Teachers’ Guide

National Standards

Pursuit! game questions and guide dialogues address 17 of the 20 Voluntary National Content Standards in Economics.  This list provides the specific trails, questions (Q = Question), and guide dialogues that illustrate each of these standards. To view all 20 standards, go to the web site of the Council on Economic Education.

 

Standard 1: Scarcity
Productive resources are limited. Therefore, people cannot have all the goods and services they want; as a result, they must choose some things and give up others.
Trail 1:  Q3,8

Standard 2: Marginal Cost/Benefit
Effective decision-making requires comparing the additional costs of alternatives with the additional benefits. Most choices involve doing a little more or a little less of something: few choices are "all or nothing" decisions.
Trail 1: Q8
Trail 2: Q8
Trail 3: Q4
Guides: Entrepreneur, Uncle Sam

Standard 3: Allocation of Goods and Services
Different methods can be used to allocate goods and services. People acting individually or collectively through government, must choose which methods to use to allocate different kinds of goods and services.
Guides: Teacher, Uncle Sam

Standard 4: Role of Incentives
People respond predictably to positive and negative incentives.
Trail 1: Q8
Trail 2: Q4
Guides: Inventor, Scientist, Entrepreneur

Standard 6: Specialization and Trade
When individuals, regions, and nations specialize in what they can produce at the lowest cost and then trade with others, both production and consumption increase.
Trail 1: Q3

Standard 7: Markets—Price and Quantity Determination
Markets exist when buyers and sellers interact. This interaction determines market prices and thereby allocates scarce goods and services.
Trail 3: Q4

Standard 8: Role of Price in Market System
Prices send signals and provide incentives to buyers and sellers. When supply or demand changes, market prices adjust, affecting incentives.
Trail 3: Q4
Guide: Entrepreneur

Standard 10: Role of Economic Institutions
Institutions evolve in market economies to help individuals and groups accomplish their goals. Banks, labor unions, corporations, legal systems, and not-for-profit organizations are examples of important institutions. A different kind of institution—clearly defined and enforced property rights—is essential to a market economy.
Trail 1: Q4,8
Trail 2: Q5,8
Trail 3: Q6
Guides: Inventor, Scientist, Teacher, Entrepreneur, Banker

Standard 11: Role of Money
Money makes it easier to trade, borrow, save, invest, and compare the value of goods and services.
Trail 1: Q4
Trail 2: Q5,8
Trail 3: Q6
Guide: Banker

Standard 12: Role of Interest Rates
Interest rates, adjusted for inflation, rise and fall to balance the amount saved with the amount borrowed, which affects the allocation of scarce resources between present and future uses.
Trail 3: Q6
Guides: Teacher, Banker, Uncle Sam

Standard 13: Role of Resources in Determining Income
Income for most people is determined by the market value of the productive resources they sell. What workers earn depends, primarily, on the market value of what they produce and how productive they are.
Trail 1: Q8
Trail 2: Q4
Guides: Inventor, Entrepreneur

Standard 14: Profit and the Entrepreneur
Entrepreneurs are people who take the risks of organizing productive resources to make goods and services. Profit is an important incentive that leads entrepreneurs to accept the risks of business failure.
Trail 1: Q5
Trail 2: Q5,6,7,8
Trail 3: Q1,4,8
Guides: Scientist, Entrepreneur

Standard 15: Growth
Investment in factories, machinery, new technology, and in the health, education, and training of people can raise future standards of living.
Trail 1: Q1,2,3,5,6,7
Trail 2: Q2,3,5,6,7
Trail 3: Q2,3,4,5,8
Guides: Inventor, Scientist, Teacher, Entrepreneur, Uncle Sam

Standard 16: Role of Government
There is an economic role for government in a market economy whenever the benefits of a government policy outweigh its costs. Governments often provide for national defense, address environmental concerns, define and protect property rights, and attempt to make markets more competitive. Most government policies also redistribute income.
Trail 2: Q1
Guides: Scientist, Teacher, Uncle Sam

Standard 17: Using Cost/Benefit Analysis to Evaluate Government Programs
Costs of government policies sometimes exceed benefits. This may occur because of incentives facing voters, government officials, and government employees, because of actions by special interest groups that can impose costs on the general public, or because social goals other than economic efficiency are being pursued.
Trail 3: Q7
Guide: Teacher

Standard 18: Macroeconomy-Income/Employment, Prices
A nation's overall levels of income, employment, and prices are determined by the interaction of spending and production decisions made by all households, firms, government agencies, and others in the economy.
Guide: Uncle Sam

Standard 20: Monetary and Fiscal Policy
Federal government budgetary policy and the Federal Reserve System's monetary policy influence the overall levels of employment, output, and prices.
Guides: Banker, Uncle Sam