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Demo · Business Ethics

A term, then the next question.

When a student stalls on price controls, Kai Coach names the idea and immediately hands the reasoning back.

Business Ethics · Pilot module

The coach supplies the term and leaves the reasoning to the student.

The Business Ethics module coaches one argument about price controls through to the ethical judgment it forces: who goes without when a scarce good is rationed by queue instead of by price. In this exchange, the student has reached the core economic idea and stalls.

The questionIt asks about the lost benefit.
Kai Coach…if a buyer values a unit more than it costs a seller to provide it, both could have gained from that trade. When the ceiling prevents it, what shared benefit is left unrealized?
The stallA name for the idea, and then the next question.
StudentI don't know
Kai CoachNo problem. The missing benefit is the gain both sides would have received from a trade worth more to the buyer than it cost the seller to make; the book calls that lost benefit “surplus.” In your own words, does a binding ceiling mean fewer beneficial trades happen, or more?
Supplied the termLeft the reasoning to the student
Why it matters

Ethical questions invite advocacy, so the coach stays evenhanded.

The module moves through three phases, which we call Mechanics, The Twist, and Judgment. Students first work out how a price ceiling operates, then confront a less obvious consequence, and finally reach an ethical judgment of their own. Throughout the module, Kai Coach never offers its own verdict on whether price controls are right or wrong. It asks students to defend the position they reach with the reasoning the course provides. The module remains in preparation for its first classroom pilot.

Adapted from a test session of the pilot module and paraphrased.

What would students write if they had to think first?

Kai Coach is part of Kudu Humanities.

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