Positive or normative?

Identify the POSITIVE statement mady by David Neumark in their research and his colleagues Lev Drucker and Katya Mazirov on the impacts of raising minimum wages in Israel.

• Higher minimum wages will do more to redistribute income if the owners of businesses who pay the higher minimum are at the top of the income distribution, and conversely if minimum wage employers have relatively low incomes, the redistributional effects are weakened.

• The minimum wage should be increased to $15.

Identify the POSITIVE statement made by Edward Glaeser in his research on the effects of income inequality.

• The rich have profited the most from our open economic system, so it is only fair that their taxes are raised to help lift poor families out of the poverty they helped create.

• The more unequal the distribution of income in a society, the more mental illness that society experiences.

Identify the NORMATIVE statement made by followers of Karl Marx.

• Laborers should receive greater parts of capitalist profits.

• The average income of the richest 10% of the population is about nine times that of the poorest 10% across the OECD, up from seven times 25 years ago.

Identify the NORMATIVE statement made by Harvard economist Raj Chetty regarding his research on social mobility and income inequality in America.

• Rises in income inequality in America since the 1950s has caused social mobility to decline rapidly.

• The government should giving low-income families housing vouchers to move into more desirable neighborhoods in order to increase their chances of improving their social status.

Identify the POSITIVE statement made by Harvard economist Raj Chetty from his research on the COVID-19 pandemic.

• During a pandemic, it may be more fruitful to mitigate economic hardship through social insurance than through economic stimulus.

• Every family should be given a EUR1000 stimulus per month to offset the effects of the pandemic.

Identify the POSITIVE statement made by sports economist Stefan Szymanski on his research into football (soccer).

• Female soccer (football) players have faced more hurdles over the last 100 years then male soccer players. For example, they have been paid less, and their leagues have been banned, even though (as with the US team) the women’s teams are often better than the men’s.

• Women’s soccer needs a lot of support to make up for the 50-year ban they faced in the 20th century, and I think the soccer authorities that grew rich with men’s soccer should be diverting a significant amount of their resources into women’s soccer.

Identify the NORMATIVE statement made by Josh Bivens regarding his research on the effects of Air BNB.

• The economic costs Airbnb imposes on a city likely outweigh the benefits. Furthermore, the potential benefit of increased tourism supporting city economies is much smaller than commonly advertised.

• Air BNB should be more heavily taxed in Prague because it creates more wear and tear on the city’s infrastructure.

Identify the NORMATIVE statement made by nobel prize winner Elinor Ostrom regarding her work on common access resources (common access resources are resources shared by a group of people to which all have unlimited access but none have ownership - like the ocean or a forest).

• When a group of people share a common access resource (e.g. a lake or a forest - something they all can use but no one technically owns), they can avoid overusing or abusing the resource if they take the time to discuss how they should use it; in this way they can avoid top-down, government intervention.

• Governments should not tell communities how to use their common access resources.

Identify the POSITIVE statement made by Esther Duflo on the use of bednets in Africa (bednets soaked in mosquito repellent prevent malaria).

• People in developing countries are more likely to use mosquito-preventing bed nets if they pay for them.

• People in developing countries should not be given mosquito-preventing bed nets.

Identify the NORMATIVE statement made by Stephanie Kelton on budget deficits.

• Comparing the idea of a government budget to a household budget in order to scare people about budget deficits is simplistic, as these are not at all similar.

• It’s OK for governments to run large budget deficits.