Surge Pricing: Uber, Hotels & Hurricane Plywood
Quality reviewed September 2026
- Grades
- Grades 9-12
- Time
- About two 50-minute class periods
- Includes
- 11 ready-to-teach files
- Format
- Word (.docx) ยท PowerPoint (.pptx)
- Slide deck
- Guided notes
- Guided notes teacher key
- Activity + answer key
- Quiz + answer key
- Exit ticket + answer key
- Teacher guide
- Teacher presentation notes
What students do
- Explain why an Uber fare jumps from $12 to $30 after a concert using a demand spike against a fixed supply of drivers
- Argue both sides of the debate over whether a price spike on hotel rooms during an emergency is price gouging or an efficient market signal
- Read a supply-and-demand chart to show how a $120 price cap below the $260 equilibrium creates a hotel room shortage
- Trace how a rising plywood price pulls quantity supplied from 2,000 to 5,000 sheets by drawing in out-of-town sellers
What it covers
- The two jobs a high price does at once, rationing scarce supply and signaling more of it to show up
- Three real surge markets side by side, Uber rides, hotel rooms, and hurricane plywood
- Both sides of the price-gouging debate, argued with the same supply-and-demand tools
Learning targets
- Explain surge (dynamic) pricing as a price that RISES when demand spikes against a fixed or slow-to-grow supply, to RATION the scarce supply
- Use a demand-spike chart to show why an Uber ride costs more at 2am after a concert - a MOVEMENT along the curve to a higher equilibrium price
- Explain how a high price acts as a SIGNAL that pulls more supply into a market (more drivers log on, more sellers ship plywood in)
- Argue both sides of the ethics debate: is a price spike unfair PRICE GOUGING, or an efficient market SIGNAL that rations supply and attracts more of it?
Peek inside
What You See
Concert ends - thousands leave at once
Everyone opens the app at the same time
The app flashes '2.5x surge'
A $12 ride is suddenly $30
What You See and the Economics Behind It
When a concert ends, thousands of riders open the app at the same time and the app flashes a price.
A $12 ride is suddenly .
Demand SPIKES while the supply of drivers is for now.
The high price both rations rides and pulls in more .
SECTION 2
1. WHY THE UBER FARE JUMPED. Jordan Reyes hands you the first report. Use Chart Reference 1 (chart_uber_surge) - the Uber demand-spike chart shown below.
(a) Read the OLD equilibrium fare (before the concert) and the NEW surge fare (after the concert) off the chart.
Why this matters
An Uber fare jumping from $12 to $30 after a concert is doing two jobs at once: rationing a supply of drivers that cannot keep up, and signaling more drivers to log on. A $120 hotel price cap below a $260 equilibrium, and a plywood price pulling supply from 2,000 sheets to 5,000, show the same pattern elsewhere.
I kept the price-gouging debate genuinely open on both sides, because a case that only points one way teaches an opinion, not a trade-off. Students argue the same chart from both directions, once as the renter, once as the hotel owner, before landing on a side.
From one teacher to another
A price spike does two contradictory jobs at the exact same moment, it rations a supply that's running short and it signals more sellers to show up, and that tension is the whole point of the case study. Students run an Uber surge fare, a hotel-room shortage during an evacuation, and a plywood run before a hurricane through the same supply-and-demand chart, then argue whether each spike counts as gouging or a market doing its job. I kept the ethics debate genuinely open on both sides, because a case that only points one way doesn't teach the trade-off, it just teaches an opinion.
Every file in this toolkit
-
Activity (Student)
Jordan Reyes investigates three reported price jumps as a consumer-protection analyst: an Uber fare from $12 to $30, a $120 hotel rate held below market during a wildfire, and a plywood price that draws in outside sellers. A ruling on gouging closes the case.
-
Activity (Answer Key)
A $140 jump between the hotel's capped and normal price gets flagged as the biggest dollar surge here, beside the Uber fare's move from $12 to $30 and plywood stock reaching 5,000 sheets from 2,000 as outside sellers arrived.
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Exit Ticket (Student)
The ticket's questions explain why a rideshare fare doubles right after a concert, name the second job a high price does besides rationing scarce supply, and predict what a capped rate below equilibrium does to hotel rooms in an emergency. One side of the price-gouging debate needs a defense.
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Exit Ticket (Answer Key)
Demand spiking against a fixed short-run count of drivers explains the rideshare jump, pulling more sellers into the market is the second job a high price does, and a shortage is what capping hotel rates below equilibrium produces. Five terms and a defended side round out full credit.
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Guided Notes (Student)
A $12 Uber fare jumping to $30 once a concert lets out gets explained as a price rationing scarce drivers and signaling more of them to log on, then that logic gets applied to a capped $120 hotel rate and a hurricane plywood run. Students weigh in on whether that spike is gouging.
-
Guided Notes (Teacher Key)
The $260 hotel equilibrium above the $120 cap and plywood supply climbing to about 5,000 sheets from a starting 2,000 once its price can rise come tallied with their numbers. Rationing, price signal, fixed supply, and shift of the curve round out the page.
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Quiz (Student)
An Uber fare moving from $12 to $30 opens the set, and a later item asks why holding hotel prices at $120 while the market would clear at $260 leaves rooms in short supply.
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Quiz (Answer Key)
The Uber jump ties to a shift in the demand curve, not a change in supply, the $120 cap gets credited with the hotel shortage, and a climbing price draws in out-of-town plywood sellers.
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Slides
Rationing and signaling get separate frames before three markets share one pattern, a $12 ride jumping to $30, a $120 hotel cap held under a $260 equilibrium, and plywood stock growing to 5,000 sheets from 2,000, with the gouging debate weighed before three vocabulary slides and a closing recap.
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Teacher Guide
Gas before a storm, generators after a blackout, and bottled water during a boil-water notice fill a regulator-role extension where each spike gets sorted into rationing, signaling, or plain gouging.
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Teacher Presentation Notes
A wildfire evacuation pushing hotel demand past a frozen $120 rate becomes the shortage card, scripted right alongside plywood sellers pulling in well over double their normal stock once the price climbs.
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