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I came into this class thinking that economics is just the study of the supply and demand of the products and services that are available in the country. I have learned through reading the first chapter of the book that there is so much more to it than that. I was surprised to learn about the economy running on scarcity of resources, which makes sense. There are ten principles of economics that I had no idea existed. People have to make tradeoffs in their lives. Not just with money but also with their time and personal resources. The cost of something comes down to what you are willing to pay for it. Again, this does not have to be monetary. People think about the margin of things when they are assessing the cost of something. Doing a cost/benefit analysis of decisions is a rational choice. I learned that trade can benefit both sides and even if you are in competition with another person or even another country, everyone can benefit from working both with and against each other. The description in the book of the differences between a market economy and a Communist economy was interesting. I learned about Adam Smith’s theory of the “invisible hand” and how it says that people’s decisions tend to help the economy as a whole and it is better to keep the government from having too much of a say in the economy. Government can help, though, through regulations, police and the court system. Our standard of living is dependent on our ability to use our resources to make products and use our time to provide services. Inflation causes prices to rise when the government prints too much money. This makes some sense to me but at the same time almost does not. Why would the government print out more money? The final principle of economics discussed has to do with the connection between inflation and unemployment. When there is more money in the economy, there is more spending on goods and services, which creates the need for more workers. This in turn lowers the unemployment rate. How can you figure out the fine line between inflation and lowered unemployment?