Competition

Competition is a healthy part of economics. It causes the goods that are less desirable to go away or die down and the popular (not necessarily better) ones to stay around. My biggest example of competition is the one in the portable mp3 player market. The iPod is clearly the king but i remember the first mp3 player i had was a dell jukebox thing. It wasn't bad, it was durable, had good sound, held a lot of music, and was smaller than the smallest iPod at the time. But the iPod was so darn cool that i eventually got one and i have not seen a commercial or advertisement anywhere for any dell mp3 players. Now it seems like the iPod has a monopoly on the mp3 market. Not a complete monopoly because other companies do sell them but i have only met a handful of people without a iPod ( my dad even has one). But they seem to be the better ones and have been pushing out all of their competition so far as to have closed them or limited their sales.

fads and consumer behaviors

Why is it that there are things that seem to be cool one moment and lame the next? How did bandannas become cool in the eighties and die out by the mid nineties to flannel t- shirts and ripped jean? How does one even try to keep up or make money selling these things. I think people that change styles according to whats hip are trying to fool themselves on who they are. The thing that i think sellers do to influence consumer behavior is honestly guess what is gonna be hot in a year and make a crap ton of it ( or look at something that was cool 10 or 15 years ago). Consumers are probably the least predictable things in the world. Like why is the iPod the best mp3 player and not the Zune, there is not reason just because someone told us that so now everyone believes it. They sound they same, do the same thing and so on so why does one outsell the others? Consumers have infinite wants and a finite budget, what makes them choose one thing over an other. I think its a mix of style, whats cool with the people around the consumer, what celebrity endorses the product, and if they think they need it. Example is right now if Justin Beiber endorsed a pair of weird little boys shoes with a heel on them they would sell because he is popular not because the shoes are good or conforable just because he says he wears them. Consumer behavior is swayed by the slightest thing and you could be popular on month and not the next.

externalities

Externalities are pretty hard to comprehend because they affect people that are not involved in the decision making. Like say i go to the store and get the ice cream that i like for my family to eat. It does not matter if they like it or not because they are affected by the choice i made with publix without being involved in the decision. They can have negative and positive affects. An example is that if i decide to smoke a cigarette inside a classroom. The decision i made is going to harm people in 2 ways, second and third hand smoke. Everyone know about second hand smoke but third hand smoke is less commonly known. Third hand smoke is explained by me smoking that cigarette in a room and the toxins go into the carpet and the walls and for 6 months or so after that the carpet and walls release the toxins into the air in the room. So a person that did not even know i was there smoking 4 months earlier is going to be harmed by the smoke toxins. a postive example is like the ice cream one i used. When i go to the stores and get ice cream that i like and bring it back home and everyone else likes it also. With these example i think that is the best way to understand externalities in their simplest form.

Personal Income Taxation

The federal personal income tax is a progressive tax. Which is basically saying that the more money you make the higher your tax percentage is going to be. And most days i would agree with this but for the sake of argument ill take the rich people side. Now if i busted my hump everyday of my life and somehow became as rich as i would like to be why should i have to be taxed more just because i worked harder or has a better idea. when someone who is living decently working 40 hours a week doing something is getting 50 grand a year of taxable income and getting taxed 5% ( i don't know the figures but i'm just giving an example) and i am working 60 hours a week managing a corporation that employs thousands of people and gives back to the community and im making ( a comfortable) half million dollars a year but im being taxed 25%  that doesn't seem to be too fair. Not saying i'm working harder that the other making 50 grand but i am doing a lot more things and responsible for a lot more people. I just do not think one should be taxed according to the amount of money they make. it should all be one level for everyone like the constitution says " all men are created equal" and should be taxed the same way.