Chapter 18 Blog Post

This chapter covers the idea of markets for factors of production. Before even reading this I immediately remembered the flow chart we received numerous chapters ago relating firms, households, job markets, and factors of productions. This chapter dives further into what factors of production might entail and why it is so important for a company to heavily consider them when pursuing their business.

This chapter overall made sense to me. I understood it pretty much as marginal cost only with people, which was made it easier take in at first. I understand that it is highly beneficial for competitive markets, however the book made it seem as though this were not applicable to markets such as monopolies of oligopolies. Would this idea not be just as beneficial to them? I was a little confused by this but I won't let this get in head. Another thing that kind of confused my in this chapter was the differentiated factors that affect supply and demand. I didn't quite understand why they some of the situations didn't go both ways, but again this is something that I know not to focus too heavily on. Overall the chapter was easy to understand, but a little clarification in class would be great.

Chapter 17 Blog Post

In this chapter, Mankiw discusses oligopolies. It talks about the difficulties of maintaining such a market due to the greed of an individual firms and antitrust laws. It also talks about the many theories that go into maintaing an efficient market. I thought that this chapter was actually pretty easy to understand, because the chapter basically described something that fell in between perfectly competition and monopoly. I found it fairly easy to understand why oligopolies might've wanted to form cartels through collusion, and why it might've been a problem. It also made sense to how too many would just create another competitive market. Something that actually didn't quite make sense to me was the in depth game theory ideals. The stuff discussing Bonnie and Clyde kind of confused me, because I feel as though oligopolies would talk before making any decision. If this were the case then prisoner theory wouldn't actually be a problem worth worrying about (unless selfishness were the only factor driving decisions).  Other than that the chapter was pretty interesting and I can't wait to have it throughly explained in class as I find that to be really helpful.

Chapter 16 Blog Post

This chapter begins by discussing/ exploring the idea that monopolies have the potential to also be competitive. This idea confused me from the beginning, as I thought that monopolies were characterized as having no competition what so ever. I know that I will struggle to grasp this chapter as I was able to get by the previous one with this understanding. It'll be a pain trying to distinguish markets, oligopolies, and markets in this aspect now since they're like all very similar. I also really thought that there were no close substitutes in the market when there was a monopoly so the fact that competition happens due to potential replacements definitely confuses me.

Besides this concept (really just the beginning) this chapter was not that bad. I was definitely able to understand the long and short run affects for the monopolistic market. It all made sense, because the previous chapter helped us understand what dictates profit and everything. I don't quite understand why it is so desirable to exactly break even, however I do know that that is a good place to be regardless so I might bring it up in class, or just shut up about it, depending on further reading/ rereading.

Chapter 15 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

This Chapter discuss the affects and rises of monopolies. I think that this is actually a fairly simple chapter to sink one's teeth into as this was not a very difficult chapter. I thought that this was fairly simple, because the we have kind of touched on the topic of monopolies and their power however it is nice to finally read the extent of their power. In this chapter you not only read about what they are (along with real world applications), but also the regulations put in place to check their power. This was once again easy to take in, because we have covered the idea that government intervention is necessary so that the market (perfect or not) works at full efficiency.

If I had to really pick something tricky about this chapter, it would be the fact that there was so much covered in a single chapter. If I do recall this was same stuff was covered for markets, however it took around 4 or 5 chapters to summarize all of the knowledge pertaining to deadweight loss, government intervention etc. I know that it should be easy to understand to an extent, however I had a troubles taking in all of the information and I know that this will definitely mess me up on the test.  

Chapter 14 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

This chapter discusses the competitiveness of the markets and how this affects separate competitors decisions when selling. This chapter also brings the ideas of supply and demand together with the fairly new concepts introduced in the previous chapter. This chapter really confused me. I know that it is hard especially since the last chapter was a little difficult for me to understand, however this was far less equation heavy. I didn't quite understand the graphs. It was not until I referred back to the elasticity laws/ logic that I was able to understand what was going on. Even then I was still left wondering how to calculate profit from this. I know that that is a pretty huge portion of the chapter, so I hope to learn that soon.

Another thing that I fail to understand is the idea of exits, enters, shutdowns, and sunk costs. If asked to figure that out on a graph (with the the total cost and what not given), I know that I would genuinely struggle with this. That also seems like a difficult yet important part, so I definitely plan on receiving help on this chapter.

Chapter 13 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

Chapter thirteen discusses the idea of total cost and how to calculate and interpret this through a graph. This chapter had a lot of content in it making it a little difficult to absorb when first reading it. After a while you begin to realize that this chapter was actually kind of reiterating everything in more complicated terms. For example the way to calculate the total marginal cost seemed pretty clear when it was discussed at the beginning of the chapter, yet the book still talks about calculating it, slope- wise. This seems incredibly redundant and makes a simple concept seem long and tedious.

Overall the content of this chapter was pretty easy to understand. I think that everything that we learned in previous chapter (especially chapter 4) has prepared us for the idea that the end goal is to have profits i.e make money. This made it very easy to use economic reasoning, once again, to work through the actual substance.

Chapter 11 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

This chapter was very interesting in my opinion. Despite not having any complicated math behind the concept, I still find that there are some concepts that may trip me up on the test. I understand the terms "rival in consumption" and "excludability", however I have troubles trying to sort the 4 categories of goods. Natural monopolies always confuse as I still don't quite understand how they are not rival in consumptions thus leading me to mix them up with private goods. I am also confused by the difference between tragedy of the commons and the free rider problem. I understand when and how they are both applicable, yet I fail to see the difference in the two ideas. This most likely won't be a problem on a quiz  however it was definitely something that puzzled me throughout the reading.

Overall this chapter was fairly simple. I can see how it might be viewed as a little more difficult than the  previous chapters however I found it overall to be very comprehendible. I for the most part discusses the ideas of moral and common sense so if ever in doubt I know that I could reason through a question which I find comforting.

Chapter 10 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

I actually really enjoyed reading this chapter because despite focusing on the practical human greed aspect of business and economics I find it refreshing to also read about the social effects business have/ must uphold. I know that extrenalities are dealt with for the purpose of furthering profit and all, however I think that this is a very important for those who actually want to go into this discipline to understand that there are consequences for all actions and I think that this is one of those lessons.

Despite finding most of this section to be common sense I did not actually know that there was such a thing as positive of extrenalities. The concept was easy but it seemed as though extrenalities only had a negative connotation. The Coase's Theorem is also relatively new to me however I found that this was really just a way of talking about settling disputes, which is the chapter in its entirety.

Chapter 8 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

Chapter 8 was not at all a very difficult chapter to grasp. It was really just an extension of the previous two chapter which talked broadly of the idea of taxes. This chapter simply verified the idea that taxes kind of screw over both the buyer and the seller. I have yet to come up with an actually proposal however I feel like there should be a better way to fund for public amenities.

I suppose this chapter did introduce the two new ideas though: the concept of deadweight loss and Laffer's model. I don't actually understand how we might be tested on the model however I feel as though I understood the meaning of the curve. It makes sense that there is a "sweet spot" in the sense that too little levied leads to no benefit and too much may result in economic chaos. deadweight loss makes me once again question the efficiency of tax, but I understand how to calculate it nonetheless.

Chapter 7 Blog Post

Shahid Monametsi

This chapter confused me numerous times. I know that this was meant to be on of the easier topics (especially after tax wedges and what not), however I feel as though I failed to grasp a lot of the concepts covered at the moments. I feel as though the book made calculating the consumer surplus far more complicated than it actually is, and I found myself getting lost in the transition. Nonetheless, I think that this chapter is very intriguing because it further explains the human reactions in the economy. I felt as though this chapter was more realistic than the earlier chapters in the sense that it takes into account human reaction and the tendency to want more for less (greediness).

One part of the chapter that came across completely clear to me was the social planner bit. While I thought price was the only thing guiding the market (as explained in the invisible hand ideal), having a character/ person in charge made everything easier to follow for some reason. The equations provided to find Total Surplus seemed logical, however I know that I could never derive them if ever needed.

I found the end of the chapter to be a brief summary of everything we've learned. While the term Market Failure is new,  I believe that the cause and effects made perfect sense based off of what we've already learned (policy makers interferences and efficient proaction).

Chapter 6 Blog Post

Despite struggling to grasp the concept of elasticity until the near end, I am happy to move on. I found that chapter 5 required a little too much calculating for my liking which brings me to why I thoroughly enjoyed chapter 6. This chapter discussed the effect that the government has on demand and supply. It reiterates one of the ten principles again (government can benefit the market) to show just how well the government can effect the quantity demanded of supplied for goods. I thought that this chapter for the most part was easier to follow, because there were real life examples with every term. Not only does this show the practically/ real world application of the idea, but also helps me personally understand the term(s).

Overall I think the policy making and theoretical aspect of economics is a lot easier, and I think that this chapter was much easier to digest. I actually really found the bit on taxes and who ends up paying the most from that system. I hope to talk more about the elastic and inelastic properties of this section though, because that was definitely one portion that confused me.

Crisis Actors Review

This articles basically spoke to the idea that we have these people that speak whenever disasters happen. These "actors" then go on to blow certain situations out of proportion thus making the public freak out unnecessarily, by appealing to the general public's emotions. The article did however talk about how so much of what goes on is a lie, how public speaking is a "lying game" and how we as human beings have the ability to either take these events with a grain of salt, or play along. This idea actually reminded me of an episode of 30 Rock where the producers of the tv stations (CNN) were trying to sway viewers' emotions by making up false tragedies. While it was meant to be comedic I feel as though the message aligned perfectly with that of this article.

This topic was admittedly a lot more content heavy than what I was expecting when I was preparing to complete the assignment. I found myself re- reading sections either because I wan't too clear on the content, or simply out of shock that the writer was saying such things. Overall I found the topic of crisis actors and other conspiracy theories truly interesting, however the I found the tone of the piece fairly dark.

Chapter 5 Blog Post

When I began to read this chapter I became very excited. After reading Chapter 2 I figured that economist function much like scientist. This however left me wondering if there was a way that they measure human response to the law of supply and demand. I knew that there had to be some practical way of plotting response and this chapter essentially answers most if not all of my questions pertaining to the matter.

I however didn't think that there would have been so many conditions when determining whether the market was elastic or not. The idea of incorporating revenue into the idea of supply and demand made perfect sense, yet I failed to understand that the term 'elastic' could be applied to everything. I think I will most likely get tripped up on questions on the chapter test relating to calculating prices such as the  cross price of demand and price of supply, due to all of the equations however I know all it requires is a little more practice/ studying. Overall I am actually pretty ecstatic about this chapter because it includes so many basic algebra concepts, and I find it cool that the disciplines are mixing.

Chapter 4 Blog Post

Chapter 4

I found this chapter to particularly interesting, because I immediately made the connection back to the ten principles introduced in Chapter 1. While the sixth principle skimmed the idea that interests controlled the market economy, this chapter fully explained the phenomenon that is Supply and Demand. While I thought that I actually had a good idea of what Supply and Demand was, I found myself learning new concepts and ideals such as supply schedules or inferior goods. I have never taken into account the many external factors that may effect the demand curve, however this chapter expressed these catalyst in a way that was easy to understand.

Question(s):

Can supply and demand really be graphed in such a linear fashion (as shown on pg. 78)? As the price becomes exceedingly expensive I assumed that the demand might drop exponentially, so this surprised.

Is there an industry that can afford to stay at a constant equilibrium quantity (an example)?