Edexcel Economics Unit 4 Global Economy Discussion Thread (10.June.2014)

just not sure id get the mark because of the time scale

Was it not better to talk about the initial rise from 40-50?


Posted from TSR Mobile

Who did question 2 essays it looks like not many people did them?

I was checking through my exam answers today, I was pleased with what I had until I realised the mistake I had done on 1ai, the 20 marker about the budget deficit. I wrote the whole essay about the current account deficit...my head fell into my hands as I looked at the clock and realised I had 2 minutes left, so the damage was done. Is it likely I will get any marks at all for the essay or will it just haunt me until August 14th, and beyond? **** sake lol

wait can anyone tell me what is 5(e) asking about? I wrote down things about increased competition and reduce labour cost would increase economic growth and reduce unemployment.
But I heard some people were writing about how supple side policy and monetary policy could increase labour productivity.
So confused and I am worrying...


Posted from TSR Mobile

This is EXACTLY what happened to me. Well, I finished the exam feeling amazing then on the bus I realised what I've done. I too am wondering how many marks I would get out of 20, bare in mind that you can drop about 30 marks and still get an A, so you should be ok.

Ha I feel your pain, yeah fingers crossed, I'm so borderline on a grade boundary too :/ Even 3/4 marks out of 20 would be nice!

Labour market reforms: i.e. education and training, reduction in trade union power, reduction in unemployment benefits, reduction in income tax rates, reduction in employment protection legislation.

The question was essentially how could supply-side policies achieve economic growth and reduce unemployment, which was a bit of a Unit 2 question. There was nothing to do with monetary policy.

didnt realise it was supply side - but did write about training.Also wrote about factors from the extract such as better business envionment aswell as workers being oayed wages etc. etc. is that ok?

Hey guys, I found it a mixed paper, and that appears to be the general consensus, with some awkward questions with difficult formats that could end up in lower grade boundaries (fingers crossed)
Anyway I did question 3 and 4.

3A
I didn't like this question at all, I separated growth and development by saying development is a composite index idea (made up of varying factors) I just said how it would effect development, and how countries have developed without growth? I then mentioned that it was almost impossible to develop without econ growth because GDP is part of development? I finished with mentioning the difficulty in explicitly defining 'economic development' All in all it was horrid.

3B
This was okay. Savings gap-define-draw the diagram and then just say whether you thought it was significant or not and then just go wild on constraints, I put
Foreign exchange gap
PPD
Civil wars/corruption/poor governance
Human/Capital inadequacies
Maybe another but I can't remember? (Infrastructure maybe)
I then did prioritization of factors

4A
Use the graphs, say what you would define 'economic performance' is. Use the values and compare to the rest of G7

4B
The other tricky question on the paper, it was really unclear what they wanted here, especially for 8 marks.
I just drew the Lorenz curve, defined the gini coefficient and that was pretty much it really.

4C
This was similar to the last one, say why income inequality may have been reduced
-doubled income
-4% growth
-population not declining anymore
The gini coefficient was going up because although income inequality was falling, the amount of income that was owned by the richest was increasing (i hope you guys realised this) and then you can say that growth is driven by the richest so they reap the most benefits resulting in the gini coefficient going up.

4D
This was pretty much PPD again.-define
Restricting economy meaning Russia can't fall back on other sectors
The oil will eventually run out (data reference)
Income inelsaticity of primary products (however saying that oil will always be needed as evaluation)
The volatile price of primary products (see figure 3)-however evaluation saying that oil will always be needed causing it to go up in value
Difficulty in planning incomes so hard to invest (same point as above I think)
Then evaluated by saying some countries have developed with PPD (Botswana-diamonds) and that if a country has a comparitive advantage in the good then it should produce it

4E
This question looked hard at first but it was almost exclusively comprehension
outline the benefits from the text-and maybe the fact that the WTO now has Russia's back in trade disputes
-I think the benefits were increased consumption (eval with AD shifting and the size of increased consumption)
-More FDI-eval with costs and benefits of FDI
-more income from exports (tax revenue up for the government)

Costs were....
-Lower tariff revenue (didn't have time to draw the diagram)
-Reduced subsidies meaning domestic industries may loose out
-Harsher economic climate compared to china maybe?

I hoped that helped people, I'm really hoping for an A* in this and I'm praying to all the old gods and the new

Labour market reforms: i.e. education and training, reduction in trade union power, reduction in unemployment benefits, reduction in income tax rates, reduction in employment protection legislation.

The question was essentially how could supply-side policies achieve economic growth and reduce unemployment, which was a bit of a Unit 2 question. There was nothing to do with monetary policy.

hi all.
want help in determining what kind of grade ill get in august.
thought unit 3 went pretty well but most say it was easy. hopefully should have got an b/a in that.

today, however, was pretty two sided haha.
i did question 3 in section a.
set out i as;
-definition of economic development, measurements that it includes eg phones per 1000/clean water availability.
-influence of economic growth on development; eval with higher rate of growth, greater the impact.. dat magnitude ****.
-how other factors also influence development; did infrastructure and health and education. evaluated with time lags of building roads/hospitals etc and time lag of education and training actually influencing markets and thus the development.
-little evaluative conclusion; not *dependent* on economic growth but its most significant as it influences the other factors; better growth means higher potential for infrastructure/h+e schemes as government likely have larger expenditure budget as result..
-used developing country examples for all; india roads causes damage to motor vehicles, literacy rates of ghana etc etc..

think that went well. b similar.
- savings gap constraint as represents initial asymetric information which handicaps growth.. negative multiplier..
- poor infrastructure also crucial.. negative multiplier as can increase costs of transporting goods and can prevent establishments eg hospitals being made which benefits h+e..
- h+e (bit repetitive of part i, i know..).. aids/hiv in developing countries very prominent. often can hinder ability to work or productivity of workers.. better health care would combat this..
- poor infrastructures more significant than savings gap, as time lag of implementation means no immediate fix... savings gap issues can be combated with aid fdi debt cancellations etc and solved relatively quick; same cant be said about infrastructure, although it can be funded..
- primary product dependency. analyse with presbich singer theory.. however, evaluation; some countries eg botswana and diamonds have grown economically despite this..
- conclusion explaining savings gap restraint although harmful if uncombated, it is easy to fight against eg fdi etc..
-backed all this up with examples of developing countries again...

what we reckon people, scores from that? obviously just guesses..

now, i did 5 in section b, and thought the questions when i properly looked at them were really hard to understand and grasp what was wanted..
a). should be 5/5
b). just did AS and AD both shift left? defo got 2 from application.. described why shifts took place etc.. put into context of leaving 2008 recession.. thoughts?
c). thought this one was really weird. was it why labour unit costs high/low or something? cant remember q but can remember what i wrote haha anyway, didnt know what to put. want to know what sort of mark i can expect from saying it was down to availibility of labour... demand for labour... wages of workers in labour market.. evaluating with effects depnd on elasticity of demand in labour market.. etc.. will i even get a single mark on this? just wrote down a load of crap tbh. shrug.
d). this one was why imbalances all reducing... did 2 bits of data from relevant figure.. germany and greece levels etc.. reasons i gave were; all in eu and so under same monetary policy.. cant use QE, interest rates or inflation to influence their own balances individual. eval with; needs of the euro zone unit put before the individual needs which could be risk in long term as it may be hard for isolated firms to combat unique recession when in this group.. other point was transpararent costs which ive no idea why i put haha. feel like i got wrong end of stick again. said about how this makes firms more competitive, makes their prices of goods closer together, meaning they will all more likely be in balance.. which is completely unrelated and stupid but i panicked haha. didnt even put in 2nd eval. poor me. i realise now that it should have been focused more on that actual imbalance.. again, will i get any marks for this?
e). think this one was bad too. should have been supply side policies shouldnt it. think by luck i may have loosely described a few.. would i be rewarded for any of this? .. started with labour reforms that increase education and training in labour markets so then more productive/competitive, then lead to growth. then wrote about labour reforms that would subsidise countries with smaller labour markets so then they would become more competitive; meaning higher growth in natural competition and also more employment. then quoted extract on nmw bit, said they could reduce nmw to increase growth as firms have higher profit margins due to lower costs.. could then invest in better research and development to improve labour service long term.. then said, however this would work against reduced unemployment aim; less incentive for labour workers to be employed with lower min wage.. then said they could try what has been tried in product market (quoted extract) and make it easier to hire and fire workers. reduce costs when needed for firms.. could potentially benefit or damage unemployment rates depending on countries strategy.. again nervous that i get 0 marks for whole of this answer haha.

would rlly appreciate response.. what marks you think id be rough credited; especially for last 3 of section b. maybe not give me estimation of marks; but respond with what you put.. may think im mad for typing all this out haha. but thanks if you read. sorry if it bugged u

Sounds good. C was factors influencing unit labour costs. Don't worry I missed half of the last question on the data response and did D wrong. I thought it said why they would want to reduce current account imbalances


Posted from TSR Mobile

I agree with everything you have said, found the exam harder than the others but just about manageable. Question 4C) was tough, but thought about it after the exam: a reason for inequality increasing but poverty decreasing, the break from Communism? I'm sure there was a line in this in the extract and also know Capitalism is on the syllabus.... this would be harsh though if they were looking for this

Yeah i mentioned that for 4(c) about the decline of communism and increase in capitalism as the reason for gini coefficient increasing

My timing was horrible. I didn't manage to do the 15 marker so I guess that's goodbye A* , to be in shout for an A I can only have dropped about another 15 marks - which seems doable. Still gutted about that 15 marker