Economics and Woman Empowerment

One says if you teach a parrot to repeat the words - supply and demand- there you go, you can produce an economist. I find it very witty and funny but economics is more than that. One funny analogy is to say that pop music is all about Justin Bieber. Ok here's a better analogy. To say economics is about supply demand is equivalent to say Cambodia is all about Angkor Wat and temples. Yes, Angkor Wat is an indispensable wonder which puts Cambodia on the world map, but Cambodia has more things to offer besides the beautiful Angkor Wat. Similarly, we can use the basic concept of supply and demand as a framework for our analysis on many social phenomenon. 

The mind-boggling thing about economics is that you can see economics everywhere you go. (Credit to our friend at Economind for the inspiration.) Should you use your last $10 on drinking with your friends or $10 phone card to call your bae? That is an economic question related with cost and benefit and which alternatives produce the higher level of satisfaction and happiness or what economists like to call “utility”. (The term utility is a bit vague and I’m pretty confident that it is very very similar to satisfaction and happiness. I hope our friend at Economind would share the same understanding) Should you send a girl to school or force her to help family at home? Yes, it’s more about gender equality and education but I can assure you that it has everything to do with economics. You see, an educated woman can participate in the labor force and labor is a scarce resource to the economy. We don’t have an infinite amount labor to produce goods and service, so we have to be clever in allocating the labor in a way that produce the most output “as many and fast as possible”. Economists also have a term for that. It’s called “efficiency”. Making a woman stay at home may not be the most efficient way to utilize her labor. She may be able to be involved in other activities that generate more social or personal benefit, be it a manager, a teacher, a salesperson, a factory worker and so on. An educated woman produces more than just income for household. A study found that a child born to an educated mother is “50%” more likely to survive past the age of 5. An economist can even monetize the social return/benefit of child mortality reduction and of educating a woman all thanks to our brilliant mind.

Our friend at Economind made a very interesting point and I'll add his whole quote. "Economics is indeed everywhere. A failure to recognize this is a failure to see solution to many problems. Gender empowerment is in every bit and piece economics as it is about gender equality. On top of what you just said, allowing women in labour force will also raise tax revenue and increase marginal productivity of capital, meaning capital investment will yield more return due to larger base of labour force. This boosts economic growth significantly."

Now you understand the massive scope of econ. Well, similar to M&M chocolate candy which comes with many colors, economists can be separated into many kinds as well such as trade economist, financial economist, health economist, agricultural economist, other development economist and so forth. The point is when it comes to allocating scarce resource to its most efficient use, superman has nothing on economists and they are just one call away to save the day. (Congrats to you if you get the Charlie Puth’s reference. Give yourself some kind of reward because you have a good taste, my friends.)

Find our friend Economind athttps://www.facebook.com/economind/?fref=ts