Frederic Bastiat (1801 – 1850) was a French political economist famous for exploding popular economic misconceptions (misconceptions that persist to this very day outside the economics profession!)....

Frederic Bastiat (1801 –

1850) was a French political economist famous for exploding popular economic

misconceptions (misconceptions that persist to this very day outside the

economics profession!). He developed the concept of opportunity cost, one

of the building blocks of economic theory, arguing that it is not enough to

consider only the seeneffects of an action; we must also account

for that which is not seen.

In What Is

Seen and What Is Not Seen, Bastiat refutes 12 specific fallacies

regarded as conventional wisdom (from “The Broken Window” through

“The Right to Employment and the Right to Profit”). Your extra

credit assignment is as follows: Read the essay and summarize each of

Bastiat’s 12 arguments. In your own words, lay out Bastiat’s position on

each issue and explain his reasoning. Convince me that you understand the

logic underlying each of his arguments; simply copying and pasting won’t do the

trick. In terms of length, I have no specific requirements in mind but I

would guess that 1-4 paragraphs per argument will suffice. That said, you

will not be penalized for deviating from this guideline.

Each argument summary

in which you demonstrate competence of the economic principles at work will

earn you 1 point toward your final course grade. Additionally, you can

earn 1 more point for applying Bastiat’s seen vs unseen analysis to a current

news or political issue in which the popular press or a politician has taken a

stance that betrays fallacious economic reasoning.

You can find Bastiat’s

essay here (note: The link opens inside of blackboard for some reason. I

would suggest pasting it into a browser window so you don’t have to deal with

the blackboard header):

.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html#Chapter%201,%20What%20Is%20Seen%20and%20What%20Is%20Not%20Seen”>http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html#Chapter

1, What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen