ECO 212 Final Exam 2

1) Why do consumers have to make tradeoffs in deciding what to consume?
A. there are not enough of all goods produced.
B. they are limited by a budget constraint.
C. the prices of goods vary.
D. not all goods give them the same amount of satisfaction.

2) Economics does not study correct or incorrect behaviors, but rather it assumes that economic agents make the best decisions given their knowledge of the costs and benefits. What term best describes this behavior?
A. selfishly
B. emotionally
C. rationally
D. equitably

3) Consider a good whose consumption takes place publicly. On what factors would your decision to buy that good depend?
A. only on the price of the good, and not on other factors, such as other people’s actions.
B. only on how many other people buy the good, and not on the good itself.
C. only on the characteristics of the good itself and not on other people/s actions.
D. both on the characteristics of the product and on how many other people are buying it.

4) What might you call an outward shift of a nation's production possibilities frontier?
A. a situation in which a country produces more of one good and less of another.
B. an impossible situation.
C. rising prices of the two goods on the production possibilities frontier model.
D. economic growth.

5) If a commercial dairy farm wants to raise funds to purchase feeding troughs, in which market does it do so?
A. dairy products market.
B. factor market.
C. product market.
D. output market.

6) Which of the following countries is not close to the free market benchmark?
A. Singapore.
B. Germany.
C. North Korea.
D. Canada.

7) If a 35 percent increase in price of golf balls led to an 42 percent decrease in quantity demanded, then the demand for golf balls is
A. relatively elastic.
B. relatively inelastic.
C. perfectly elastic.
D. unit-elastic.

8) Economists in general
A. Incorporate tastes into economic models only to the extent that tastes determine whether pairs of goods are substitutes or complements.
B. Believe that they must be able to explain people's tastes in order to explain what happens when tastes change.
C. Do not believe that people's tastes determine demand and therefore they ignore the subject of tastes.
D. Do not try to explain people's tastes, but they do try to explain what happens when tastes change.

9) Price elasticity of demand measures
A. how responsive sales are to a change in buyers' incomes.
B. how responsive sales are to changes in the price of a related good.
C. how responsive quantity demanded is to a change in price.
D. how responsive suppliers are to price changes.

10) Which of the following is evidence of a surplus of bananas?
A. The quantity demanded of bananas is greater than the quantity supplied.
B. The price of bananas is lowered in order to increase sales.
C. The equilibrium price of bananas rises due to an increase in demand.
D. Firms raise the price of bananas.

11) At a product's equilibrium price
A. the product's demand curve crosses the product's supply curve.
B. the quantity of the product demanded is greater than the quantity of the product supplied.
C. the quantity of the product demanded is less than the quantity of the product supplied.
D. the product's demand curve is the same as the product's supply curve.

12) Danielle Ocean pays for monthly pool maintenance for her home swimming pool. Last week the owner of the pool service informed Danielle that he will have to raise his monthly service fee because of increases in the price of pool chemicals. How is the market for pool maintenance services affected by this?
A. There is a decrease in the supply of pool maintenance services.
B. There is a decrease in the demand for pool maintenance services.
C. There is a decrease in the quantity of pool maintenance services supplied.
D. There is an increase in the supply of pool maintenance services.

13) Which of the following best explains why unemployment rates are higher in the European economies than in the United States?
A. European industries pay a lower wage rate than industries in the United States.
B. Unemployment benefits are more generous in Europe than in the United States.
C. Workers in Europe are less productive than workers in the United States.
D. More Europeans go to school fulltime and are therefore not able to participate in the labor market.

14) At low wages, the labor supply curve for most people slopes upward because
A. the demand for labor is perfectly elastic at low wages.
B. as wages increase the opportunity cost of leisure increases.
C. as wages increase income also increases unless hours worked decrease.
D. the supply of labor is perfectly inelastic at low wages.

15) Let MP = marginal product, P = output price, and W = wage, then the equation that represents the condition where a competitive firm would hire another worker is 
A. P × MP = W. 
B. P × W > MP. 
C. P × MP > W. 
D. P × MP < W.

16) An individual's labor supply curve shows
A. the relationship between the quantity of hours worked and total income earned by that individual.
B. the maximum wage rates offered to that individual by various potential employers.
C. the relationship between wages and the quantity of labor that she is willing to supply.
D. the relationship between wages and the quantity of labor that a firm is willing to employ.

17) Which of the following will not cause the labor demand curve to shift to the right?
A. an increase in the market wage rate
B. an increase in the price of the firm's product
C. a technological improvement that increases labor productivity
D. an increase in human capital in the labor force

18) The labor supply for an industry would decrease if
A. a greater percentage of women want to work outside the home.
B. the wage rate falls.
C. the percentage of the population from age 16 to 65 decreases.
D. the government welcomes foreign workers into the country.

19) Private costs
A. are borne by producers of a good while social costs are borne by those who cannot afford to purchase the good.
B. are borne by producers of a good while social costs are borne by government.
C. are borne by consumers of a good while social costs are borne by government.
D. are borne by producers of a good while social costs are borne by society at large.

20) Which of the following is an example of a common resource?
A. taxicab services
B. the Sumatran tiger population in the world
C. rabbit fur
D. the stock of knowledge in the public domain

21) Which of the following displays these two characteristics: nonrivalry and nonexcludability in consumption?
A. common resources