Chapter 10

     In Chapter 10, it talks about externalities. An externality is the effect on a 3rd party when a trade or activity occurs. Negative externalities have an adverse impact on the bystander, such as pollution. Positives externalities have a beneficial effect on the bystander, such as technology spillovers. Negative externalities lead markets to produce a larger quantity than is socially desirable, while positive externalities leads to a smaller quantity than desirable.
     The government can interfere with the trade such that a more desirable outcome occurs. This is called internalizing the externality, altering incentives to make people take into account external effects. In the case of negative externalities, tax would reduce the quantity produced. This type of tax is called a corrective tax. In the case of positive externalities, subsidies would increase the quantity produced.
     Externalities can also be solve privately. An example of this is charities who try protect the entirement. Donations to schools are also ways that people try to help what they value. Two groups can also make agreements and make a contract to give each other the most benefits as possible, such as bee keepers and apple growers.
     Economist Ronald Coase came up with a theory known as the Coase theorem. It states that if private parties can bargain without cost over allocation of resources, they can solve the problem of externalities on their own. The example the book uses is a barking dog. Either the owner of the dog can pay the victims to keep the dog, or the victims can pay the owner to give up the dog. Transaction costs, or costs that parties incur when trying to make a deal, prevents this from always happening.
This chapter is a 1 in difficulty.

Abandoned House

When I was little, I went to the neighborhood elementary school that was 4 blocks down the road. Up until the 2nd grade, my mom would drive me to school on her way to work. When 3rd grade began, my parents felt that I was old enough to walk to school on my own.

Everyday on my way to and from school, I passed by this old abandoned house. It was a 2 story wooden house with a basement. The white paint was peeling off the walls, revealing the stained dark brown wood underneath. The front porch was covered in dust. The lawn was covered with dead grass and patches of dirt. Curtains covered every window in the house, except for one on the 2nd floor which had a naked, faceless mannequin inside.

It was almost the end of the school year. All of the snow from last summer melted and spring has started. When walking home from school, I noticed that the front door of the house was slightly opened. But, there were no signs that anyone had gone in or out of the house. I had this strange impulse that said that I have to go inside and see what was inside.

The stairs of the front porch creaked loudly when I stepped on them. I pushed the door open and stepped in. The house was completely void of life. All the furniture was covered with white blankets. A blanket of dust covered the floor. The first room looked like what was the living room. 3 doors connected the living room to other rooms, and a stairwell in the back of the room lead to the 2nd floor. On the left, there was the kitchen and dining room. On the right, there was what looked like a sewing room. The door in the back of the room was closed.

I went up the stairs to the 2nd floor. Each step made the stairs creak. At the top of the stairs, there was a long hallway which was connected to four bedrooms and a bathroom. At the end of the hallway was the room where the mannequin looked out of the window.

In the bathroom, there was faint dripping of water. I walked into the bathroom. In it, there was an old bathtub, a toilet, and a sink with a mirror above it. The mirror faced out the door. It was yellow and had a large crack in it. When I looked into it, I noticed that there was some ink on my face that got there during school. While trying to get the pen off my face, I saw something move behind me in the corner of my eye.

I immediately turned around. There was nothing behind me. The house looked slightly darker. I peaked my head out of the door and looked to my right. Nothing. I turned and looked to the left. In the room where the mannequin is, the curtains were now closed. The mannequin was standing in the middle of the room, facing into the hallway. I was scared.

I started walked towards the stairs, then I noticed something in the bedrooms. In the bed, there was a human-shaped lump under the blankets. Hesitantly, I went into one of the rooms. I removed the blanket from the bed. Underneath was another mannequin. I was startled and jumped back. I walked back into the hallway, and the mannequin was now standing at the end of the hallway in front of the door frame.

I ran down the stairs and to the door. The door was closed. It was locked, and I couldn't leave anymore. I panicked and looked around. In the sewing room, I noticed something around the corner of the door frame. It was an arm and a leg. There was a mannequin standing there. I started to pound on the front door and crying for help. But then I realized, I saw that one of the basement windows were opened. I realized that the door at the back of the room must lead to the basement. I ran to it, twisted the door knob, and the door opened, revealing a set of stairs. Before going down, I noticed on the top of the stairs in the corner of my eye. I turned to see what it was. There were 3 mannequins standing at the top of the stairs.

I ran down the stairs as quickly as I could. In the basement, there were dozens of boxes around the room. In the middle, there was a mannequin. But it wasn't like the other ones. It was lying on the ground, with its body twisted into shapes impossible for humans. In the back of the room, there was an opened window. I ran around the mannequin, climbed on top of the boxes, and tried to climb out of the window. As I was about half-way out, I felt something grab my leg. I kicked and kicked as hard as I could and got free. I got out of the house and ran home as quickly as I could.

I never passed by that house again.

Waiting in ER

Today is Tuesday, March 11th, 2003. I received a call from the hospital about an hour ago to come quickly. I rushed to pick up my 2 sons from school and drove to the hospital. Now, I am waiting in the emergency room. It all started about a year and a half ago.

It was Thursday on September the 18th. My wife worked as a librarian at the library 4 blocks down the street from our house. I worked about half a mile away from our house at the school, teaching college students. My kids were only 11 and 14 years old. At 5:00 P.M. that day, my wife called me to pick her up, she said that she had excruciating pain in her thigh. She usually walked to and from work. For the past month or so, she has been feeling a weird pain in the side of her leg. After a week, the pain increased, and she started taking painkillers. Now, pain killers weren't enough to stop the pain.

The next day, she took the day off work and I took her to the hospital to have her checked out. After 2 hours of waiting in the waiting room and being examined for 2 hours, the doctors came to us and told us that she had a tumor in her leg. Thankfully, the tumor was near the outside of the leg, so it could be easily removed.

A week later, on September the 27th, we went back to the hospital for her surgery. The kids came along to cheer her up. We waited a little over an hour for her surgery to be completed. The doctors told us that it was successful and there was no more tumor in her leg. She could go back to work in a week.

Everything was fine for the next 6 months. Then, my wife started feeling pain again. But this time, it was farther up her body, around her hips. On June 6th, we went back to the hospital. The doctors discovered that the tumor has spread to her pelvic bone. Our only option was to amputate her leg and part of her pelvic bone to remove the tumor. And so we did. On December 11th, my wife went back into the surgery room for 4 hours. When she came back out, she was in a wheelchair.

Everything now seemed fine. She was no longer feeling any pain. Getting around in a wheelchair was difficult for her at first, but she was getting used to it. She went back to work after about a month. But after 8 months, it happened again. She was feeling pain again, but this time it was in her chest.

And again, we went back to the hospital. And again, the doctors examined her. And again, they found a tumor inside of her. The tumor had worked its way into her lungs. We were devastated. We finally thought that it was over.

But it wasn't.

On February 23rd, she started chemo therapy. After 3 sessions, she could no longer take the pain of it. She would rather slowly die of the cancer than to go through such horrific pain. Her last chemo session was on the last day of February. She stayed home, living with the tumor inside of her. Today it is March 11th, 2003. And here I am, waiting in the hospital once again. After about waiting for what felt like a life time, the doctor came out to talk to me.

"I'm sorry to tell you this, but your wife has passed away."

Short Story 1

A man eats dinner with his wife. They discuss how he clearly deserves a promotion, but his boss would never allow it. They finish their dinner and bring their plates into the kitchen.

“As long as I have you and a steady job, I’m happy”, the man said, kissing his wife on the forehead. They head to bed. It is 11 at night, with the clear moon shining through the window. The man slowly drifts to sleep.

The man’s name is Jack Woods. He was born in 1962 and raised on his family’s farm. He went to the nearby high school. After high school, he did not have the money to go to college. He became an accountant, earning an average salary. He met his wife at the age of 20, and quickly fell in love and married a year later. They have been married for 9 years now. He has been working at the same place for the same place for the past 11 years and only makes a little more than he did when he started.

The man wakes up, but he is no longer at home in his bed. He sits up on the mat, staring at the metal bars in front of him. It was just a dream. His wife is no longer with him. He found her laying outside their front door, stabbed to death. His boss was also murdered, just a few days afterwards. He was found guilty of the murders, although he was truly innocent. He received a life sentence for the murder of his wife and boss. The gates buzz and the bars slide open. He steps out of his cell and lines up with the other prisoners. They walk to the showers. A cold gush of water hits his face, as it does everyday for the past 4 months.

Everyday, he goes through the same routine. At 6:00, all the inmates wake up and hit the showers. After showering, they go back to their cells to fix their bed and eat breakfast. At 7:00, he has leisure time in the prison yard. At 11:00, everyone eats lunch. At 11:30, he works in the laundry department, folding and packing up clothes and bed sheets. At 5:30, everyone eats dinner. After dinner, everyone goes back to their cells, then lights out at 9:00.  He repeats this process everyday, with little variation.

He is neither the biggest nor the toughest inmate around. In his first month in prison, he was often harassed by the others. He was beat up, had his food stolen, and came close to being raped once, if it wasn't for the nearby guards. Now, he learned to avoid any type of interaction with others, just trying to get through the day.

Before he sleeps, he mourns for his wife. He can not cry anymore, after what happened when the inmate in the next cell heard him.

Everyday since a month ago, he tries to smuggle out shirts and bed sheets and whatever else he could get his hands on and hide it in his mat. He has collected a sizeable amount, enough to feel a small lump in the bed if laid on but not enough to notice.

One night, he lies completely awake in his bed at night. He does not mourn for his wife. Once it seems like everyone has gone to sleep, he gets up and pulls the clothing and bed sheets out of his mat. He rips them up, making long strips of cloth. Using the cloth, he makes a loose rope. He ties the rope, making something that resembles a noose. He ties it to the pull up bar in his cell and places a chair underneath it. Standing on the chair, he puts his head through the loop. He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. He kicks over the chair he’s standing on.

A Principle to Keep

     There are many important principles in this world, some more important than others. In my opinion, the most important principle to keep at all times is the unnecessary taking of another person's life. Killing someone in self-defense or in the defense of someone else is one thing, but bloodshed solely your own benefit and nothing else is something that should never be done. Not only do you take another person's life by killing them, you are taking away part of your own humanity. A killer becomes something less than human, maybe even less than the filthy rats that crawl around in the sewers eating waste, because unlike rats, humans have the intelligence to judge whether or not something is right or wrong.
     In normal society, murder is usually rare, due to the punishment that comes along with it. If one does commit murder, it results in the murderer being secluded from society for the rest of their life, or even death. In a post-apocalyptic society, such as the one in The Road, murder seems to happen far more often because of the lift of the governing body and the need to survive, and things far worse than murder such as cannibalism or keeping the person alive to use as a sex slave. The question is whether or not murder is more justified because of these extreme situations where murder is sometimes needed for survival. I do not think that murder is justified at all in this situation, or any situation at all.

Thankful for Justin

     Every year around this time, we are suppose to take some time out of our days to appreciate what we have in our lives. It is a time to say thanks to everyone in our lives that have made an impact on us. I am lucky to have so many wonderful friends and family members that support me. I am grateful for the opportunity to receive an education in this great school and the opportunity to get ahead in life. However, this blog is just about that one person in my English 2 class that I am really thankful for.
     The person I am writing about is Justin Lam. We have been friends for about 2 years now, because he is the older brother of one of my friends. Although he is older than me, we share a lot of the same classes, since I was a frackie. He shares the same Algebra 2 class together, and he sits in front of me in English. Whenever we have a group project in English, we are usually in the same group. He is the first person I go to when I don't know what the homework is for English.
     We are not just friends in school though. Whenever I go to his house, he is very generous and gives me food and drinks to eat. Although we are not that common, we are still friends. He does not have the same interests as me, since he watches shows that I don't like, and he's not as good as a gamer as me. But, he is still a funny person and makes English a lot more enjoyable. I am thankful to have Justin Lam as a friend.
   

I Celebrate Myself

     I celebrate myself for being who I am, and not being what others want me to be. I have my own interests and my own sources of happiness. Some may be happy with their solitude, being surrounded by nature. Others may like the company of dozens or even hundreds of other people around them at all times. However, I sometimes enjoy just being on my own in my own room, with the only connection I have to the outside world is the Internet, or being with just a small group of friends. Being different from others should not be frowned upon, but encouraged.
     If everyone in this world were almost exactly the same, the world would be boring. Everything would be exactly the same. It is the individualism of the artist to create something new that would amaze or interest others.
     So, I celebrate myself, just for being myself. I celebrate myself for not trying to become a doctor or lawyer like my mom wants me to. I celebrate myself for doing things that makes me happy and not what others want me to do to make myself happy. In the end, if you're not truly being yourself, you are not truly happy.

Poe

     Edgar Allan Poe was an American writer and poet who lived in the early 19th century. He played a major part in the American Romantic Movement. Poe was one of the earliest short story writers in America. He is known for his works with mystery and horror. Today, he is still one of the most famous writers and his works are studied deeply by a majority of scholars.
     At a very early age, he became an orphan with his father running away and mother dying. Throughout his entire life, he struggled through depression and hardship. His escape was gambling, and consumption of alcohol. Although he was taken in by the very wealthy Allan family, his debts in gambling destroyed his relationship with them, causing him to not be able to finish University and struggled to survive off of only his works of writing.
     Most of Poe's works seem to be a reflection of his emotions. All of his stories that we have read so far have to deal with the supernatural, ether with people coming back from the dead or a raven that drives a man insane. These works reflect the darkness and depression inside of him. His works all have a sense of gloominess or despair. Many of his works reflect upon the loss of his his wife, Virginia Clemm. When Virginia dies, Poe falls deeper into depression and consumes more alcohol, just as the characters in The Raven and Ligeia does when they lose a love one.
     By reading the works of Poe, one can see into his mind and go deep into his emotions. This brilliant, tormented man is one of the greatest writers in American history.

What is an American?

     The simplest way we can describe an American is a citizen of the United States. But, it goes much deeper into that. People of every nationality have their own background and traditions. The people of the United States are not just made up of one group of people, but several ethnicity groups. The creates a melting pot of traditions, changing some and completely creating new ones. People come here for 2 main reasons: economic opportunities and freedom. This is what unites the people of the United States.
     The idea of freedom is what created the United States. The 13 original colonies in the eastern coast of North America fought for their independence from Britain. They abolished monarchy and created a government made up of 3 branches. From there on out, people have been fighting for more and more freedom, leading to the civil rights movement which fought against segregation of race and the women's rights movement which fought against segregation of sex. As the country grew and grew, more people were attracted from around the world.
     As the country grew, the economy grew with it. Soon, the United States became one of the most, if not, strongest countries in the world. This is a huge accomplishment, considering how young the country is. This is largely accomplished by people attempting to live the American Dream: to have freedom and the opportunity to work your way up from nothing to prosperity and success.
     In conclusion, Americans are people who strive for success. They are people who enjoy the freedom of this country and are in the pursuit for happiness. People of many different backgrounds coexist in the same communities, each with the same goal as each other. Immigrants come here and adapt to the traditions that we have here, as well as adding to it and changing it. So, an American is not just one type of person, but people from all around the world who had the chance of coming here and took that chance to try to achieve the American Dream.

The Modern Puritan

     Puritans in the past were a very strict group of religious followers of the Bible. Everything in their life revolved around the Bible and God. Anyone who would go against these rules would be strictly punished by public humiliation, excommunication, in some extreme cases they would even be executed. People who didn't follow the Puritan beliefs or didn't believe in their God would sometimes be tortured and/or thrown out of the community. Now, in modern times, Puritans do not exist anymore. Although there may be few people who still follow these beliefs, there are no large communities of Puritans.
     The group closest to the Puritans today would be the Amish, as said in class. They have strict rules about living a simple life, so they do not use modern technologies such as cars and phones. Most of them do not get an education past 8th grade, as they think that they do not need any higher education to live their way of life. But, they are probably not as strict as the Puritans were.
     However, there are still very strict rules in our society today. The obvious ones would be no killing, hate crimes, or anything of that sort. People would not be executed or banished as easily as people were in Puritan communities. Even rules that were very strict before, such as use of profanity, are often just shrugged off. So in this day and age where most people are more laid back about breaking small rules, I do not believe that any true Puritans could exist anymore.

John Proctor: Hero or Stooge?

      John Proctor is both a real person and a fictional one in a play. The real John Proctor was a 60 year old man. The fictional version of him was a man in his thirties. In the real world, John couldn't have possibly had an affair with Abigail Williams, as she was only 12 at the time. But, in both versions, it ends the same way: John Proctor gets accused for witchcraft and hangs. This post will be talking about the fictional John Proctor in The Crucible.
     In the beginning, John Proctor is a respected farmer with 3 sons and a wife. There are many faults however, such as him not going to church as often as he could because of his disapproval of the church's pastor, Parris. His biggest fault is his affair with Abigail Williams, who is 16-17 years old in the play. As the play progresses and more and more people are being accused of witchcraft, Proctor's wife, Elizabeth, gets accused by Abigail. When Proctor gets a chance to free his wife in exchange for revoking his charge on the court, he declines because his friends' wives are also being accused. This is his first act of heroism.
     Eventually, Proctor decides to come clean to the court about his affair with Abigail, in order to prove that Abigail is not with God and that her claims are false. When Elizabeth gets called into court to say whether or not this is true, she lies in order to protect Proctor. Throughout the course of the play, Mary Warren sides with Abigail and turns against Proctor, claiming that Proctor has been performing witchcraft.
     Proctor is then forced to either plead guilty to witchcraft and falsely accuse someone else of witchcraft, or be tried by hanging. Elizabeth pleads with Proctor to sign a confession so that he can live. But in the end, Proctor decides to stick to his Puritan beliefs and rips up the confession. In the end, John Proctor dies a true Puritan. He stays true to his morals and is pure in the very end. John Proctor is a hero.

Arrivals - There Goes The Neighborhood

     Before the Americas was "discovered" by the Europeans, there were already millions of Natives thriving with their own unique cultures and traditions. But, the explorers did not care about their culture and thought of the people as barbarians and savages for living the way they did. They didn't even think of them as their own people. They referred to the Natives as Indians because they thought they were in the Indies, even though the people looked different and had completely different cultures. The arrival of the Europeans changed the lives of the Natives forever.
     The Europeans did not see the Natives as equals to themselves. They saw themselves as more civilized and more human than the Natives, because they were more technically advanced. They saw them as opportunities to spread their religion and a source of wealth. They invaded their land and forced them to change their way of life to be more like the Europeans. When the Natives did disagreed with the invaders or refused to change their religion and culture, they were forced out of their homes. The Europeans thought so little of the Natives that Columbus kidnapped 6 Natives to bring back to Spain to please the king and queen.
     They did not just stop there. They created plantations in the Americas to grow cash crops to increase their wealth. On these plantations, they forced the Natives to do hard physical labor. Diseases brought over by the European combined with the difficult work ravaged the population of the Natives. Wars between the two cultures and disease killed millions of Natives. Entire tribes went extinct, wiping away their culture and traditions. The Native way of life was drastically changed by the Europeans, and might not ever return to the way it was before.

Me

       Hello, my name is Jiawei Huang (you pronounce it Jay-Way). I am a freshman in Whitney M. Young, the best school in Chicago, and possible the world. Although I am a freshman, most of my classes are with sophomores and juniors, and a couple of my academic center friends. This creates some difficulties for me, in terms of both school work and social life. Right now, I would say that my entire life would be focused on school with breaks whenever I'm not doing work.
       There are few things interesting with me, as basically everything I do revolves around school. One of these things is that I have a pet hedgehog that I named Potato, because he kind of looked like a potato. I live with my grandparents because my mom works outside the city, because it is hard for her to find a job here in Chicago. They do not fully approve of my exotic pet, but my mom convinced them to let me keep him.
       During my free time, I either go out to a friend's house or stay home and play League of Legends, an enormous multiplayer strategy game played by millions around the world. I'm a diamond player in North America, which makes me pretty good. Most League players I know in real life treat me like a god because I am diamond. I grew a small garden in my backyard over the summer, but I don't really have time for that anymore since school started.
       Since school started, I've been under a lot of stress with all the homework I get. My favorite class that's not gym or lunch would probably be trig/algebra 2, because I find that challenging myself with some difficult math problems calms me and relieves a lot of stress off of me, which is different from most people. My least favorite class would probably either history or English (sorry). All of my teachers are very nice though. That's about the general gist of my life.