Economic growthEconomic growth can be defined as the increase or improvement in the inflation-adjusted market value of the goods and services produced by an economy in a financial year. Statisticians conventionally measure such growth as the percent rate of increase in the real and nominal gross domestic product (GDP). Growth is usually calculated in real terms – i.e., inflation-adjusted terms – to eliminate the distorting effect of inflation on the prices of goods produced. Measurement of economic growth uses national income accounting.
Fiscal policyIn economics and political science, fiscal policy is the use of government revenue collection (taxes or tax cuts) and expenditure to influence a country's economy. The use of government revenue expenditures to influence macroeconomic variables developed in reaction to the Great Depression of the 1930s, when the previous laissez-faire approach to economic management became unworkable.
New classical macroeconomicsNew classical macroeconomics, sometimes simply called new classical economics, is a school of thought in macroeconomics that builds its analysis entirely on a neoclassical framework. Specifically, it emphasizes the importance of rigorous foundations based on microeconomics, especially rational expectations. New classical macroeconomics strives to provide neoclassical microeconomic foundations for macroeconomic analysis.
MacroeconomicsMacroeconomics is a branch of economics that deals with the performance, structure, behavior, and decision-making of an economy as a whole—for example, using interest rates, taxes, and government spending to regulate an economy's growth and stability. This includes regional, national, and global economies. Macroeconomists study topics such as GDP (Gross Domestic Product), unemployment (including unemployment rates), national income, price indices, output, consumption, inflation, saving, investment, energy, international trade, and international finance.
Public worksPublic works are a broad category of infrastructure projects, financed and procured by a government body for recreational, employment, and health and safety uses in the greater community. They include public buildings (municipal buildings, schools, and hospitals), transport infrastructure (roads, railroads, bridges, pipelines, canals, ports, and airports), public spaces (public squares, parks, and beaches), public services (water supply and treatment, sewage treatment, electrical grid, and dams), and other, usually long-term, physical assets and facilities.
Say's lawIn classical economics, Say's law, or the law of markets, is the claim that the production of a product creates demand for another product by providing something of value which can be exchanged for that other product. So, production is the source of demand. In his principal work, A Treatise on Political Economy (Traité d'économie politique, 1803), Jean-Baptiste Say wrote: "A product is no sooner created, than it, from that instant, affords a market for other products to the full extent of its own value.
Great RecessionThe Great Recession was a period of marked general decline observed in national economies globally, i.e. a recession, that occurred from late 2007 to 2009. The scale and timing of the recession varied from country to country (see map). At the time, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded that it was the most severe economic and financial meltdown since the Great Depression. One result was a serious disruption of normal international relations.
Population pyramidA population pyramid (age structure diagram) or "age-sex pyramid" is a graphical illustration of the distribution of a population (typically that of a country or region of the world) by age groups and sex; it typically takes the shape of a pyramid when the population is growing. Males are usually shown on the left and females on the right, and they may be measured in absolute numbers or as a percentage of the total population. The pyramid can be used to visualize the age of a particular population.
Chicago school of economicsThe Chicago school of economics is a neoclassical school of economic thought associated with the work of the faculty at the University of Chicago, some of whom have constructed and popularized its principles. Milton Friedman and George Stigler are considered the leading scholars of the Chicago school. Chicago macroeconomic theory rejected Keynesianism in favor of monetarism until the mid-1970s, when it turned to new classical macroeconomics heavily based on the concept of rational expectations.
TariffA tariff is a tax imposed by the government of a country or by a supranational union on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and policy that taxes foreign products to encourage or safeguard domestic industry. Protective tariffs are among the most widely used instruments of protectionism, along with import quotas and export quotas and other non-tariff barriers to trade.
