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- Exploring economics: the secret life of t-shirts
Exploring economics: the secret life of t-shirts

This free course, Exploring economics: the secret life of t-shirts, aims to describe what goes into making and selling t-shirts. Which resources, which markets, who is involved, the income people get, the income and value they create are all discussed. You will explore these questions at different stages of the production of a t-shirt, and you'll use concepts from economics such as 'supply chains' or 'value added' to answer them. The course will be described using data. You should think about key numbers and data which help constructing evidence of how a t-shirt is produced, from raw cotton to our wardrobe.
Course learning outcomes
After studying this course, you should be able to:
- define a supply chain and understand how different stages of the t-shirt production chain can be organised differently
- engage with different data sources and their objectives
- read into data to tell an economic story
- evaluate what the 'made in...' tag on your t-shirt really means.
First Published: 06/06/2019
Updated: 01/04/2020
You can start this course right now without signing-up. Click on any of the course content sections below to start at any point in this course.
If you want to be able to track your progress, earn a free Statement of Participation, and access all course quizzes and activities, sign-up.
Course content
- Introduction
- Learning outcomes
- 1 Defining a supply chain and organisation of the supply chain for a t-shirt
- 2 Who are the main actors at each stage of production?
- 3 Value added in the supply chain
- 4 Interactive activity
- Conclusion
- Glossary
- References
- Acknowledgements
- This site has Copy Reuse Tracking enabled - see our FAQs for more information.
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About this free course
6 hours study
Level 1: Introductory
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