Glossary Terms:

Any activity or organization that produces or exchanges goods or services for a profit.

Decision made or course of action taken when faced with a set of alternatives.

The study of how people, firms and societies choose to allocate scarce resources with alternative uses.

Payments earned by households for selling or renting their productive resources. May include salaries, wages, interest and dividends.

Money paid regularly, at a particular rate, for the use of borrowed money.

The purchase of capital goods (including machinery, technology or new buildings) that are used to produce goods and services. In personal finance, the amount of money invested in stocks, bonds, mutual funds and other investment instruments.

The quantity and quality of human effort available to produce goods and services.

Anything that is generally accepted as final payment for goods and services; serves as a medium of exchange, a store of value and a standard of value. Characteristics of money are portability, stability in value, uniformity, durability and acceptance.

A good or service that can be used to satisfy a want.

A process of manufacturing, growing, designing, or otherwise using productive resources to create goods or services used to to satisfy a want.

Earnings from an investment, usually expressed as an annual percentage.

The money a business receives from customers who buy its goods and services. Not to be confused with profit.

Payments for labor resources; unlike wages, not explicitly based on the number of hours worked. See also Wages.

A regular payment, often at monthly or biweekly intervals, made by an employer to an employee, especially in the case of professional or white-collar employees. Salaries are paid for services rendered and are not based on hours worked.

To keep money for future use; to divert money from current spending to a savings account or another form of investment.