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Economics in the News - June 7-13 How Economics Impacts Our Lives on a daily basis

Economics impacts our lives every day. Below are some of the top storylines from this past week related to economics.

"Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work." -- Stephen King, author
In recent weeks a used ticket from Kobe Bryant’s final NBA game sold for more than $40,000. A used ticket stub from the first modern World Series in Major League Baseball was sold for $100,000. Sports collectors and the memorabilia sector are facing a short supply, as sports teams are trending more and more toward the use of digital tickets.

Prices for sports memorabilia has appreciated in recent years, whether it be for used tickets, trading cards or bobbleheads. Collectors and sports enthusiasts enjoy retaining their ticket to a memorable game as a keepsake, but with digital and generic tickets, that may become harder to do in the future. [The Athletic]

There are plenty of unopened boxes of Girl Scout cookies this year. Girl Scouts has an excess inventory of 15 million boxes of unsold cookies this year. The COVID-19 pandemic forced troops to nix their traditional cookie booths for safety reasons.

The cookie sales help fund troop programming such as, travel, camps and other activities. Typically, an estimated 200 million boxes of cookies are sold each year or $800 million boxes worth. As COVID-19 cases spiked during the spring selling season, troops opted not to sell cookies, leaving 15 million boxes of leftover cookies. [Associated Press]

o As pandemic-weary travelers head for the most popular American destinations this summer, many of the national parks have closed their gates due to being overcrowded. Lines can back up for hours, as visitors wait to get into the parks.

Arches National Park in Southeast Utah attracted 194,000 visitors this past April, up 15 percent from April 2019. Yellowstone National Park saw a 50 percent increase in vehicle entries over Memorial Day weekend compared to Memorial Day 2019. Some residents and park advocates are pushing parks, such as Arches, to use a reservation system. The increase in visitors is aiding the nearby economies, but residents are frustrated due to an increase in human waste and visitors damaging the area. [The Wall Street Journal]

Many companies are preparing to solicit their staff back to the office. However, can companies require their employees to become vaccinated? According to the federal agency that enforces workplace discrimination laws says that they can.

Executives remain fearful of lawsuits from requiring a vaccine and the political upheaval it could cause, but they must weigh workplace safety as well. As many companies are weighing their options, they are surveying their workers to see how many have received the vaccine. Some companies, like Walmart, are paying their employees for proof of vaccination. Other companies plan to offer on-campus sites for vaccines for employees to gain easy access. [The New York Times]

How much are you willing to spend for an opportunity of a lifetime? A mystery bidder pledged $28 million to win an auction for the opportunity to join Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos and his younger brother Mark on their July 20 space mission.

With his space exploration company Blue Origin, Bezos and the winner will be aboard an 11-minute mission aboard a reusable rocket named New Shepherd. Nearly 7,600 people from 159 countries bid on the experience. The $28 million will be donated to Club for the Future, which is Blue Origin’s foundation. The mission will make a brief trip above the Karman line, which is the altitude where space begins approximately 62 miles above sea level. [NPR]

Credits:

All images credited to iStock