Self-paced
P1
Economists have long defined prosperity in terms of monetary value, gauging a given nation's prosperity solely on the basis of the total monetary value of the goods and services produced annually. ███
Economists' perspective ·
Measure nation's prosperity based on monetary value of stuff nation produces
Critics' perspective ·
There are other values (besides money) important to prosperity
Such as qualify of life and environmental health.
Example Supporting Critics ·
Things that reduce QOL and environmental health can lead to increased monetary value
Weakening ozone layer leads to sales of hats, sunglasses, and sunscreens. Economists would measure this as increase in prosperity, when it's actually a decrease.
P2
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Risk of Economists' Perspective ·
People can try to increase monetary value but hurt QOL and environment.
In one case, a small town opposed limits on cutting down trees, because it thought limits would decrease wages and jobs.
P3
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Critics' Perspective (on town example) ·
The town loses a lot more without the limits
Without limits, their land would be damaged. This hurts something the town clearly values. Also, you can understand the value of the land in monetary terms; the town still loses more from forgoing limits on cutting trees.
P4
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Economists' rebuttal ·
Prosperity needs to be quantifiable
Critique ·
But prosperity involves non-quantifiable values
Analogizes economists' position. They're like literary critics who (mistakenly) think sales are a better measure of a book's value than the literary quality of the book.
Passage Style
Critique or debate
2.
The example in the passage ██ ███ ██████ ████████ ███ ███ ██████ ██ █ ████ █████ █████████ ████████ ████ ███ ███████ █████ ████ ██████ █████ ████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ███████████
a
Harvest limitations have ██████ ████████████ ██ █████ █████ ██ █████ ████ ██ ███ ██████████
Unsupported. Residents of the community argue that the limitations would cause lower wages and fewer jobs. The critics don’t deny this. They just claim that the community will lose even more— in monetary value and quality of life— without the limitations.
b
Harvest limitations should ██ ███████ ████ ████ ███ ███████████ ████ ████ ██████ ███████ ██ ███ ██████████
Unsupported. The critics don’t tell us the circumstances under which the limitations should or should not be imposed. They just claim that the community will be better off if the limitations are imposed.
c
The advantages to ███ █████████ ████ █████ ██ ███████ ██ ███████ ███████████ ███ ██████ ██ ████████ ███ ██████████████
Supported. P3 describes the critics’ perspective of the rural community. The critics conclude
d
Communities protest harvest ███████████ █████████ ███████ ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ███ █████████ ████████ ██████ ██ ████ ███████████
Unsupported. The critics don’t make any claims about why the community is protesting the harvest limitations. Instead, they simply claim that the community will be better off with the limitations, both in terms of quality of life and in terms of monetary impact.
e
It is the █████████ ██ ██████████ ████ █████ █████ █████████ ██ █████ ███████████ ██ ████ ███████ ███████████ ████ ███████████
Unsupported. Just because the community is “implicitly adopting the economists' point of view” does not mean that economists’ arguments caused residents to oppose the limitations. They might not even be aware of the economists’ arguments. Either way, the critics’ perspective is simply that the community will be better off with the limitations.