one more classroom exercise

["Craven, Jim" <JCraven@xxxxxxxxx>]

Title: Message

I give my students the famous quote from Lenin (that's Vladimir not John) :"When it comes time to hang the last capitalist, he is probably the one who sold the rope." I ask what that means. Eventually, with some probing, they get the idea that what Lenin meant through his metaphor, it that capitalism, in terms of its core "logic" and imperatives of profit maximization, accumulation of capital, expanded reproduction of the whole system itself, winds up doing in the short-run what ultimately digs its own grave and undermines its stability and viability in the long run.

 

I ask the students to study ads on tv and come up with some that reflect contradictions between short-run profit maximization and long-term viability and interests. One of my all-time favorites has to do with marketing sleeping aids during early-morning hours when insomniacs are likely to be watching: If the ads are successful, fewer and fewer former insomniacs are likely to be watching during these hours--they are now sleeping--so that audience numbers/shares will drop in the long-run (as will ad revenues and revenue rates) the more successful the ad campaigns for sleeping aids in the short-run.

 

Jim C.

 

 

James M. Craven

Blackfoot Name: Omahkohkiaayo-i'poyi

Professor/Consultant,Economics;Business Division Chair

Clark College, 1800 E. McLoughlin Blvd.

Vancouver, WA. USA 98663

Tel: (360) 992-2283; Fax: (360) 992-2863

http://www.home.earthlink.net/~blkfoot5

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