But I splurged last weekend and bought all that candy and stickers that was on my shopping list. It's been eye opening to see how much the kids have bought into it.
It's basically a 3 tier system. At the top, for the toughest tasks is air heads. In the middle is starbursts. And at the bottom are the stickers. At least that's how it is in my brain.
Two moments from today.
A kid comes up to me at the start of the afternoon and says "I NEED STICKER! I NEED!" I say, okay you can earn one outside. He asks how. I say by doing a great feat. He asks how. I say that, ya know, we'll just go outside and look around and feel out the energy and most of time epicness happens. And then he found an old inner tube that another kid has hid behind the tree last week.
The other thing that happened was that a boy earned an airhead for cleaning up some of the cafeteria. He then cleaned ALL of the cafeteria and did every job that is left to me and my coworkers at the end of the day. I told him very clearly that he could not earn any additional airheads. But he was very savvy in increasing the value of his one airhead by eliminating all of the labor that could allow other kids to earn airheads. Does anyone know how to describe this in economic terms?
4 comments:
I talked to Kody and what the airhead kid did is rent-seeking. He basically just found a way to lock others out of the market! (other examples: people who live in expensive neighborhoods try to restrict new building in the area to keep the value of their property high; also, new hairdressers often have to get an expensive license that requires significant training time to open their business - that protects the value of existing hairdressers). The interesting thing about the airhead example is that if the kid didn't try to exchange the airhead for anything, he wasn't really increasing the market value. But he was making it more of a "status good", which probably increased his enjoyment. That kind of less tangible effect is what behavioral economists have just begun to study!
also send me some airheads and stickers pls
Oh my gosh! Haha,that explanation makes me so happy. Thank you and Kody for the insight! If I get the chance, I'll teach the term to the kids. :D
From wikipedia: Rent-seeking results in reduced economic efficiency through poor allocation of resources, reduced actual wealth-creation, lost government revenue, increased income inequality,[1] and (potentially) national decline.
Lololol
Haha that is amazing
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