Step 1
Find a news article or story what was published since the start of the term (May 2018 – present). It can really be about anything since economics can offer insight into any event, but it’s a little easier if you start with a story that relates to business, money, finances, or the economy in general. Here are some places to try.
American Public Media’s Marketplace
Nightly business report
Michigan Radio
CNN money
Detroit Free Press

But really, any news site is fine. And the story doesn’t have to be a written article. It can also be a video or audio clip.

Step 2
After reading/viewing the story try to identify the economic concept(s) that best relate to the story. It should be something that helps either give a deeper explanation as to what’s going on, or even offers a contrasting explanation to what the author is saying.

Step 3
Write your one page paper using economic concepts to offer additional insights to the article. Warning: Don’t just recap what the story said, this is not a book report. You are to analyze the story and offer additional points using your newly gain knowledge of economics. A good way to do this is either elaborate on what the author is saying or try to challenge it. But use economics! Start by thinking of the story in the economic framework; scarcity, tradeoffs, incentives, equilibrium… And try to identify relevant concepts from the book. Remember the ultimate purpose of these papers is to demonstrate your knowledge of economics/macroeconomics so I can award you extra points. To make your use of course content glaringly obvious, bold and underline and vocabulary, names, or terms from class. For example you could say “this is a good example of Adam Smith’s invisible hand theory and goes to show that with the right institutions the self interest can match the social interest.” There is not a required maximum or minimum name of terms to use, but if you look back at your paper and you only have 1 or two terms bold/underlined on the entire page, it probably won’t get too many points.