RS THE END

This semester class was great.  It was great because it was actually enjoyable to go to.  I liked doing most of the blog it was a change from doing other work.  I am satisfied with my work I did in the is class.  What I can of done better would of been write more notes.  I do plan to retain all of this wonderful information I have learned.  Yes I plan to be genius and famous and you already know...........Imma Boss http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfjwNrloDZg

-Paul Guarino

Reflection on: RS The Interview Project

This blog is a my reflection on the interview project. I had interviewed myself, my mother (52), and grandfather (73). 

I thought this interview project was going to be boring and dumb.  But the interviewing my mother and grandfather was fun and interesting.  I learned a lot  my mother and grandfather's past and how it was much different then than now.  Gas and a lot of items were much cheaper back in the day.  They also talked about how the Wars changed their lives.  Even how they shopped and communicated was different.  A lot of things change because of science and new technologies.


I was not that surprised about this information at all.  I knew about the past for the most part. Being in school for this long you learn about history.  I mean everyone grows and everything changes.  That's just how life is.

I did enjoy doing this assignment.  It was funny talking to my grandfather about this stuff and asking him question and hearing his answers. It was a good assignment because it was different and it was change from always watching videos and writing blog on that. Change is good.

RS The Interview Project

This blog post shows the answers based off of an interview done by myself on a myself which I am 20, a 52 year old, and a 73 year old.  Myself and the 73 year old are males, the 52 was a female.

The government should regulate the economy?

20 year old: agree

52 year old: disagree

73 year old: agree

Politics have a major influence in the economy?

20: disagree

52: agree

73: disagree

Everyone should take an economics class in high school?

20: disagree

52: disagree

73: disagree

Banks should be government owned?

20: agree

52: agree

73: disagree

The government bailouts worked?

20: disagree

52: agree

73: neutral

Local government should have more control?

20: disagree

52: agree

73: disagree

We should Invade Iran?

20: disagree

52: disagree

73: agree

In 6 months the economy will be better than today?

20: agree

52: agree

73: disagree

I am well informed about economic news?

20: disagree

52: agree

73: disagree

The recession personally affected me?

20: disagree

52: agree

73: agree

In your lifetime, what city that you are familiar with has changed the most (both positive and negative)?

20: West Haven, CT (both)

52: New York City, NY (positively)

73:  Fort Lauderdale, FL (positively)

In your opinion, what president had the biggest positive impact on the economy? Why?

20: Clinton/ peaceful economy

52: Regan/ reformed the tax code

73: Carter/ Nobel Piece Prize

What is your first memory of a major economic event impacting your life?

20: 9/11

52: Vietnam War

73: WWII

How do you get economic news? How has this changed over your life?

20: Local News/ newspaper

52: CNN/ newspaper

73: ABC/ newspaper

What is your definition of economics (when you hear the word economy or economics what do you think about)?

20: The study of choices

52: Money fluctuating

73: About the value of your Money

How do you deal will rising prices e.g. substitute cheaper brand, stop buying? Any examples?

20: Shop Online/Ex. Amazon & Ebay

52: Buy US made products /Ex. U.S. made clothes

73: Stop buying groceries/Ex. Go out to eat every night

What product or service has most changed over your lifetime?

20: Internet/Video Games

52: Laundromat

73: Phones

How do you handle saving and how has this changed?

20: I used to always save it in my room/now I save it in the bank

52: I used to have one bank account/now I save in different ones

73: Keep it in my house/now his daughter handles his money in the bank

What product or service has had the biggest price change in your life?

20: Gas

52: Cell phones

73: Gas

What age were you when you got your first credit card?

20: 18 years old

52: 23 years old

73: N/A

How much does the stock market affect your life?

20: N/A

52: The stock market helped her and didnt help her

73: N/A

What was your wage at your first job?

20: $7.65/ hour

52: $6.25/ hour

73: N/A

The Warning

This blog is my opinion on the PBS Frontline Special: The Warning.  As I sit here on a Friday afternoon I am doing this blog for class.  This video is very boring and making me sleepy.  But writing something and throwing some pictures in the blog is better than getting zero.

I did not like this video. I enjoyed watching The Meltdown video on PBS better. "In The Warning, veteran FRONTLINE producer Michael Kirk unearths the hidden history of the nation's worst financial crisis since the Great Depression."  "At the center of it all he finds Brooksley Born, who speaks for the first time on television about her failed campaign to regulate the secretive, multitrillion-dollar derivatives market whose crash helped trigger the financial collapse in the fall of 2008."  They talk how they didnt really like Brooksley Born and she was a women.

RS Regulators Mount Up

This blog is my opinion on the Commanding Heights - The Battle for the World Economy produced by WGBH interactive.

The point of this whole video is how the Wars affect the World's economy.  They talked about the economy as far back as the 1900's.  The economy is different now, and was different then, & will be different in the future.

I didn't really like this video it was bording.  But Money make the world go round!!

RS: Not Everything Sucks

"Hans Rosling's 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes - The Joy of Stats - BBC Four"

The YouTube video "Hans Rosling's 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes - The Joy of Stats - BBC Four" I watched was very interesting.  I think it is not surprising because the world keeps on growing and getting smarter.  Humans have been figuring out how to do and change to make things better forever.


The Ted video Peter Diamandis: Abundance is our future I watched was good I agree with Peter Diamandis.  He is right that everything is getting better and better, people are living twice as long it is great.   "I’m not saying we don’t have our set of problems; we surely do. But ultimately, we knock them down.”  Humans and the power of science lets us figure out just about thing over time.  Anything is possible, I bet in my lifetime cancer will be cared.  Like he said a cell phone now is way cheaper than a cell phone then.  Everything is basically available on a phone with all the apps now.  

Diamandis talks about this education and health app that can do testing better than humans. Thats honestly crazy and awesome.  The earth now has 7 billion people and everyone is going to get education and healthy.  Only 2 billion use the internet by 2020 3 more billion will join so it will 5 billion strong on the internet.  Everyone will be smarter, safer, healthy, and more educated. This is great for the world!

RS 10 Spring Break: A Time to Reflect

1. What is your strongest memory from this class so far?
My strongest memory from class so far is when you always talk and show my blog. MVB (Most Valuable Blog/Boss).


2. What is your strongest memory about an economic concept?
My strongest memory about an economic concept is when you talked about it would be better for you to run in a race and A-Rod to enter home run contest.  From this semesters probably the GDP.


3. What was your favorite topic to write a blog post about? Why?
My favorite topic to write a blog on was RS 7 because it was interesting about killing creativity.


4. What blog post do you think you did your best work on? What was good about it?
I think the blog I wrote the best was RS 8.  It was good because it was funny and truthful.


5. What about the Engel Indoctrination Program (this class) has made you a better person? Or are you worse? If so, why? As always, creativity counts.
Well I learn how to write a blog and make it look cool.  I couldn't say I'm a better or worse person because of this class, but I would say I'm smarter and more informed on real life issues.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfjwNrloDZg

Spring Break^^^^^^^^^^^^

Spring Break What I am really going to do ^^^^^^^


BUT STILL

RS 9 CPI

This blog is my take on the podcast The Price Of Lettuce In Brooklyn by Planet Money.  This podcast was aired on October 22, 2010.  

CPI is Consumer Price Index.  CPI show the price change is all items from housing to food to education.  The CPI shows the prices change from month to month. "There are two different types of CPI. There is Headline CPI which is all prices collected by these assistances and there is Core CPI which cuts out food, oil and things that fluctuate dramatically because it gives a more accurate reading of CPI." I have never heard of this until now.  If you knew the CPIs early u could be rich.  I looked up some graphs on CPI.  They were interesting.

In my opinion this guy George Minichiello is weird and creepy.  He cant tell anyone what stores and the store owners name he goes to figure CPIs and sent it to the government.  Its a weird and time consuming job i think.

RS 8: Gross Domestic Product

I had no idea what GDP was before this class.  I thought GDP stood for Good Dog Poop.  I had no clue.  I'm not into the whole thing about how rich or poor America is.  But now thanks to my Marco-economics class and my great professor (Engel) I know GDP stands for Gross domestic product.


"Gross domestic product (GDP) refers to the market value of all officially recognized final goods and services produced within a country in a given period." "GDP per capita is often considered an indicator of a country's standard of living; GDP per capita is not a measure of personal income."

I was surprised that the United States of America's GDP is actually pretty good at $14.59 trillion dollars. ^^The graph above is the USA's GDP from 1960 to 2010.^^


This part of the blog is my take on the podcast Why GDP Is Like GPA by Robert Smith of NPR. This podcast was air on October 28, 2011.
I agreed with Robert Smith that GDP is like GPA.  GDP is like GPA because GDP is not a perfect number.  GDP and GPA are alike because both "paints a limited picture".  Also GDP is very hard to calculate just like GPA's are.


This part of the blog is my take on the article Why GDP Per Capita Can Start A Bar Fight by NPR.  This article was posted on January 10, 2012.  This article compares Europe's GDP and USA's GDP.  They talk about how each country spends their money to determine their GDP's.  I agree that USA does spend to much on the military.  The USA has to change there ways.

Above is a map of the world with all their GDP numbers.

RS 7 "Title It Whatever You Want" << I like this Title Tho Engel

This blog post is my take on the video “Ken Robinson says schools are killing creativity” by Ken Robinson. This video was posted in June of 2006 and appeared on TED.  Creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson challenges the way we're educating our children.

Sir Ken Robinson discusses how kids are all born artist, but lose it as they grow older.  Which I believe is true.  All little kids are creative, but Robinson believes they lose there creativeness as they taught in schools these days.  I believe this is not 100 percent true because if it was thee would be no artist in the world.  He also talks about we all dont know whats going to happen in 5 years and what the kids (starting school now) are going to be taught (and how if we dont what will happen how can we teach them).  

Robinson thinks creativity is as important as any subject in school.  "The grading system forces children to believe that if you get good grades then you are a smart person." "Kids then do not want to make mistakes because they want good grades making them fearful of taking chances." "Ken’s argument is that we are educating children out of their creativity and we are. Children are creative because they take chances and because they are scared of taking chances they lose their creativity."  He talked about a girl in the 1930s because she would not stop moving.  The doctors check her out and they left her alone.  The whole time they watched her dance.  She became a famous dancer after that.  Now and days they would of gave she pills to calm down.

I believe Sir Ken Robinson has great points.  This video was a great interesting video and it made it better that Sir Ken Robinson was a funny man. I believe you need a balance of both creativeness and education.  Creativeness helps kids express themselves.  Education is the key to this life, I mean maybe in the future is wont be as important.  But for now education is the key to surviving in this life.  Education means everything.  Having an education should get you a job you love, never worry about it, and you come home happy after working.  Being creative can get you place too but you got to get lucky and get discovered. Education is for some and creativeness is for some.  I believe in both and believe I do both.  The picture above^ is a little creation I drew last year during my (block) Media Studies class.^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

RS 6 Personality Sorter

Personality test results

Ta-dah, your personality type is ESTP!

Extraverted (E) 57%	Introverted (I) 43%
Sensing (S) 50%	Intuitive (N) 50%
Thinking (T) 55%	Feeling (F) 45%
Perceiving (P) 68%	Judging (J) 32%

Artisan Portrait of the Promoter

There are lots of Promoters -- maybe ten or so percent of the population, and life is never dull around them. In a word, they are men and women of action. When a Promoter is present, things begin to happen: the lights come on, the music plays, the games begin. Clever and full of fun, Promoters live with a theatrical flourish which makes even the most routine events seem exciting. Not that they waste much time on routine events. In work and in play, Promoters demand new activities and new challenges. Bold and daring at heart, and ever-optimistic that things will go their way, Promoters will take tremendous risks to get what they want, and seem exhilarated by walking close to the edge of disaster. Because of this, they make the very best trouble-spot administrators and negotiators, and they can be outstanding entrepreneurs, able to swing deals and kick-start enterprises in a way no other type can.

Promoters also have a hearty appetite for the finer things of life, the best food, the best wine, expensive cars, and fashionable clothes. And they are extremely sophisticated in social circles, knowing many, many people by name, and knowing how to say just the right thing to most everyone they meet.

Charming, confident, and popular, Promoters delight their friends and investors with their endless supply of stories and jokes. At the same time, these smooth operators are usually something of a mystery to others. While they live in the moment and lend excitement - and unpredictability - to all their relationships, they rarely let anyone get really close to them. They have a low tolerance for authority and commitment, and are likely to leave situations where they are expected to toe the mark, or where they must play second fiddle. Promoters understand well the maxim, "He who travels fastest, travels alone," although they are not likely to be lonely for long, since their boldness and sense of adventure tends to make them highly attractive to many other people.

RS 5 Inside the Meltdown

I watched Inside the Meltdown, a documentary about the stock market crashing.  They mainly talked about Bear Stearns was an investment bank company, Lehman Brothers a global financial firm, and AIG an insurance corporation.  Bear Stearns was bought out, Lehman Brothers went bankrupted, AIG was the only one of these three businesses that stayed in business.  "There was literally a pause in that room where the oxygen left," says Sen Chris Dodd (D-Conn.).  This meltdown was extremely serious toward the United State future.  I think this was one of the worst downfalls in America.  I think since the United States government helped Bear Stearns that they should of helped Lehman equally to them.  This should not happen to major companies in the United States.  The United States government should have had a plan already made in case this could happen since it happened before.  I think Paulson and Bernanke were trying really hard to do something to help the United States.  I agree with Paulson and Bernanke’s plan to bail out the stock market.  Paulson got the nine largest banks in America to save the stock market.  I believe Paulson was a good man putting his country first and bring his enemies closer to help get the country out of this disaster.  Like they always said keep your friend close but your enemies closer.  And thats just my.................

For a LOL

RS 4 - A Former Lobbyist Tells All

This blog post is my take on the podcast A Former Lobbyist Tells All by Jacob Goldsteen and Alex Bloomberg of NPR. This podcast was aired on January 27th, 2012.

This podcast talks to a former lobbyist and what they do to get there.  In my opinion I found that if you got money then you can be a lobbyist. The lobbyist go to hundreds of fundraisers and keep some of the money they raise.  The money people get they get facetime with a high powers.  Nancy Pelosi when to 400 fundraisers. The lobbyist are selfish in my opinion.

They are many examples of the guideposts in this podcast. Such as there is no free lunch. The lobbyist paid to move highe up in the ranks.  Russell Simmons is even a lobbyist.