Facebook stock goes public (cont'd)
Facebook’s stock price gives the company a value of $104 billion. Is
it really worth that much?
Facebook’s IPO was
reportedly the third largest IPO in U.S. history, behind just General
Motors and Visa. At a price of $38 per share,
if you add up all the Facebook shares, that
makes the company worth $104 billion.
This makes Facebook the most expensive
company that has ever made an IPO. In fact,
it makes Facebook one of the most highly
valued companies in the United States. Do
you think Facebook is really worth $104
billion? Why or why not? Many economic
experts are asking that same question.
There is no question that Facebook is very
popular. As you can see from this chart,
it has more than 900 million users. But
Facebook doesn’t get a penny from any of
them, because it’s free to all its users. In fact,
Facebook didn’t start making a profit until
2009, five years after it started. To understand how Facebook works, you have to
understand that those 900 million users are
not Facebook’s customers. Instead, they are
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Facebook’s
product.
What
do
you
think
this means?
Facebook’s 900 million users make the site
a very appealing place for advertisers to put
their ads. The advertisers are Facebook’s
paying customers. The more people who use
Facebook, the more Facebook can charge
advertisers who want to put ads on the site.
But to continue its growth, Facebook faces
many challenges. Some people wonder if
people will get turned off by all the ads
and stop using Facebook. Others wonder if
Facebook is ultimately just a fad. After all,
many Internet companies have become very
popular, only to fall out of favor within a few
years. Do you think Facebook is a fad? Or
do you think it will still be around in 10
or 20 years? If you had $10,000 to invest
in the stock market, what company would
you buy stock in? Why? END
Bolivia’s new cash crop — quinoa
The ancient crop has become hugely popular recently.
Have you ever heard
of quinoa — keenWAH? The quinoa plant grows high in the
Andes Mountains. Where are the Andes
Mountains? (South America.) The leafy plant
is actually a member of the spinach family.
It is grown for its nutritious seeds, which are
treated like a type of grain. For centuries,
quinoa has been an important part of the
diets of the people who lived in the Andes.
In fact, the crop has been grown there since
3000 B.C. But the rest of the world had no
idea that this food even existed.
That all changed a few years ago, thanks
to a growing demand for organic food. What
does “organic” mean? (Grown without
chemical fertilizers and pesticides.) Organic
food has become very popular in recent
years. This is especially true in the U.S.
and other wealthy nations. More and more
people are also interested in eating whole
grains, because they are very healthy. We’ll
learn more about this shortly. So grocery
stores have begun selling more kinds of
grains than just the typical ones they have
always sold: rice, corn, and wheat flour. Do
you buy organic food?
Thanks to quinoa’s new popularity,
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NewsCurrents Week of May 28, 2012
places that
grow the crop
are
making a lot of
money.
In
2011, Bolivia
earned $64 million from its quinoa crops.
This was 36 percent more than it earned
the year before. But this jump in demand
for quinoa has also caused some problems.
For one thing, the price of quinoa has risen
so sharply that most Bolivians can no longer
afford to eat it. Now, nearly all of Bolivia’s
quinoa is sold to other countries. Also, farmers in Bolivia are using nearly all their farmland to grow quinoa and nothing else. Why
do you think this could be a problem?
Bolivians will have to import more of their
food now, which will cost them more money.
It might also cause part of their culture to be
lost as well. In addition, it is always a bad
idea when a country becomes dependent on
one crop. Can you think of an example of
this being true? (Ireland was overly dependent on potatoes in the 1800s, which was a
problem when the crop became blighted, leading to the Potato Famine.) NEXT
Bolivia’s new cash crop — quinoa (cont'd)
Whole grains have many health benefits.
Quinoa isn’t technically
a grain, because it isn’t
a member of the grass family. But it has
many of the same health benefits. It is high
in protein, and is easy to digest. Can you
name some of the cereal grains? (Rice,
wheat, millet, and corn.) Whole grains are
grains that have all their vitamins and minerals intact. That is because they haven’t
been refined. When flour is refined, part of
the grain is removed. Refined wheat flour,
for example, makes fluffy white bread. But it
also lacks the nutrition of whole wheat.
Nutritionists say people should trade whole
grain breads and pastas instead of those
made with white flour. Do you try to eat
whole grain bread and other whole grain
foods? The body digests whole grains more
slowly than refined grains. There is evidence
that this leads to a lower risk of Type 2 diabetes. But that’s only the beginning of the
health benefits you can get by adding more
whole grains to your diet.
On the screen, you see a few of these
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benefits.
Scientists
and nutritionists keep
finding more
and
more
evidence of the health benefits of whole
grains. First, of course, they contain a lot
of fiber, which is great for digestion. Whole
grains also lower cholesterol levels and blood
pressure, both of which mean a lower risk
of heart disease. According to many studies, people who eat three servings of whole
grains a day have a lower risk of getting
certain cancers. Like fruits and vegetables,
whole grains are also a good source of disease-fighting substances called antioxidants.
Whole grains contain important B vitamins,
vitamin E, and iron. Including whole grain
products in your diet can also help prevent
osteoporosis and many other bone-related
ailments. What other healthy foods do you
try to eat as often as you can? END
The “tiny house” movement
The small house movement is a backlash against oversized
suburban homes.
Americans usually like
things big. We invented
big cars, we built big houses, and we
regularly consume supersized sodas and
hamburgers. But one of the latest trends
in houses goes in the other direction. It’s
called the “tiny house” movement, and
that’s exactly what it’s about — tiny or
very small houses. Look at the tiny houses
shown here. What do you think it would
be like to live in one of these homes?
Some people use them as vacation cabins,
but some people have decided to live in
their tiny homes year-round.
These houses aren’t just tiny one-room
boxes. Even though they are small, they
are designed to use every inch of space
for storage and living. And as you can see,
they can be hauled by truck just like a
trailer or camper. Do you think it would
be fun to be able to move your house
from one place to another whenever you
wanted? Another big difference between a
tiny house and a regular house is price.
Building a normal sized home can cost
hundreds of thousands of dollars or more.
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But
you
can buy the
plans for a
tiny house
for a few
hundred dollars, and build one for a few
hundred dollars more.
The tiny house movement is about more
than saving money. It is also about saving the environment. For many years, the
trend in new homes was to build them bigger and bigger. And many people still want
the biggest house money can buy. But in
the last few years, more people have been
“downsizing,” or getting rid of extra things
in their homes and moving into smaller
homes. Why do you think more people
are doing this now? How do you think
living in a smaller home can be good
for the environment? (They use less
electricity and less energy to heat or cool,
for example.) Do you think you could live
in a house as small as these? What is
the smallest home or apartment you’ve
ever lived in? NEXT
NewsCurrents Week of May 28, 2012