The movie is related to economics because it shows the stark differences between the protagonist, Chris Gardner, and the financial positions of his workplace competitors and also because it shows the downside of investing in high-risk ventures.

In the movie The Pursuit of Happyness, which is based on a true story, Will Smith, who plays Chris, is a young single father who wants to give his son a better life.

Initially, Chris invests in a medical device and becomes a door-to-door salesman, meeting with a series of doctors to try to sell them the device. However, he does not have the success he had hoped for, and he has invested all his capital and savings in the device. Eventually, without income and with his savings depleted, he loses his apartment, and his wife leaves him.

He interviews for a job at a Wall Street firm and is hired, only to learn that the first step towards having a paid job is to do an unpaid internship. Looking at the other candidates, it is clear that Chris would have a much more difficult time struggling through the internship period without any income.

He has no savings to fall back on and no family to rely on. The economics of his situation are much different than the economics of the other candidates. After much internal deliberation, he decides to take the position. He and his son live in short-term housing and shelters because they cannot afford anything else. There is a dramatic comparison between Chris’s economic position and that of the other people with whom he works, as he aspires to obtain the well-paying job at the end of a successful internship period.

The film The Pursuit of Happyness is the story of a man who, by constant persistence, rises himself out of poverty and homelessness and makes a living in the world. It deals with economics in several ways.

First of all, it is an encapsulation of the American Dream, which is the idea of capitalism and being able to pull oneself up by the bootstraps and become rich. The idea discussed in the film in detail is that people (Americans in particular) have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—and capitalism provides that last item on the list.

In a more realistic sense, however, it does portray a picture of the American economy. There are, in a sense, no barriers to entry when it comes to wealth and higher income jobs, but that is somewhat unrealistic. Only those individuals with the proper education and background, even if they don’t have the prior experience, are welcome to pursue certain goals. That’s why it is so shocking that Will Smith’s character is even considered for the internship he receives.

Additionally, there is an aspect of game theory in the film—the internship, and the job the main character eventually receives, are zero-sum problems. If he gets the internship, it necessarily pushes someone else out of that position. Additionally, with the sales call, he has to win out over someone else’s sales pitch in order to successfully make the sale. This is a standard economic principle.

The film has to do with "economics" in the sense that it tells the "rags to riches" story of a man who loses everything on a bad investment but earns his way into a successful career as a broker through determination and hard work. It also provides a window into how Wall Street firms operate and how deals are made. I find that the film is more concerned with the social or psychological costs of capitalism, however, than the actual workings of the economy. Will Smith's character is a great salesman and someone who has a great deal of personal integrity, yet a series of bad choices, fueled in part by his enthusiasm for "making his fortune," and in part by his desire to provide for his family and gain social status, causes him to become homeless. Even though Smith experiences first hand the brutality of the capitalist system in the US, and is reduced to living in a subway men's room with his son, he nevertheless sees the chance to compete for a job in a stock trading firm as his way out. 

The film is very clear about the costs of pursuing this dream, both for Smith and his son (Smith's real life son Jaden was cast as his fictional son in the film). In a way, it is his need to provide for his son and set an example that drives Smith to win the competition for the job. Although the "system" has real impacts on his son's state of mind, Smith is determined to show his son that his father can be a "winner" and that hard work and believing in your dreams will pay off in the end. In this sense the film is optimistic about American capitalism; this story of the film is a kind of recapitulation of what "market economies" are supposed to enable: the ascendance of the "best" products through intense competition.

I think that the film relates to economics in a couple of ways.  The first is that Gardner is depicted as wanting to succeed in an economic condition that is also making his life difficult.  Gardner seeks to find success in a capitalist configuration.  Yet, it is this same configuration that contributes to making his son and himself homeless.  Gardner's desire to find economic success in the economic condition that is making his life a challenge represents a unique perspective on economics.  At the same time, Gardner's internship is shown to be in the very intense and brutal world of capitalism.  Gardner is further shown trying to teach his son the lessons of survival in the world is one that does not have to trade off with being a compassionate human being.  In this light, Gardner is teaching or parenting in a realm that understands the economic condition in which they live, but does not absorb it. Gardner does not teach his son some type of Social Darwinism, but rather teaches him how he needs to assert his own sense of self without trading off with others.  It is here where I think that economics is present in the film and creates a unique dynamic in terms of assessing what is and what should be.