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Why Price Matter

Prices act as a rationing mechanism. The state of mankind is one of the infinite wants coupled with finite resources. The task of economics, then, is to figure out what is to be produced with our scarce resources. It is through prices that the resources we have get put to their highest-valued use in the economy. In order for this allocation to work, however, prices must be allowed to fluctuate freely. Let us look at an example. Let’s imagine that there is a large forest fire, wiping out a large portion of the supply of wood. As a result, the supply of wood has drastically decreased. This decrease in supply would raise woods price, causing a reallocation of wood throughout the economy. Since it would now cost more to use wood for production, only those uses where the producers viewed the raised price as still worth it would continue to use it. Those who decided that using wood was no longer viable would simply alter their business model. Wood would still continue to be used in, say

Compulsory Unemployment In Nigeria

On compulsory unemployment President Muhammadu Buhari inaugurated a 30-member tripartite National Minimum Wage Committee for the negotiation of a new National Minimum Wage. This has produced a lot of expectations and hope among Nigerians. The committee, which includes cabinet members, governors, labour leaders, and executives from the private sector, is expected to upwardly review Nigeria’s minimum wage from its present monthly rate of N18, 900. Now, Nigerian workers are demanding N56, 000 new minimum wages. The question is, is that realisable given the current comatose economy where the extant N18, 000 minimum wage is not paid as and when due? Correspondingly, given an unemployment rate of 18 %(NBS Q3 2017) which is equivalent to roughly  18 million people and a youth unemployment rate of 33.10% NBS Q3 2017). The general thesis that makes increasing the minimum wage attractive to the electorate, which makes it attractive to presidential candidates, can be summed up in two propo