist

The NBA season is getting ready to tip off, which marks my favorite time of the year. The holidays are right around the corner and the basketball season will be in full swing within the next 30 days.  One of my favorite players, Kobe Bryant, is in the process of rehabilitating his achilles tedon, which he tore in the playoffs last May. Some said his career was over, and most thought he would not be back for a while, possibly missing all of this upcoming season.  But noone expected Kobe to be where he is now.  He is probably still at least two and a half months away from playing in an official game, but Bryant has amazed everyone with how quickly he is recovering. Time and time again Kobe has proved that he is the league's toughest player, but he must have been doubting himself big-time in the training room this past May.  The regular season wasn't ideal. The Los Angeles Lakers did not live up to expectations, and they were lucky to make the playoffs. Kobe knew the diagnosis as soon as the injury occurred. He knew that he was done playing basketball for a while.  But instead of being helped off the court, he actually slid the tendon back into place for the time being and shot his free throws before walking off the court under his own power.  That right there is enough to show why he is the toughest player in the NBA. After the game, Mr. Bryant had some decisions to make.  He realizes his age is climbing. What does he value more? His health or basketball? For a lot of people, the easy decision would be to retire.  Surely Kobe has more than enough money to support his family for generations to come. But I am willing to bet that the easy decision for Kobe would be to rehab his ankle and do everything in his power to make a comeback.  After all, the only things Bryant has known are loyalty, toughness, and winning.  In more ways than one did Kobe have to think like an economist.  Would he retire or attempt to come back? This decision was probably easy.  His values are very clear. It has always been about basketball.  aHow would he go about his rehab? There are probably more ways than one to go about a torn achilles tendon.  Did one way have a higher marginal benefit than another? What about the opportunity cost of the process? Would he have to sacrifice some time of the regular season for a full recovery? Or maybe one way was more risky but allowed him to return sooner. Kobe had no other choice but to act like an economist the day everything went wrong last May.  I just can't wait to see my favorite player return, hopefully sooner rather than later.

Is GDP a Good Indicator of how the Economy is Doing?

I don't believe that GDP is a good indicator of how the economy is doing.  GDP does not take into account anything that is sold on the black market.  Although it may be illegal and I personally do not approve of it, selling things in the black market provides jobs for some that are not qualified or are not in a position to get a job that counts towards the GDP.  No matter how hard the government tries to eliminate the transactions that happen illegally, they will always happen.  The black market provides jobs and keeps money flowing, but does not count towards GDP.  It's almost impossible to count the black market, so GDP cannot count it accurately. Therefore, GDP cannot accurately measure the economy's success.

The Need for Greed

A topic in Econ this week was greed. Naturally, the question that arose was, "is greed a good thing or a bad thing?"  Over the years, I've noticed that I've become much more opinionated.  That's not really a good thing or a bad thing, it just kind of happened.  However, I'm having a tough time deciding if greed is good or bad. My initial instinct was that greed is definitely beneficial to society.  And in a lot of cases I still stand by that.  Without greed, there are no world leaders.  Without greed noone is being taken advantage of and being stepped on, which sounds like a good thing. But in a way, since no one is being taken advantage of, isn't everyone being taken advantage of? To prove this, let's go back to the Prehistoric Era.  A Tyrannosarus Rex was a breed of dinosaur that was strictly carnivorous.  But as a group, all T-Rex's decide that eating other dinosaurs is greedy because they are taking away the lives of others for their own good.  So all T-Rex's stop eating and die out, affecting the whole biosphere and causing all dinosaurs to die.  There's my theory on how the dinosaurs became extinct; because T-Rex's stopped being greedy.  In order to make it to the top, sometimes people must be greedy and do things they aren't proud of. It's a way of life. Hunt or be hunted.  With all this being said, there are certainly perks of greediness.  But too much of a good thing can be dangerous.  I believe that is is greed that has caused this technology-geared generation.  Kids want more, and they want more now.  When I was in elementary school, my friends and I were always playing basketball outside or making up games to play.  Nowadays, the parks look like something out of an old western film, with a tumbleweed passing through and no one to be seen. Everyone is too busy inside on some sort of technology. Second graders have cell phones and iPods. It kills me to say that, because I am way too young to sound like my dad or grandpa telling me how hard he had it as a kid.  But the greed and wants for tangible items at such an early age has destroyed the imagination of kids.  During any given passing period at Conant, you could be bumped into ten to twelve times by students wandering around with their heads down looking at their phones.  The greediness kicks in because everyone wants to feel popular: to have the most Facebook friends or the most followers on Twitter. Noone knows how to use their imagination effectively anymore.  The creativity in a student's mind is used to gain retweets and favorites on a post, it's not used for innovation or anything productive for that matter.  Maybe I'm wrong and I just have a skewed vision because it's just one school: monkey see monkey do.  Either way, the point is still evident.  Greed can either exploit one's potential, or greed can completely destroy it.

Washington Takes A Vacation

The government is indefinitely on break. Barack Obama is taking some time off and vacationing in the Bahamas. Every politician residing in Washington D.C. is currently drinking piña coladas with his or her feet up poolside at a five-star hotel, using the money that they are getting under the table while everyone else turns the other cheek.  Obviously, this is not true, but it might as well be.  The Sentate and House are unable to agree on a federal spending budget, and as soon as the deadline of 12:00 midnight on October 1st passed, the government shutdown was effective. No, that does not mean that the USA will break into a state of emergency, similar to that in the recent movie, "The Purge." For the most part, everything will function normally.  Cops will still be patrolling the streets and responding to emergency calls, security guards will continue to protect, and Congress will work on reaching an agreement.  However, non-essencial expenses, such as museums and transportation for college games between schools such as Navy and Army, will be cut.  That leaves the employees who work at these expendable locations unemployed for the time being, which is an obvious problem.  To me, the arguments between the Republicans (House) and Democrats (Senate) sound eerily similar to the ones I hear between girls in the hallways of James B. Conant High.  Both sides will refuse to admit that they are wrong, and it becomes a challenge of who can convince more people to hate the other side. No ground is gained, and in fact, the problems escalate, all communications cease and the only things that are exchanged are dirty looks. That being said, the conflict in Washington holds a little more significance than the very sophisticated bickering between the teenage females venting at their lockers to their friends.  The Democrats want to fund everything.  The Republicans are also in favor of funding everything with the exception of ObamaCare.  Maybe I'm not in any position to do all of this bashing on the parties of Washington, because my background political knowledge is very thin, almost to the point of embarrassing.  However, I know that an unnormal amount of stubbornness must be present for a politician to be successful, along with a very good poker face and very good lying abilities.  Therefore, I'm going to go ahead and guess that one of these parties knows that they are fighting a losing battle, but they are trying to bluff and save face by holding out in hopes of the other party caving.  Only time will tell with this, and for the sake of America, let's hope its sooner rather than later.

Spongebob's Supply and Demand

The topic of the week in Econ is supply and demand.  I can't think of a better example of supply and demand than in an episode of Spongebob Squarepants.  In this particular episode, Mr. Krabs, an economist if there ever was one, is having a yard sale.  He convinces Spongebob to buy a hat that holds soda cans and has straws connecting to the mouth for people that would like to drink their soda in a hands-free situation. Believing it is totally worthless, Mr. Krabs tells Spongebob that it once belonged to Smitty Werbenjagermanjensen, and that "he was number 1!" Rumors surface that the hat is the last of its kind, and it is very valuable.  Someone offers one million dollars to Spongebob for the hat, but he declines because it belongs to Smitty.  Mr. Krabs is beside himself for selling such a rare and valuable hat.  However, the following day, a warehouse is discovered that contains dozens of the hat, and all of the sudden the price drops drastically and the hat is basically worthless.  The demand for the hat was high because the supply was thought to be low, so the price skyrocketed.  But once the supply increased, both the demand and price dropped drastically.

Syria and the President's Decision

A couple of weeks ago, President Barack Obama spoke on national television about the issues in Syria.  His take was clear; Obama does not want to get America involved, but he will if he believes it is called for.  When Mr. Obama said "America is not the world's policemen," he had my attention. I completely agree with this statement, but at the same time, he still leaves that overlooming promise that the USA will not hesitate to do the right thing.  The issues in Syria could potentially escalate into something worse if not handled correctly.  One motto that we have lived and died by is "America does not negotiate with terrorists."  Syria is and will be no exception.  Obama may not be the best president in history, but he has my support with when dealing with the Syrian government.

The NFL Season is Back

This past thursday, September 5th, 2013, marked the beginning of the NFL season. Between watching my favorite teams and managing my fantasy roster, I have very little free time on sundays.  Throughout the week, I am constantly looking at my fantasy football rosters (I currently manage four teams) to make sure I put myself in the best position to win.  Like any other fantasy owner, I'm always faced with decisions.  Just this week, I had to decide whether to start Robert Griffin III or Cam Newton. The Panthers were playing Seattle, one of the top defensive teams in the league.  Who do I value more at this point in time? Which quarterback's marginal benefit is greater? Weighing the pros and cons, I decided to go with RGIII, whose Redskins are playing a much weaker Eagles defense.  Cam Newton, sitting on my bench, only had 12 points, so as long as Griffin can produce more than that, this economic risk will have paid off for me.