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Economics
Listen
to this Commentary!
Leah Chapple Stingley
My palms were sweating as I sat in my chair on the first day of my economics
class, gripping the desk.
I'm Leah Chapple Stingley with a commentary from Youth Radio.
What is a market economy anyway? As teenagers, I thought it was our job to spend
money, not analyze it.
Just when I thought I was getting the hang of economics, I heard about these
"BREAD" guys. BREAD is short for Berkeley Regional Exchange and Development.
Instead of using traditional American dollars, BREAD members swap services and
goods in a system of bartering. I know it sounds like a hippy commune that teens
wouldn't dare enter. But teenagers have always had a subculture of bartering.
My friends and I share Mp3's and clothes all the time. I asked my Economics
teacher if we would ever talk about underground markets like BREAD in class.
She said it doesn't follow the curriculum. It's too bad that she would rather
see us get hooked by advertisers than learn to be a productive member of the
economy.
For Youth Radio, I'm Leah Chapple Stingley.
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