Channel 4 News — A Grocery Store Without Foreign Products

When countries decide not to participate in international trade, we enter a world of autarky. Few of us realize the impact that international trade has on our daily lives. One grocery store in Germany decided to remove all foreign-made products from their shelves in order to make a statement about trade, immigration, and diversity.

This clip was originally recorded by instragram user @Heinzinger and then shown on a Germany news channel with the additional commentary added on top of the original video. Thanks to @NinjaEconomics for bringing this to my attention.

2017 0

The Onion — Outsourcing Your Own Job

In this satire piece, The Onion News Network interviews employees who are outsourcing their labor to foreign workers so that they can have more fun in the office.

2017 2

Outsourced — Made in America

Many people are upset with outsourcing, but they aren’t willing to pay the price difference to ensure their products are made in America. In this scene from Outsourced, Asha walks an angry customer through the process of locating an American-made product only to find that he isn’t interested in paying the higher price.

2017 0

Outsourced — Understanding Cultures

Mr. Todd discusses with his new Indian staff that they must understand the culture of the clients that will be calling them. They go over examples related to the differences between US and Indian culture and also practice with callers.

2017 0

Project Runway — Specialization

James Tierney shared this great clip on his website a few years ago and it covers the idea of using Project Runway to discuss specialization and gains from trade. One of the contestants describes the process of designing the outfit line and discusses each member’s role in the creation of the outcome.

2017

Brad Paisley: American Saturday Night

This is one of the better “lyrics” music videos made by a YouTube user for Brad Paisley’s American Saturday Night. I use this song as my pre-class music for the international trade chapter. I use this as an introduction to start talking about why we have preferences for items from certain regions of the world and why we don’t just make them all here?

2016 0

John McCain on NAFTA

This is one I only show after some serious prepping that I don’t care about the politics behind it. John McCain was asked his thoughts on NAFTA during the Iowa primaries. The end is geared toward the politics, he does a nice job explaining the pros and cons of trade agreements. I find that when students hear the same message from other people, they tend to remember it.

2015 0

Human Powered Ferris Wheel

I use this in my international trade chapter to talk about factor endowments. Countries with a a lot of people (like India and China) will tend to do things using more labor than others.

2015 0

King of the Hill — The Best of US and Canada

Hank and Gordon get into a debate on the merits of each country. They go on to discuss different comparative advantages of their home countries. Both Canada and the United States likely have enough resources to produce all of the items they mention, but they benefit from trade when they specialize in their comparative advantage.

2014 0