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Shadowing practice: Intro to Economics: Crash Course Econ #1

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  1. I'm Janky Clifford and I'm the host of Crash Course Economics.0:00
  2. Stan!0:04
  3. 13, you're co -host.0:05
  4. Oh, co -host!0:06
  5. Yeah!0:07
  6. Well anyways, we're making our Crash Course Economics series at the YouTube space in lovely Los Angeles, California because Mr.0:08
  7. Clifford and I are both from Southern California.0:14
  8. Yeah.0:16
  9. Who are these no names?0:16
  10. Where are the Green Brothers?0:18
  11. If there aren't any Greens, I'm unsubscribing.0:19
  12. How can you unsubscribe?0:22
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  1. What is this?0:23
  2. Some kind of a moving newspaper?0:24
  3. Oh.0:27
  4. Did we just get heckled by the Muppets?0:27
  5. It sounds like it.0:29
  6. Hey guys, hey guys, listen, don't feel bad about not being green, okay?0:30
  7. It's crazy.0:33
  8. It's crazy.0:35
  9. Hi guys.0:36
  10. Listen, being green is great in everything but being Adrian and Mr.0:37
  11. Clifford, well that's great too and in fact, you know guys, it's not easy being green.0:40
  12. I think I could sing a song about that.0:45
  13. Can I sing with you?0:47
  14. Of course.0:48
  15. Yeah, hold up.0:49
  16. No, no, no, no, we can't afford the licensing agreement for that song guys.0:49
  17. Economics.0:53
  18. Oh.0:53
  19. Sorry.0:54
  20. Well, okay, well in that case why don't you guys just introduce yourselves?0:54
  21. Okay.0:57
  22. I'm Mr.0:59
  23. Clifford and I'm a high school economics teacher and YouTuber and I'm going to focus on teaching you the theories and graphs of economics, you know, the textbook stuff.0:59
  24. And I'm Adrian Hill.1:05
  25. I'm a senior reporter for the Public Radio Show Marketplace and I'm going to focus on showing you the real world applications of economics.1:06
  26. You know the good stuff, the really fun stuff.1:12
  27. Hey, we're both fun.1:14
  28. We're definitely not going to teach economics like this.1:15
  29. Welcome to Crash Course Economics.1:17
  30. I am thrilled to be teaching you this fascinating subject.1:19
  31. I'm sorry Professor Honeydew, but that's why people hate economics in high school and college.1:26
  32. Anyway, Stalern Waldorf have a point.1:30
  33. The most important question in economics is where's John Green?1:32
  34. I mean, everyone knows he won a bronze medal in economics at the Alabama State Academic to Catholic.1:35
  35. Well, John Green isn't hosting because economics.1:39
  36. We'll explain later.1:43
  37. So, let's start with the basics.1:51
  38. What is economics?1:54
  39. Well, it might be easy to determine what economics isn't.1:55
  40. Economics is not the study of money or getting rich, although understanding economics can help with that.1:57
  41. Economics is not the study of the stock market.2:01
  42. It's just not.2:03
  43. And economics is not primarily about men in bow ties forecasting what will happen in a given market or the overall economy.2:04
  44. Actually, a few economists do that, but that's not the main focus of economics.2:09
  45. Economics is the study of people and choices.2:12
  46. The famous economist Alfred Marshall defined economics as, A study of man and woman in the ordinary business of life.2:15
  47. It inquires how he gets his income and how he uses it.2:21
  48. Thus, it is on the one side the study of wealth and the other, more important side, a part of the study of man and woman.2:24
  49. So let's talk a minute about what else econ is.2:30
  50. Economics is an 18 -year -old deciding whether to work or go to college and how that affects her future income.2:33
  51. Economics is a company deciding whether to produce smartphones or tablets and how that's influenced by what we consumers want to buy.2:38
  52. Economics is the government deciding whether to increase its spending when there's a recession and if it's worth going into debt.2:45
  53. So despite what you might think, economics is not boring and dull.2:51
  54. Okay, some of it is, but it's not all like that.2:56
  55. I promise it's awesome.3:00
  56. Understanding econ can forever change the way you think and problem solve.3:01
  57. Our job over the next 40 weeks is to teach you concepts that will help you understand the world and hopefully make it a better place.3:05
  58. No matter who you are, you will be using economics.3:13
  59. In fact, you are using econ right now.3:16
  60. You made a choice to watch this video.3:19
  61. That means you must feel that the benefit outweighs the cost.3:21
  62. You might be thinking, this is YouTube.3:24
  63. There's no cost, but sure there is.3:27
  64. You could be watching videos of kittens or skaters falling on their face or Charlie biting fingers.3:28
  65. Oh!3:33
  66. The cost of watching this video is the video you're not watching, the value of the next best alternative.3:33
  67. Economists call this your opportunity cost.3:39
  68. If you're still watching this video, it means that you believe it's the best use of your time or you wouldn't be watching it.3:42
  69. But what if I'm watching this at school?3:47
  70. You ask, what if I'm forced to watch this?3:49
  71. Well, you weren't forced to go to school.3:51
  72. You could ditch, you could drop out, you could move to a country that doesn't have compulsory education.3:52
  73. But the cost would outweigh the benefit.3:56
  74. Even if you are at school, you're not forced to watch the video.3:58
  75. You could close your eyes or put your head down.4:00
  76. No one's gonna pry your eyes open.4:02
  77. Let me creepy.4:04
  78. Now let's talk about why John Green isn't here teaching this course.4:04
  79. John is an entrepreneur.4:07
  80. He writes books, runs DFTBA, vlogbrothers, and Mental Floss and creates movies.4:09
  81. But he can't do everything he wants to do.4:13
  82. He looked at the benefits and costs of his choices and in the end decided to spend more time writing books.4:15
  83. So Mr.4:21
  84. Clifford and I are jumping in to teach you economics.4:22
  85. And believe it or not, we just covered the two most important assumptions in all of economics.4:24
  86. First, the idea of scarcity.4:27
  87. People have unlimited wants but limited resources.4:29
  88. And second, everything.4:31
  89. I mean, everything has a cost.4:32
  90. And if these assumptions are true, then we need a way to analyze our choices and get the most from our limited resources.4:33
  91. And that's economics.4:38
  92. Wait, but let's go back to the idea of benefits and costs.4:39
  93. About 30 ,000 people a year die in car accidents in the US.4:42
  94. Is there a way to ensure there will never be another traffic fatality?4:46
  95. Yes, we can crush all the cars, close the roads, and force everyone to walk.4:49
  96. That would solve the car crash problem.4:53
  97. Do you want to decrease the number of people convicted of murder?4:55
  98. You could decriminalize murder.4:58
  99. You want to end the unethical treatment of elephants?5:00
  100. You could kill off all the elephants in an ethical way, of course.5:02
  101. But before you decide to tenderly euthanize herds of beautiful elephants, think about it for a second, each of these solutions is absurd because the costs clearly outweighs the benefit.5:06
  102. Traffic fatalities are tragic, but we don't prevent them at all costs.5:17
  103. You know that driving has risk, that you might get in a car accident, but you still drive.5:21
  104. Why?5:26
  105. Well, first, who's going to walk to the gym and walking home with heavy groceries in the rain is way worse than the teeny tiny chance of dying in a5:27
  106. car crash.5:33
  107. The point is, individuals, businesses, and countries can't have everything, so they're forced to weigh the benefits and costs of their decisions and make choices.5:34
  108. Let's look at another example.5:42
  109. Military spending in the United States is over $600 billion per year.5:44
  110. That's close to what the next top 10 countries spend combined.5:49
  111. They're a total of about 20 active aircraft carriers in the world today, and the US has half of them, and it's building more.5:53
  112. The opportunity cost of those aircraft carriers could be hospitals, schools, and roads.5:59
  113. So is the US spending too much on the military?6:04
  114. Should the US focus on making guns or butter?6:07
  115. That is, weapons or consumer goods.6:10
  116. And notice the key word here is or.6:12
  117. We can't produce an infinite amount of weapons and consumer goods because we don't have an infinite amount of workers and farms and factories and raw materials.6:14
  118. Scarcity means we must make a choice.6:20
  119. The American president Dwight D.6:22
  120. Eisenhower explained this best in 1953 in a speech about Cold War military buildup.6:24
  121. Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed.6:28
  122. Those that are cold and are not clothed.6:35
  123. This world in arms is not spending money alone.6:37
  124. It's spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.6:39
  125. And this is a good time to mention the role of politics and economics.6:43
  126. We're not pushing some liberal anti -military policy here.6:46
  127. We're just pointing out that military spending has an opportunity cost.6:49
  128. The resource is not being used for social services like feeding the hungry.6:52
  129. We're going to try not to push a political agenda on you.6:55
  130. We're going to show you both sides and let you decide which one's best.6:57
  131. So please don't say Mr.7:00
  132. Clifford loves capitalism so he's just a pro -business conservative, or Adrienne's talking about environmental regulation so she's an anti -business liberal.7:01
  133. Yeah, we are pro -business and you are too.7:08
  134. I mean, where do you think your computer came from?7:10
  135. That computer was brought to you by capitalism and the private sector.7:11
  136. But that being said, the security and laws, roads and that traffic ticket you got the other day came from the government.7:14
  137. Conservatives and liberals fight over the details, but the free market alone can't solve all of our problems.7:20
  138. And the government can't solve all of them either.7:24
  139. Government officials use economic theories to guide public policy and their effects are widespread and affect billions of people.7:26
  140. Sometimes the theory is flawed, but many times the policy is flawed.7:32
  141. Economists suggest policies based on theories supported by data and understanding of incentives.7:35
  142. Having the right incentive is key.7:39
  143. But the right incentives can be hard to figure out.7:40
  144. Take for example public colleges and universities.7:43
  145. Many of them used to get state money for each student they enrolled.7:46
  146. That meant universities had financial incentives to focus on recruiting as many students as possible, but not actually helping them succeed once they were in class.7:49
  147. So states have started changing the incentives.7:57
  148. Now more and more states reward schools for the number of students that complete courses or earn degrees.8:00
  149. And in some places this has worked.8:06
  150. It's helped schools increase their graduation rates by shifting money from marketing budgets to programs to help students do better.8:08
  151. But those incentives can also backfire if they're poorly designed.8:14
  152. A university that gets money for graduates could push students through the program without giving them a good education.8:18
  153. It might want to admit only students who come in with super high test scores, instead of considering other factors that might make them good candidates.8:24
  154. It might push students into less rigorous majors.8:31
  155. But incentives can help solve problems without adding more resources.8:34
  156. You just have to get the incentives right.8:38
  157. Many non -economists assume that the way to improve things like healthcare is to spend more money.8:41
  158. Economists would point out that the U .S.8:45
  159. already spends almost twice as much per person as other rich countries.8:47
  160. And in many cases, they get worse health outcomes.8:51
  161. Economists would also say that rather than spending more money, we need to make sure that insurers, hospitals, doctors, and patients have incentives to produce the most effective care possible8:54
  162. at the lowest cost possible.9:02
  163. The point is, if you mess up the incentives, the policy's not going to work.9:04
  164. When Vietnam was under French colonial rule, the regime issued a bounty on rats to exterminate them, giving money to people for handing in rat tails.9:08
  165. I guess because piles of rat bodies were too gross.9:17
  166. The plan backfired.9:20
  167. To make as much money as possible, the rat catchers cut the tails off the rats and release them, allowing them to make baby rats.9:21
  168. The policy actually increased the rat population.9:27
  169. It made things worse.9:30
  170. Eek!9:32
  171. We'll talk more about this idea of perverse incentives in another video, when we talk about the 2008 financial crisis.9:33
  172. Eek!9:39
  173. Again, for now, let's go to the Thought Bubble.9:39
  174. Speaking of 2008, people sometimes criticize economists asking, why didn't they predict the 2008 financial crisis, or why can't they agree on what the government should do or shouldn't do9:42
  175. when there's a recession?9:50
  176. These criticisms fail to distinguish between macroeconomics and microeconomics.9:51
  177. Specifically, all these complaints are about macroeconomics.9:55
  178. Macro studies the economy as a whole.9:57
  179. It looks at the whole nation's output, unemployment, inflation, interest rates, government spending, and growth.9:59
  180. Macro answers questions like, will unemployment rise if there's an increase in taxes?10:04
  181. Will an increase in the money supply boost output, or just increase inflation?10:08
  182. Will a slump in European economies cause U .S.10:12
  183. economy to slow down?10:14
  184. Macroeconomists get more airtime because they predict the direction of the overall economy and work with the media, businesses, and Congress and the Federal Reserve.10:15
  185. But, less than half of all economists are macroeconomists.10:22
  186. There's a whole other side of economics that look at different questions.10:25
  187. How many workers should we hire to maximize profit?10:28
  188. If our main competitor releases their product in May, when's the best time to release our product?10:30
  189. And which is better for fighting climate change?10:34
  190. A gas tax, or increase in fuel efficiency?10:36
  191. These are all microeconomic questions.10:38
  192. They're not about predicting GDP or measuring unemployment, but they are crucial questions that economists must answer.10:40
  193. Also, if you don't know what GDP is, or what a higher low unemployment rate is, don't worry, we'll get there.10:46
  194. So, macroeconomists are two different groups asking different questions under one academic umbrella.10:50
  195. If economics was biology, macroeconomics would be ecology, while microeconomics would be cell biology.10:55
  196. If economics was physics, macroeconomics would be cosmology and relativity, while microeconomics would be Newtonian mechanics.10:59
  197. Thanks Thought Bubble.11:05
  198. Stan, I've always wanted to say that, and I can cross off my bucket list.11:06
  199. Now, I've ringed the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange, arm wrestle Ben Bernanke, and so many giant pool of money like Uncle Scrooge.11:08
  200. Obviously, we're glossing over the details, but we promise to cover everything in the next 40 weeks.11:13
  201. From supply and demand to monetary policy, we'll cover it all, except for maybe the giant pools of money.11:18
  202. We can't promise you that learning economics will make you wealthy, but we can promise that learning economics will enlighten your mind and make you a more informed decision maker.11:24
  203. And that makes us all better off.11:32
  204. Thanks so much for joining us.11:34
  205. We'll see you next week.11:36
  206. Thanks for watching Crash Course Economics.11:36
  207. It was made with the help of all these nice people.11:38
  208. They work on the show because there's financial and implicit benefits that cover their opportunity cost.11:40
  209. Now, if you want to help them with those financial benefits, consider going over to Patreon.11:44
  210. It's a voluntary subscription platform that allows you to pay whatever you want monthly to help make Crash Course free for everyone forever.11:48
  211. Thanks for watching DFTBA.11:54

Learn American pronunciation from a fast-paced B1 economics lecture

English speaking practice at B1 level comes through clearly in this introduction. Crash Course's economics lecture moves at 234 words per minute, faster than 88 percent of the catalogue, packing native-speed American pronunciation into 223 lines. The clip opens with informal banter between two hosts joking about the show, then shifts to clear introduction and definition. This progression from natural conversation to structured explanation gives you multiple contexts for practicing listening and speaking together.

The opening establishes pace and rhythm through informal exchanges, training your ear to catch natural speech patterns. The host introductions model professional clarity, showing you how American speakers articulate in more formal settings. The definitions section then patterns repeated structures that your mouth can anchor and reuse. Together, these sections build a complete picture of American English in academic contexts.

How repeated definitions teach american accent patterns in this lecture

Shadowing english speaking practice becomes most precise in the definitions section. The hosts use repetition to teach meaning, which also makes these lines ideal for practicing native-speed pronunciation. Look at lines 52 and 53, which establish a parallel structure: "Economics is not the study of money or getting rich, although understanding economics can help with that" and "Economics is not the study of the stock market."

The repetition of "is not" across these lines creates a pattern your mouth can repeat and master. Then line 55 extends this structure with added detail and colloquial language: "And economics is not primarily about men in bow ties forecasting what will happen in a given market or the overall economy." The phrase "men in bow ties" reveals how American speakers weave informal expression into formal explanation, a key feature of natural speech.

  • On line 52, stress "Economics," "study," and "not" equally to anchor the pattern
  • On line 53, repeat the same stress pattern for consistency in your speaking
  • On line 55, notice how "men in bow ties" shifts the tone before returning to formal language like "forecasting" and "overall economy"

How to improve english speaking and listening by shadowing this economics clip

Work through these focused steps to develop native-speed pronunciation and fluency. Repeat each section five times before moving forward. This approach lets your ear and mouth develop together, building the muscle memory that comes from practicing real spoken patterns at their natural pace and rhythm.

  • Begin with lines 1 to 40: the informal banter establishes natural conversational American pronunciation and helps your ear adjust to native speaking pace
  • Continue with lines 34 to 38: the host introductions show clearer articulation and professional speaking style in academic contexts
  • Focus on lines 51 to 55: the repeated definitions provide structure your mouth can replicate, building fluency for patterns you can apply elsewhere
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