The Wage Is Right!
and-demand model, high school economics students spend considerable time studying competitive markets for such goods as wheat, apples, and corn. They usually spend less time studying markets for labor. That is a shame, because high school students have a vital interest in understanding why some jobs pay more than others and why in the future, certain occupations are likely to experience much faster growth than others. The supply-and-demand model is the ideal tool for shedding light on these matters. In this article, I describe a set of brief classroom games that encourages students to apply the supply-and-demand model to labor markets. The games are patterned after The Price Is Right, a longrunning game show on CBS in which contestants guess the prices of various goods. In the class version, the students guess the median earnings of different occupations and predict which will grow the fastest. The games acquaint students with different occupations and help them understand how earnings are related to training, talent, and other factors. Once the students understand the rules, each game lasts about ten minutes. The students can play several games during one or two class periods or use the game to fill brief time slots throughout the school term. The activity correlates with the National Council on Economic Education’s Content Standard 13 for the twelfth grade.