NCERT Solutions for Class 9th Social Science Chapter 8 Building Blocks in Economics: The Problem of Choice

About this chapter

Some preferences are needs (food, water, shelter) and others are wants (gadgets, vacations, luxury items). Fig. 8.1 sets the two rows side by side. Human wants are unlimited and keep changing — the chapter's example is upgrading from a bicycle to a motorbike and then to a car. Resources — the factors used to produce goods and services — are limited in quantity and have alternative uses . Fig. 8.2 shows the same steel going into medical equipment, aircraft manufacturing or refrigerator manufacturing. Limited resources against unlimited wants produce scarcity , and scarcity forces choice . When one alternative is chosen the others are given up. The value of what is given up is the opportunity cost . This is the chapter's central tool, and it applies to money, to land, to time and to public s

• Chapter opening
• The chapter's opening paragraph
• Needs and wants
• Opportunity cost in everyday life
• What to Produce and for Whom?
• Market Economy
• The chapter's recap points, with the evidence behind each
• End-of-chapter exercise