Teacher's Guide - The Curriculum Project

Inflation (cont’d)B. Hsa Hsa - this is an example of how labour unions can push up wages and cause inflation. Alabour union is when a group of workers get together to obtain, improve and protect their workingrights. As a group they have more power to negotiate with their employers than as individuals.When a labour union negotiates higher wages, employers may increase the prices of their goods/services so that they don’t lose money.C. Mazalia - this is an example of the ‘Wage-Price Spiral’. Higher prices force workers to ask formore wages. When their employers give them the wage increase, they then raise their prices toavoid losing money. As a result, the workers ask again for more wages. This can lead to rapidinflation.D. Southeast Asia - this is an example of inflation caused by economic crisis. The value of acurrency is linked to other world currencies due to the relationships of trade and investment betweencountries. If a country suffers an economic crisis, the value of their currency will fall. This is particularlytrue if the country has borrowed a lot of money from other countries. The fall in the value of acurrency will cause inflation - people will need more money to buy the same things.Pre-teach: pension (noun): income paid to people after they retire, by governments orfrom private funds.Ask students to read through the five examples on pages 44 and 45. Givethem about 20 minutes. Elicit any words that they don’t know. See if theclass can guess them. If not, provide a dictionary and ask one student tolook up the word and tell the rest of the class.The Curriculum Project ECONOMICS: an introduction - Teacher’s Guide21