Chapter 24 Monopoly

This graph is specific to an oligopoly and shows the change in quantity demanded in relation to the change in price for both elastic and inelastic goods. Total Revenues will be increased, if the firm decreases their price but increase their quantity. Due to the fact that the costs remain the same, the revenue line on the graph can be seen to be steeper than the costs meaning that the profit is higher. The graph therefore also indicates the point where the firm is able to make the most amount of profit, in relation to the price they set and the quantity they produce.

A monopoly is advantageous to the society and is encourages by the government if there are high fixed costs and very strong economies of scale. At the same time, it could also lead to unequal distribution of wealth; containment of consumer choice; lobbying and unethical spending.

In these circumstances, the cost structures are not the same as with the competitive industry and so we cannot say that the oligopolistic firm results in higher prices than if a competitive market structure were to be adopted. In fact going along the theory of the downward sloping cost curve we can come to the conclusion that it would be the other way around and consumers would

A natural monopoly is an industry in which one business already exists is not economical because the competing business would not be able to reduce their prices as low as the price of the natural monopoly and therefore wouldn’t be profitable. Natural monopolies are established when multiple firms startup costs are too high to enter the industry.

5. Suggest three (3) reasons a monopoly may or may not be efficient in any economy.

Since a monopoly is the only seller of a good in the market, the demand curve is the market demand curve. Therefore a monopoly has a downward sloping demand curve, in contrast to the horizontal sloping demand curve of a firm in a competitive market (Mankiw, 2014). Monopolies aim to find the profit-maximizing price for its product. If a firm is initially producing at a low level of output, marginal revenue exceeds marginal costs (Mankiw, 2014). Every time production increases by one unit, the marginal revenue increases again and is greater than marginal costs (Mankiw, 2014). Therefore

·  A monopolist would not be able to increase prices if the demand for a particuar product is elastic.

6. In a monopolistic competition industry, if one firm appreciably increased its price from the existing equilibrium price, which of the following outcomes would most likely ensue?

(7) A monopolist can discriminate prices for his product, a firm working under perfect competition cannot. The monopolist will be increasing his total profit by price discrimination if he find? Elastic ties of demand are different in different markets.

For the monopoly market described in Table X below, what is the profit maximizing price determined by the monopolist?

In the short run the perfect competition equilibrium can be found by graphing the marginal cost (MC), average total cost (ATC) and marginal revenue (MR) curves. In perfect competition the price is equal to the average revenue, which is equal to the marginal revenue and these are all constant, giving an infinitely elastic demand curve for the firm. The demand curve is “perfectly price elastic” due to the homogeneity of the products supplied, where each supplier, as a price taker, must focus on a single price. Given this, the only choice a supplier has in the short run is how much to produce. For profit maximisation to occur marginal costs (supply curve) must equal marginal revenue (demand curve). Profit maximisation is assumed to mean the maximisation of normal economic profit (i.e. revenue that covers the

8. Compared to a perfectly competitive industry with the same demand and cost curves, a monopoly’s price and output will be which of the following?

* If the Incumbent opts to fight, it may benefit from the Entrant’s higher unit cost and therefore still capture the entire market though at less profit margin. Since the willingness to pay for the Incumbent is $40 more than that for the Entrant, the former can fix any price at 40 more than whichever price fixed by the Entrant. So for any price fixed by the Entrant (Pe),the Incumbent’s price will be given by,

Competition failure or monopoly may result from natural monopoly where it costs incurred in production becomes lower when only one firm is involved in production than several firms producing the same output. In a monopolist market under-production, higher prices become dominant contributing to market inefficiency. Winston cites cases of misuse of monopoly power can lead to market failures and sometimes may lead to acute shortage of essential commodities (130).

b) In a monopolistic competition structure, although there are numerous firms, they carry different products. Due to product differentiation, each company is able to somewhat control their own pricing.