A-LEVEL ECONOMICS · AFTER THE COMPETITION
The Resilience Kit — Reflection Questions
Answer these in your exercise book. A couple of them ask you to read the real news story the game was based on first.
The real story: in August 2026, the UK government's Cabinet Office announced a new campaign urging households to stock up on tinned food, bottled water and other basic supplies, in case of extreme weather or disruption caused by hostile states.
Read the article on The Guardian →
- Define scarcity, using an example from the game.
- Describe one choice your team made in Round 2, and what its opportunity cost was.
- Explain, using the words "supply" and "demand", why the prices of tinned food, bottled water and torches rose in Round 3.
- Predict what would happen to the price of bottled water if a heatwave made everyone want to buy it, but supermarkets couldn't get any more delivered. Explain your prediction — use these to help build your answer:
- What would the rush to buy water signal to water producers?
- What incentive would that give producers — would they want to make more, or less?
- What happens to price when demand suddenly rises faster than supply can keep up (excess demand)?
- Discuss whether you think it's better for households to buy their own supplies, or for the government to hand supplies out directly.
- Read the article first
Explain why some retailers have warned people not to bulk-buy during stockpiling campaigns like this one. Use these to help build your answer:
- What happens when one shopper sees empty shelves and panics — what do other shoppers then do? (This copying of others is sometimes called herd behaviour.)
- If everyone rushes to buy at once, who ends up unable to get what they need?
- How could a government campaign meant to help actually end up causing some of the shortage it was trying to prevent?