Economics is a field of study that focuses on how people, organizations, and governments allocate resources to meet their requirements. Economics is further divided into two types: microeconomics and macroeconomics. Generally, microeconomics studies the economic decision of businesses and individuals, while macroeconomics covers a much larger scale, examining decisions on regional, national, continental levels. Microeconomics uses a bottom-up technique, studying supply and demand and how prices affect consumer behavior. It explores how companies and individuals allocate their resources and price their goods and services while accounting for regulations and taxes. At a fundamental level, microeconomics seeks to understand what drives human decision-making. It asks the question of why economic changes happen and not what determines the changes. For example, companies and individuals can use microeconomics to see how they can maximize capacity and production to provide efficient, competitive prices. Investors can also use it as a tool for better investment choices. At its core, microeconomics aims to understand the theory of production, supply, demand, equilibrium, and labor economics. The theory of production explains how the cost of the resources needed to make a product or service determines its price. The law of demand and supply is essential for economic equilibrium. It determines prices because suppliers must succumb to the prices that consumers demand. Lastly, labor economics is a concept that examines employees and employers to understand income, employment, and wage trends. Conversely, macroeconomics studies the economy as a whole. This discipline of economics adopts a top-down perspective and is mainly concerned about how large-scale factors affect the economy. These factors include the influence of a state’s fiscal policy, inflation, international commerce, and employment rates. Macroeconomics helps us understand indicators like what the GDP is about other large-scale economic factors. Governments use macroeconomics to establish fiscal policy. And investors who work very closely with interest rates and inflation may utilize the tenets of macroeconomics to monitor fiscal and monetary policies closely. However, macroeconomics doesn’t delve very much into specific investments. Famous businessmen like Warren Buffet have dismissed macro forecasts as mostly useless to the investors. Warren Buffet has called macroeconomics literature “the funny papers.” A Forbes interview with John Templeton revealed that this successful value investor doesn’t bother forecasting the market. He values stock by looking at its price and comparing it against what he believes it is worth. The first modern academic work for macroeconomics has been credited to John Maynard Keynes; he used monetary aggregates as a tool for economic study. Therefore, many people have named him the father of macroeconomics. Consequently, microeconomics is substantially limited in scope when compared to macroeconomics. It concentrates on particular areas and tiny units in the economic chain. Further, while microeconomics seeks to address employee income and the price of goods, macroeconomics evaluates aggregates such as general price levels, national output, and general revenue. However, the two disciplines are still essentially interdependent. This is especially true for inflation, which affects the economy at both a micro and macro level. Inflation, a macroeconomics phenomenon, causes consumers and companies to adjust with the rise of goods and services. via WordPress https://ift.tt/3GKRnTl
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![]() Since the Middle Ages, historical evidence implies that games similar to hockey, including a stick and ball and proceeding toward a goal or target, have been played somewhere in the world. The Dutch game of kolven and many forms of field hockey may have spawned modern-day ice hockey. The word hockey was first referenced in 1363 when England’s King Edward III included it in forbidden games. The name is derived from the French word hoquet, which means “shepherd’s staff.” However, the Micmac (Mi’kmaq) Indians of Nova Scotia were the first to introduce what is now known as ice hockey, one of the most popular and well-known games in the twenty-first century. These Indians’ sports appear to have been influenced by the Irish game of hurling, from which the stick’s naming was adopted and dubbed “hurley.” According to popular belief, the sport spread across Canada thanks to European immigrants and the British Army. According to historical documents, a rudimentary game variant was played in Egypt 4,000 years ago and in Ethiopia about 1,000 BC. At the same time, an old form of the game was also played in Iran around 2,000 BC. Several museums prove that the Romans, Greeks, and Aztecs played a variation of the game several centuries before Columbus arrived in the New World. The current hockey game was born in England in the mid-eighteenth century, thanks to the rise of public institutions like Eton. In 1876, the first Hockey Association was created in the United Kingdom, and the first codified set of rules was drafted. The initial association only lasted six years before being recreated in 1886 by nine founding member clubs. Ice hockey as we know it today was created in Canada during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Hockey originated in the late 1800s in the Halifax region, founded under the Halifax rules. In 1875, two teams of McGill University students played the first public indoor ice hockey game, using rules primarily drawn from field hockey, at Montreal’s Victoria Skating Rink. In London in 1908, the first Olympic Hockey Competition for men was staged, with England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales competing individually. The competition included six teams, with the arrival of Germany and France. After debuting in the London Games, hockey was excluded from the Stockholm Games in 1912 after host countries were given authority over alternative games. After lobbying from Belgian hockey supporters, it resurfaced in Antwerp in 1920, only to be dropped again in Paris in 1924. The International Hockey Federation was founded in 1924, just in time for the Paris Olympics, although it did allow hockey to return to the Olympics in Amsterdam in 1928. Since then, hockey has been a part of the schedule, with women’s hockey being added for the first time in Moscow in 1980. Montreal would be at the core of expanding hockey to the rest of the globe, hosting the first tournaments and participating in the early leagues. In 1917, the NHL was founded in a Montreal hotel. In addition, Montreal clubs have won the most Stanley Cups in the game’s history. via WordPress https://ift.tt/33g7oSd As the nation grappled with the direct and indirect impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021, the economy experienced some recovery as the stock market climbed, a new president was elected, and the international markets experienced a comeback. The year began in the middle of an economic recession, with many locally-owned businesses remaining closed or offering limited business hours. As the economy continues with its recovery, many are stepping into the tepid investment market.
Today’s consumers have many pathways to invest, but coming out of the pandemic and all of its impacts, investors looked at both risky and risk-averse ways to build wealth. For example, various bonds, more specifically government bonds, offered investors some measure of value. Considered one of the safest ways to invest, these bonds are investments in debt securities such as treasury bills, treasury notes, and mortgage-backed securities from government issuers such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. This investment tool is safe because the government backs the bonds. Because they are mutual funds, they are subject to rate fluctuations and inflation. Interest rates are proportional to the price of bonds, so when the rates rise, the price of bonds drops, and when the rates drop, the price of bonds rises. While this type of investment works for risk-averse investors, the returns are small, with many gaining returns of 1.5 percent compared to an inflation rate of two percent. On treasury inflation-protected securities, investors get 2.3 percent on the average return for a 30-year bond, which is not very remarkable but is one of the safest ways to protect against inflation. The real estate investment trust (REIT) is another investment tool that has done pretty well in 2021 is the real estate investment trust (REIT). The REIT has been long touted as one way to invest in real estate without dealing with the responsibility of managing a property. This investment tool allows consumers to purchase shares in a real estate portfolio of several properties across the country. Consumers can invest in apartments, commercial, retail, hospitals, hotels, and commercial REITs. REIT is an investment tool that provides individual investors with access to commercial real estate and multi-family complexes, typically out-of-reach for this group. Furthermore, real estate is often a good choice of investment during stock market downturns. For investors who are not risk-averse, cryptocurrencies have been an investment tool that has become very popular in the last few years. If a particular cryptocurrency takes off, the gains can be very lucrative. For example, in 2020, Bitcoin began at below $10,000 a coin and increased to $30,000 at the beginning of 2021. While the returns are high, this investment tool is highly volatile, with some falling sharply in a short time. They run the risk of becoming completely zeroed out and outlawed. Finally, high-yield online savings accounts were another investment vehicle that allowed consumers to earn more interest. This investment tool was not only a safe way to save money, but it also provided investors with easy access to their cash. |
AuthorJames Giacin - St. Louis Finance Executive and Former Hockey Player. Archives
March 2022
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