Issue 14, Fall 1997

William A. McEachern, Editor

Grapevine

The Spring 1996 issue of The Teaching Economist discussed the "Economist as Movie Hero." Jorge G. Gonzalez of Trinity University in San Antonio points out that Alex Keaton, the character played by Michael J. Fox on the TV sit-com "Family Ties," majored in economics. Gonzalez notes that, curiously, the decline in the number of economics majors began right after "Family Ties" went off the air. He says that although the Keaton character was a bit of a caricature, "many of our 1980s Reagan-loving majors found in him a great 'role model'."

Several issues back, I included a quiz matching quotes from Shakespeare with economic concepts. Charles W. Martie, formerly of Quinnipiac College in Connecticut and now with the Budget Office for the State of Kentucky, has passed along the following Shakespearean quotes. "To be or not to be..." is an example of an all-or-none choice. "My ventures are not in one bottom trusted, nor in one place" reflects risk aversion. "There's small choice in rotten apples" is an example of an economic bad.

For going on nearly four years now, Richard L. Hannah of Middle Tennessee State University (the alma mater of Nobelist James Buchanan) has required students to use the Internet. He has developed elaborate Web pages for several courses including principles of economics, managerial economics, industrial relations, economics of employee benefits, and labor and human resources. He invites you to check them out by going to his home page at http://www.mtsu.edu/~rlhannah/homepage.html. He also manages a discussion list on employee benefits, which he supports with material that can be found at http://www.mtsu.edu/~rlhannah/employee_benefits.html. Another on-line resource page he supports is linked to the Industrial Relations Research Association's page at Cornell University. Its address is http://www.mtsu.edu/~rlhannah/IR_HR.HTML.

Terry Liska from the University of Wisconsin-Platteville encourages, but does not require, his students sign up for The Wall Street Journal. Usually enough students subscribe to provide him with a complimentary subscription. If the number falls short, he asks all non-subscribers to submit written bids indicating what each would be willing to pay for a subscription. He explains that he will accept the highest bids and subsidize the shortfall to guarantee the seven subscriptions required. This approach not only gets him a subscription (though it is no longer free), but introduces The Wall Street Journal to students who would not otherwise have read it and provides sufficient information to construct the class's demand schedule for the paper. He refers to this schedule when discussing elasticity and other demand topics such as consumer surplus. Incidentally, I paid the $50 for an annual subscription to the WSJ on the Internet. I now prefer that to the hard copy, which starts to resemble a paper drive after a while.

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