I'm a graduate TA teaching a career-planning class to college freshmen who are undecided about their majors. Pretty much every student in my class thinks that the only careers that "help people" are services like nursing, social work, teaching, etc., so if you choose to do anything else, it's because you care more about lining your pockets than "helping people." Usually, the other grad student TAs and I don't get to choose what we teach, but we've been given a free day where we get to teach whatever we want, and I want to use it to totally dispel this notion that making money and/or going into business is evil, selfish, and diametrically opposed to "helping people."
I've hinted at this concept in previous classes, but every time I start to say anything that sounds even remotely like economics their eyes glaze over (these are college freshman...12 years of government schooling has utterly destroyed their minds). So I need something that a 7-year-old could understand, and a 13-year-old would be excited by.
Any suggestions for emotionally-inspiring, easy to understand, and can-be-presented-in-75-minutes-or-less arguments, quotes, videos, sound clips, etc. that I can use to make the message really stick? Any help here would be greatly appreciated!
I would start by explaining the differences between the real market and mercantilism/corporatism.
Semper Fidelis
Simply say something "crazy" like "you can make tons of money and help people too!" Then go on to lay out the case for getting into business: you make money by producing goods and services that help the consumer. All exchange is voluntary, so both parties (the producer and consumer) will most likely benefit. The more money you make on the free market, the more help you're providing to people.
It's that simple.
Mises Community Natural Rights Discussion Group
Explain to them how economics applies to everybody and everything, and that if more people understood economics we would all be far better off. If people are ignorant of or apathetic towards economics your best bet to spark interest is to relate what your teaching to what's going on in the world. With the economy in a deep depression now is the time to bring on the relevance! Ask them their thoughts on why the economy is where it is, hear what they have to say. I'm sure a lot of them will give you the typical idiot response "baaah! deregulation! derivatives! greed! capitalism! wall street!" Tell them why they're wrong in great detail; this should get them riled up and interested. At least by doing this you will probably make at least one of them go home and read something.
After you've gotten their attention you can start talking more about economics in general, just make sure you keep relating it back to what's going on so they have something to follow along with. For instance, if you're discussing the failure of so many big financial companies and the GM/Chevy, etc. you can explain competition, and explain that in a free market these companies would all be bankrupt. You can discuss what the Fed has done/is doing and explain why it's wrong, and then explain why central banking (planning) can never work. Best of luck to you!
- Chris
mprimeau: Pretty much every student in my class thinks that the only careers that "help people" are services like nursing, social work, teaching, etc., so if you choose to do anything else, it's because you care more about lining your pockets than "helping people."
Pretty much every student in my class thinks that the only careers that "help people" are services like nursing, social work, teaching, etc., so if you choose to do anything else, it's because you care more about lining your pockets than "helping people."
The world would be paradise if no one and nothing built houses, cars, roads, machinery, farmed, mined, or cooked. Thank you college freshmen for letting me now that this is how the world works.... see what I did there? I just took their statement, and made an observation/logical extension of it. Keep doing that, and eventually they'll concede that they're wrong. If I were you, I'd make them feel stupid until they respected your position. It's very, very, easy to do that when you're right.
The appeal to "charity" is a truly ironic one. First, it is hardly "charity" to take wealth by force and hand it over to someone else. -Rothbard
Unfortunately your task seems to be quite impossible. There's nothing inspiring about free-market capitalism, nothing heroic, no story line behind it. "Capitalism" is simply a character of the only true economic system, which has always existed, and will always exist. Socialism, on the other hand, has narratives; the working class struggle, the 'abuses' of the upper class, the morality of 'fairness,' ect., ect. Essentially, capitalism has no gimmicks, and as such, is usually dismissed/misunderstood by the naive and ignorant. People want plot lines, they want a story, and most of all, they want to get behind something emotionally.
If you want to inspire them, get them emotionally attached to the notion of freedom (equal opportunity), and talk about coercion. If they buy your argument, they will eventually find 'capitalism' on their own, and support it.
Calling and Occupation
Gary North: Making a Difference, Making a Living
How To Get Rich . . . and Why
Gary North: Making a Difference in the World
If you find something evil that wobbles, push it. - Gary North
May I recommend Garet Garrett's novels?
The Mises website has them I believe.
I really think that taking the "economics lecture" approach is the wrong idea here. When it comes to things like life choices, you often have to appeal to emotion or morality. I think selective Ayn Rand would be a good way to inspire some pride (although I'm not sure how easily it could be strung together in a lecture).
For instance,
Men have been taught that the highest virtue is not to achieve, but to give. Yet one cannot give that which has not been created. Creation comes before distribution - or there will be nothing to distribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiary. Yet we are taught to admire the second-hander who dispenses gifts he has not produced above the man who made the gifts possible. We praise an act of charity. We shrug at an act of achievement.
Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads armed with nothing but their own vision.
It's so easy to run to others. It's so hard to stand on one's own record. You can fake virtue for an audience. You can't fake it in your own eyes. Your ego is your strictest judge. They run from it. They spend their lives running. It's easier to donate a few thousands to charity and think oneself noble than to base self-respect on personal standards of personal achievement. It's simple to seek substitutes for competence - such easy substitutes: love, charm, kindness, charity. But there is no substitute for competence.
The man who attempts to live for others is a dependent. He is a parasite in motive and makes parasites of those he serves. The relationship produces nothing but mutual corruption. It is impossible in concept. The nearest approach to it in reality - the man who lives to serve others - is the slave. If physical slavery is repulsive, how much more repulsive is the concept of servility of the spirit? The conquered slave has a vestige of honor. He has the merit of having resisted and of considering his condition evil. But the man who enslaves himself voluntarily in the name of love is the basest of creatures. He degrades the dignity of man and he degrades the conception of love. But this is the essence of altruism.
Of course, your mileage may vary. Ayn Rand is a very divisive figure.
I swear by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.
mprimeau: Any suggestions for emotionally-inspiring, easy to understand, and can-be-presented-in-75-minutes-or-less arguments, quotes, videos, sound clips, etc. that I can use to make the message really stick? Any help here would be greatly appreciated!
To be honest, people don't do business to serve consumers with selfless dedication. Being selfish turns out to be good for everyone in a market economy. Try to put that out to your students. And only economics can make that happen.
So try making your presentation on the importance of economics rather than trying to be emotionally appealing. The appeal a Statist can generate can't be matched. All that we can do is defeat Statists through economic logic.
Hahaha using Rand and Gary North to inspire college freshmen, that's really work. Seriously, if it's like telling somebody who is decorating a synagogue to ask Hitler for help.
"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"
Bob Dylan
If you're approaching leftists, do not use Rand. Go for Mary Ruwart or Konkin or even some of Rothbard's pieces. With conservatives go for Hoppe, Reisman, Sean Gabb or even Mises. They all have short pieces you can use and discuss (or alternatively books you can excerpt from.)
To darkness I condemn you...
I'd say the best way to do it is probably to ask them to write down a career they think is absolutely evil and selfish.
Then you show how each and every one of them is not evil at all. Kinda like "Defending the Undefendable" by Walter Block. After one or two examples they should be able to do it themselve if they are not braindead.
The great thing is, that you teach them not really WHAT to think, but HOW to think. Nothing as powerful as being able to see through the fallacies on your on.
Check out some Tom Woods for ideas of how to make it entertaining: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91OIBnrjzLU
Think outside the monopoly paradigm. Net-based microsecession | Why anarchy hasn't worked
Whatever you do, I would try to make it as interactive as possible. Ask the students questions. Get them involved. Get them thinking. I would suggest watching some of Jan Helfeld's videos on youtube (channel janhelfeld). He has had success with the Socratic method. Here are two I really like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8XYHXxMc0E and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iu7LW6qMGxs. Maybe you could even show some of his clips in class? He also has some where he is asking Pelosi, I believe, about minimum wage laws.
At most, 5% of the population would need to stop complying to bring down the government.
I actually think Lilburne's Human Actions Comics series might be really good for something like this.
abskebabs:I actually think Lilburne's Human Actions Comics series might be really good for something like this.
Infinite emphasis added!
Why not a history of Classical liberal authors or their viewpoints on war or the state.
'It is difficult to imagine any normal person wishing to meet Marx for a third time.' - Alexander Gray, The Socialist Tradition
@all, he has one day. One day to talk about Capitalism. Presumably one class length, on one day, to make a point about Capitalism.
GilesStratton: Hahaha using Rand and Gary North to inspire college freshmen, that's really work. Seriously, if it's like telling somebody who is decorating a synagogue to ask Hitler for help.
I linked to Gary North's presentation at ASC 2009, reposted at LRC. To college undergrads.
I know you commented without looking at the source material, thinking you are too smart for school (pun intended) and working from reputation, however Gary North is a LvMI contributor and speaker, and you go too far with your posts trolling the institute. Such posts will no longer be accepted.
It'd be compelling for a class to hear a lecture structured (in format and substance) like the following articles :
Review of Robert P Murphy's Politically Incorrect Guide to Capitalism
Anatomy of an Economic Ignoramus - Thomas E Woods
Each article addresses many fundamental issues most people have with Capitalism and briefly clears them up.
You'll be able to explain exactly what the free market is, how it regulates, what role profits and losses play, and much more (racial discrimination, free trade, etc) . Here is an example from each article:
Thomas E Woods Jr: Che: I love it when right wing economists talk about "market forces" and "letting the free market run our economy." They make it sound like the free market is some altruistic being that always knows exactly what to do and when to do it. For one thing, no free-market economist is dumb enough to use a phrase like "letting the free market run our economy." The free market is merely the matrix of free exchanges entered into by individuals. How can a matrix of free exchanges "run" anything? Secondly, no free-market economist thinks the market "always knows exactly what to do and when to do it." If that were the case, how could free-market economists account for firms that go out of business? The argument that free-market economists actually make is that on the free market, decisions regarding what to produce, in what quantities, using what methods, and in what locations, are made in light of satisfying the most urgent demands of consumers. Business firms find out very quickly what consumers want and what they do not want, and they adjust their production decisions accordingly. Profits indicate that a particular industry is combining factors of production in a way that pleases consumers. As a result, production in that industry tends to expand. Likewise, losses indicate that value is being reduced or destroyed, and that factors of production are being employed in lines of production that please consumers less, at the expense of other lines of production where they might have produced something consumers wanted more.
Che: I love it when right wing economists talk about "market forces" and "letting the free market run our economy." They make it sound like the free market is some altruistic being that always knows exactly what to do and when to do it.
I love it when right wing economists talk about "market forces" and "letting the free market run our economy." They make it sound like the free market is some altruistic being that always knows exactly what to do and when to do it.
Secondly, no free-market economist thinks the market "always knows exactly what to do and when to do it." If that were the case, how could free-market economists account for firms that go out of business?
The argument that free-market economists actually make is that on the free market, decisions regarding what to produce, in what quantities, using what methods, and in what locations, are made in light of satisfying the most urgent demands of consumers. Business firms find out very quickly what consumers want and what they do not want, and they adjust their production decisions accordingly.
Profits indicate that a particular industry is combining factors of production in a way that pleases consumers. As a result, production in that industry tends to expand. Likewise, losses indicate that value is being reduced or destroyed, and that factors of production are being employed in lines of production that please consumers less, at the expense of other lines of production where they might have produced something consumers wanted more.
David Gordon: how...can one justify enormous severance packages to CEOs who fail? Surely one cannot here appeal to market efficiency. Murphy accepts the challenge: Robert P Murphy: Unlike routine managerial work, the task of a CEO often involves bold innovation. If the steps necessary to turn a particular company around and earn millions were "obvious," the company wouldn't be in trouble in the first place. When a new CEO comes in with ambitious plans, he knows that failure is entirely possible. If the shareholders said, "We'll pay you $20 million if you succeed, but nothing if you fail," it wouldn't be a very attractive offer at all. This is because the type of person who gets picked to head a major corporation could easily make hundreds of thousands, if not millions, for certain by consulting or offering other services less glamorous than being CEOs. (p. 21)
how...can one justify enormous severance packages to CEOs who fail? Surely one cannot here appeal to market efficiency. Murphy accepts the challenge:
Robert P Murphy: Unlike routine managerial work, the task of a CEO often involves bold innovation. If the steps necessary to turn a particular company around and earn millions were "obvious," the company wouldn't be in trouble in the first place. When a new CEO comes in with ambitious plans, he knows that failure is entirely possible. If the shareholders said, "We'll pay you $20 million if you succeed, but nothing if you fail," it wouldn't be a very attractive offer at all. This is because the type of person who gets picked to head a major corporation could easily make hundreds of thousands, if not millions, for certain by consulting or offering other services less glamorous than being CEOs. (p. 21)
Unlike routine managerial work, the task of a CEO often involves bold innovation. If the steps necessary to turn a particular company around and earn millions were "obvious," the company wouldn't be in trouble in the first place. When a new CEO comes in with ambitious plans, he knows that failure is entirely possible. If the shareholders said, "We'll pay you $20 million if you succeed, but nothing if you fail," it wouldn't be a very attractive offer at all. This is because the type of person who gets picked to head a major corporation could easily make hundreds of thousands, if not millions, for certain by consulting or offering other services less glamorous than being CEOs. (p. 21)
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