This course explores the choices that individuals and societies make about the use of resources in a competitive global economy. Students will use economic concepts and models, as well as methods of economic inquiry, to analyse current economic issues and make informed economic choices based on their analysis.

Where an allocation of resources is made, ethical value judgments are also made. The values inherent in the distribution of resources usually reflects the views of that society’s economic decision-makers. These values may, or may not, be consistent with the attitudes and values contained within the Catholic faith. As a result, students evaluate the consistency, or lack of it, of the actual method for distribution of resources, locally, nationally, and globally, as it is carried out by economic decision-makers. Evaluations of this type provide an excellent opportunity for teachers to develop Catholic values in students through questioning, discussion, and debate about how society should distribute resources compared to how resources are actually distributed.

Applying economic concepts, models, and methods of inquiry to examine current economic issues provides students with an opportunity to develop thinking, inquiry, and communications skills. This course better equips students for further study of economics at the university or college level.

 Economic Decision Making

Overall Expectations

DMV.01 · explain the cause and nature of the three types of choices that all economic systems must make;

DMV.02 · apply the concepts, models, and processes of economic inquiry to the study of economic choice;

DMV.03 · evaluate different sources and types of current economic information.

Economic Stakeholders

Overall Expectations

ESV.01 · identify economic stakeholder groups and the criteria each uses to make economic decisions;

ESV.02 · explain the economic rights and responsibilities of “the economic citizen”;

ESV.03 · compare the ways and the degree to which different types of economic systems satisfy the needs of stakeholders.

Self-Interest and Interdependence

Overall Expectations

SIV.01 · explain how stakeholders use self-interest to make choices that maximize economic well-being;

SIV.02 · describe how groups of stakeholders and markets within an economy are interdependent and may be affected simultaneously by a change;

SIV.03 · assess the ways in which, and the degree to which, people in Canada and other countries have become interdependent in the global economy;

SIV.04 · identify examples of, and reasons for, conflicts of self-interest that prevent the achievement of economic goals.

Economic Institutions

Overall Expectations

EIV.01 · compare the different types and functions of institutions in Canada’s private sector;

EIV.02 · explain the nature and economic functions of Canada’s public institutions;

EIV.03 · describe the nature of international economic institutions and their impact on the Canadian economy;

EIV.04 · describe the nature, causes, and consequences of economic institutions and activities that are part of the “hidden” economy.

Assessing Economic Change

Overall Expectations

ECV.01 · describe the nature and specific use of traditional and emerging methods of measuring economic well-being;

ECV.02 · explain the course, causes, and consequences of Canada’s economic growth and the connection of this growth to the economic goal of efficiency;

ECV.03 · analyse the causes and consequences of economic instability and the effectiveness of stabilization policies;

ECV.04 · describe changes in incomes and in programs and policies designed to help Canadians achieve an appropriate level of economic security;

ECV.05 · analyse the changing importance of the public and private sectors of the economy and what this means to the achievement of the goals of economic freedom and equity.

A final grade is recorded for every course, and a credit is granted and recorded for every course in which the student's grade is 50% or higher. The final grade for each course in Grades 9–12 will be determined as follows:

• Seventy per cent (70%) of the grade will be based on evaluations conducted throughout the course.  This portion of the grade should reflect the student’s most consistent level of achievement
throughout the course, although special consideration should be given to more recent evidence
of achievement .

• Thirty per cent (30%) of the grade will be based on a final evaluation in the form of an examination, performance, essay, and/or other method of evaluation suitable to the course content and administered towards the end of the course.