Exam One Guide
The exam will cover chapters 1,2,3,4, 6 in Sackrey and Schneider and one question on Perkins' book. The exam will have two sections. One section will test your understanding of terms and concepts and the second section will consist of short-answer essay questions. I have included some broad themes and specific concepts below that the exam will emphasize. Please look over the lecture notes for the course as well.
The Difference between mainstream economics and political economics (Sackrey)
Self-interest, market efficiency, resource allocation, division of labor and the price mechanism (Adam Smith)
Contemporary market society compared to Adam Smith's vision of a market economy.
The emergence of capitalism from feudal society (means of production, surplus, enclosure movement).
The materialist conception of history (economic base, institutional & legal support, modes of thought), labor theory of value, surplus value, necessary labortime (Marx)
The exploitation of the worker, rise of surplus value through extending working day, speeding up production through technological advance, increased frequency and intensity of periods of over-production --> collapse of capitalism (Marx).
The critique of a market society's excessive consumption habits (conspicuous consumption, pecuniary emulation) and producers transformed from worker/employers to captains of industry (generating industrial sabotage) (Veblen)
Concepts:
surplus value
enclosure movement
materialist conception of history (modes of thought --> legal, political, religious institutions --> modes of production)
invisible hand
barter
conspicuous consumption
Socially necessary labor-time (time worker spends producing value equal to his subsistence wage)
Surplus Value (product value produced beyond value of worker's wage, the source of profit)
Division of Labor
Self-equilibrating market system
Laissez Faire (and the deregulatory era beginning in late 1970s)
spread of Cash Nexus to more areas of social life
Cultural Capital
Time and Motion Studies (F.W. Taylor)
Social Mobility
Increased supervisory control in the workplace
Status Dissonance
Social Class Position (effects on health, stress)
Control over the pace of production
Conspicuous consumption