- •Unit 1 free enterprise system
- •Active Vocabulary
- •1 Translate the following combinations into Russian.
- •2 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous task.
- •3 Study the new words and make your own sentences with them.
- •4Translate into English using the expressions from the previous tasks.
- •5 How would you serve your customer?
- •Social and business skills Breaking the ice
- •3 Write the letters of the phrases in the appropriate place.
- •Introductory questions Being more specific Asking for an opinion
- •4 Match the conversational exchanges.
- •Reading
- •I The Pillars of Free Enterprise
- •1 What are the “pillars” of American economic system?
- •2 What does the right to private property give the owners of natural resources and capital? Why?
- •Free Enterprise: the Theory and the Reality
- •1What is the essence of the term “laissez faire”?
- •2 What are the three levels of American government?
- •3 In what cases does the government show its power?
- •1 What is the role of prices in American economic system?
- •2 Why is American economic system called price-directed system?
- •3 What are the fundamental questions that price system provides the answers to?
- •1 What does competition refer to?
- •Active vocabulary
- •1 Translate the following combinations into Russian.
- •2 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous task.
- •3 Study the new words and make your own sentences with them.
- •4 Fill in each blank with a suitable word.
- •5 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous tasks.
- •6 Answer the questions.
- •Social and business skills Arrangements
- •1 Read the extract and answer these questions.
- •3 You will hear an imaginary alternative version of the conversation in the book. Listen and compare your choices.
- •5 Match the sentences with the headings.
- •6 Food and drink. Match the two parts of the conversational exchange.
- •Reading
- •I Forms of business organization
- •Unit 3 how to start your own business
- •Active Vocabulary
- •1 Translate the following combinations into Russian.
- •2 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous task.
- •3 Study the new words and make your own sentences with them.
- •4 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous tasks.
- •5 Answer the questions.
- •Social and business skills Making a proposal
- •1 Make a summary of the script.
- •2 Look at the script again and notice how the meeting is structured. In which order do these stages occur?
- •3 Here us some of the language you can use for each of those four stages.
- •Refusing and accepting
- •2 Underline the phrases that he uses to refuse the offer.
- •II Becoming an entrepreneur
- •III Risks and benefits of starting a new business
- •Unit 4 financial institutions
- •Active Vocabulary
- •1 Translate the following combinations into Russian.
- •2 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous task.
- •3 Study the new words and make your own sentences with them.
- •4 Translate into English using the expressions from the previous tasks.
- •5 Match the notion and its definition.
- •6 Define the meaning of the words highlighted in the text.
- •1 Discuss these points.
- •2 Look at the three solutions offered by Patrick Ellis and underline the eight conditional sentences that are used. Which of these sentences describe hypothetical situations?
- •3 Listen and fill in the blank spaces with the correct forms of the verbs.
- •Reading
- •I Functions of a Central Bank
- •II Other Bank Services
- •III Consumer credit
1 What is the role of prices in American economic system?
2 Why is American economic system called price-directed system?
3 What are the fundamental questions that price system provides the answers to?
How the price system answers the What question. When buyers want more of a product, they are willing to pay more for it. Higher prices attract other producers. As production increases, the need for additional workers causes wages to rise within the industry. When demand for the product fails, the opposite happens. Prices fall, producers who can no longer operate profitably shut down, or switch to other products, and production falls enough to meet the reduced demand.
How the price system answers the How question. The price system encourages sellers to produce in such a way as to costs and maximize profits.
Stanly Lee owns a newspaper delivery service. Stanly used to rely on 10 to 15 kids with bicycles to deliver the newspapers before and after school. One day Stanley calculated that it would cost less to use one adult with an automobile than 15 kids on bicycles to deliver his newspapers. He laid off the school kids and hired the adult.
How the price system answers the Who question. Those who graduate from high school earn more, on the average, than those who drop out. Many professional athletes earn more than letter carriers. Physicians and attorneys earn more, on the average, than stenographers and building superintendents.
Since they earn more, professional athletes, physicians and attorneys can afford to buy more goods and services than people earning less than they do. Thus, by assigning values to the work people do, the price system answers the Who question.
Answer these questions using your knowledge and experience.
III
Competition refers to the rivalry among buyers and among sellers. Sellers compete by trying to produce the goods and services buyers want at the lowest possible price. Those unable or unwilling to sell at a price low enough to attract buyers will be unable to dispose of their goods and services. This rivalry benefits us all.
It benefits us by giving us the goods and services we want, when and where we want them. Producers know that if they don’t satisfy consumer demand, their competitors will.
It benefits us because producers must constantly strive to operate more efficiently. The quest of greater efficiency conserns scarce resources, increases output and raises living standards by reducing costs.
Buyers compete with one another because there is never around everything to go around. Those willing to pay the price can buy a steak. Those unwilling or unable to pay will substitute a less costly product like chopped meat, chicken or hot dogs. In other words, in the rivalry among buyers of steak, those unable to pay the price will lose to those who are able to pay.
If we think of private property, the price system and competition as providing the foundation of our free enterprise economic system, then profits and other economic incentives supply the cement that holds the structure together.
The role of economic incentives. Economic incentives influence our decisions about what and where to buy. The desire to achieve the greatest profit for our efforts is the principal economic incentive in the American and other market economies. Economists refer to this as economic self-interest.
Of course economic self-interest cannot explain human behavior. Workers may pass up the chance to earn more simply because they don’t want to move to another region. Business firms often reduce their profit by contributing to charitable or other public service organizations. Many parents forgo job opportunities to raise their children at home. And for many reasons other than price, consumers may prefer to shop at one store rather than another.