Mixed Economies
Chapter 2
Lesson 2
Characteristics of a Mixed Economy
•
Mixed economies
• People from one type of economy come into contact with other cultures and
adopt their technologies and ways of doing things
• People are unhappy with the way their economy is performing.
•
State’s involvement can vary considerably
•
Characteristics of traditional, command, and market economies.
Examples of Mixed Economies
•
Communist Economies
• Ideal communism
• Everyone contributes according to their abilities
• Consumes according to their needs.
• Never been a true communist economy
• Version of extreme socialism.
•
Mixed socialism
• Government owns and controls some, but not all, of basic productive
resources.
•
Mixed market economies
• Market economies that have elements of socialism or traditional economies.
•
United States - mixed market economy.
Evaluating Mixed Economies
Advantages:
• Providing assistance for people who might be left out of the country’s
economic progress
• Faster growth than command economies
Disadvantages:
• Higher tax rates to support social benefits
• Limited availability of services or decreasing quality of services
• Lower efficiency than pure capitalism
• Governments are likely to see market-oriented reforms as a threat