POL114H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Unequal Exchange, Grain, Dependent And Independent Variables
Document Summary
Indeed for much of human history, there was no rela separation btwn the two. The answer was always fairly obvious; you were rich if you were born into a rich family, and that you inhereited land from your parents. Poor people were poor cause they weren"t born into loyalty. The crown decided the price of good, who could make the good, etc. This essentially changed in the long 16th century. Wealth used to refer to how much gold someone owned. This idea became deisplaced and redefined as how much a society can produce, and therefore consiume. Consumption patterns determine if a country is wealthy or poor. We determine how well an economy is doing on the basiss of per capita gdp. An economy that"s growing at 3% or more is growing, if below 3%, recession, below 0%, depression. Also argued that wealth could be achieved thru expanding means of labour (ex; pin factory from last lecture).
