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Which of the following statements is true regarding the differences between economic and accounting costs
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Accounting costs include only explicit costs
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In order for a taxi cab to be operated in New York it must have a medallion on its hood. Medallions are expensive, but can be resold and are therefor and example of
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Fixed cost
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Prospective sunk costs
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Are relevant to economic decision making
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The difference between the economic and accounting costs of a firm are
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The opportunity costs of the factors of production that the firm owns
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Fixed costs are fixed with respect to changes in
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Output
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Incremental cost is the same concept as blank cost
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Marginal
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Which of the following cost always declines as output increases
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Average fixed cost
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The total cost (TC) of producing computer software diskettes (Q) is given as TC= 200+5Q what is the variable cost
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5Q... 200 is the fixed cost and the marginal cost is 5, the ATC is 5+(200/Q)
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Carolyn knows the average total cost and average variable cost for a given level of output. Which of the following costs can she not determine given this info
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Carolyn can determine all of the above costs : AFC, FC, VC
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Jim left his previous job as a sales manager and started his own sales consulting business. He previously earned $70,000 a year but now he pays himself $25,000 per year while he is building the new business. What is the economic cost of the time he contributes to the new business?
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$45,000 per year
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We typically think of labor as a variable cost, even in the very short run. However some labor costs may be fixed. Which of the following items represents an example of a fixed labor cost?
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A salaried manager who has a three year employment contract
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For any given level of output
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None of the above is necessarily correct
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In a short run production process the marginal cost is rising and the average variable cost is falling as output is increased thus,
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Marginal cost is below average variable cost
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In a short run production process the marginal cost is rising and the average total cost is falling as output is increased. Thus marginal cost is
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Below average total cost
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Which of the following relationships is NOT valid
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Rising marginal cost implies that average total cost is also rising
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Which always increases as output increases
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Total cost and variable cost
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If a factory has a short run capacity constraint the marginal cost of production becomes blank at the capacity constraint
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Infinite
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In the short run suppose average total cost is a straight line and marginal cost is positive and constant. Then we know that fixed cost must
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Equal zero
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In the short run suppose average total cost is a straight line and marginal cost is positive and constant. Then we know that
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Average total cost is positive and constant, average total cost equals marginal cost
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In the long run, which of the following is considered a variable cost
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Expenditures for wages, expenditures for research and development, expenditures for raw materials, expenditures for capital machinery and equipment
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An isocost line reveals the
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Input combinations that can be purchased with a given outlay of funds
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Which of the following is not an expression for the cost minimizing combination of inputs
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MRTS=MPL/MPK
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When an isocost line is just tangent to an isoquant we know that
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Output is being produced at minimum cost
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The total cost of producing a given level of output is
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minimized when the ratio of marginal product to input price is equal for all inputs.
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A firms expansion path is
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A curve that shows the least cost combination of inputs needed to produce each level of output for given input prices
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At the optimum combination of two inputs
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The slopes of the isoquant and isocost curves are equal, costs are minimized for the production of a given output, the marginal rate of technical substitution equals the ratio of input prices
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Suppose that the price of labor (PL) is $10 and the price of capital (Pk) is $20. What is the equation of the isocost line corresponding to a total cost of $100
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100=10L+20k
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With its currrent levels of input use, a firms MRTS is 3 (when capital is on the vertical axis and labor is on the horizontal axis) this implies
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The marginal product of labor is 3 times the marginal product of capital
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A firm employs 100 workers at a wage rate of $10 per hour and 50 units of capital at a rate of $21 per hour. The marginal product of labor is 3, and the marginal product of capital is 5. The firm
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Could reduce the cost of producing its current output level by employing more labor and less capital
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A firm wants to minimize the total cost of producing 100 tons of dynamite. The firm uses two factors of production, chemicals and labor. The combination of chemicals and labor that minimizes production costs can be found where
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The production of an additional unit of dynamite costs the same regardless of whether chemicals or labor are used
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A plant uses machinery and waste water to produce steel. The owner of the plant wants to maintain and output of 10,000 tons a day even though the government has just imposed a $100 per gallon tax on using waste water. The reduction in the amount of waste water that results from the imposition of this tax depends on
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The ratio of the marginal product of waste water to the marginal product of machinery
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Consider the following statements when answering this question
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With convex isoquants a firms expansion path cannot be negatively sloped.
If a firm uses only two factors of production one of whose marginal product becomes negative when its use exceeds a certain level then a cost minimizing firms expansion path will have vertical or horizontal segments
If a firm uses only two factors of production one of whose marginal product becomes negative when its use exceeds a certain level then a cost minimizing firms expansion path will have vertical or horizontal segments
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Suppose our firm produces chartered business flights with capital (planes) and labor (pilots) in fixed proportion (one pilot for each plane) the expansion path for this business will:
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Follow the 45 degree line from the origin
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Suppose our firm produced chartered business flights with capital (planes) and labor (pilots) in fixed proportion (one pilot for each plane). If the wage rate paid to the pilots increases relative to the rental rate of capital for the airplanes then
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The optimal capital labor ratio should decrease
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Assume that a firms production process is subject to increasing returns to scale over a broad range of outputs. Long run average costs over this output will tend to
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Decline
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A firms short run average cost curve is U-shaped. Which of these conclusions can be reached regarding the firms returns to scale
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The short run average cost curve reveals nothing regarding returns to scale
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The cost output elasticity equals 1.4. This implies that
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There are diseconomies of scale
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The cost output elasticity is used to measure
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Economies of scale
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At the current level of output, long run marginal cost is $50 and long run average cost is $75. This implies that
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There are economies of scale
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The cost output elasticity can be written and calculated as
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MC/AC
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When there are economies of scale
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MC<AC so cost output elasticity is less than 1
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At every output level a firms short run average cost equal or exceeds long run average cost because
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There are at least as many possibilities for substitution between factors of production in the long run as in the short run
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To model the input decisions for a production system we plot labor on the horizontal axis and capital on the vertical axis. In the short run, labor is a variable input and capital is fixed. The short run expansion path for this production system is
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A horizontal line
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Which of the following situations is not possible
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All of the above are possible: SAC and LAC are both increasing for some output levels. SAC is increasing but LAC is decreasing for some output levels. SAC is decreasing but LAC is increasing for some output levels. SAC and LAC are both decreasing for some output levels
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Generally economies of scope are present when
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Joint output is greater from a single firm producing two goods than could be achieved by two different firms each producing single product (assuming equivalent production inputs in both situations)
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When a product transformation curve is bowed outward, there are blank in production
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Economies of scope
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Economies of scope refer to
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Multi product firms
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A firm produces leather handbags and leather shoes. If there are economies of scope, the product transformation curve between handbags and shoes will be
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Bowed outward (concave)
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Two firms each producing different goods can achieve a greater output than one firm producing both goods with the same inputs. We can conclude that the production process involves
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Diseconomies of scope
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When a product transformation curve for a firm is bowed inward there are blank in production
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Diseconomies of scope
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Which of the following is true regarding the relationship between returns to scale and economies of scope
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There is no definite relationship between returns to scale and economies of scope
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Bubba burgers has discovered there are economies of scope available to the restarting. Which is most likely to be a response to this discovery
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Bubba adds grilled chicken sandwiches to the menu
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Which of the following busines combinations is likely to exhibit economies of scope
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Banking services for individuals and banking services for other business, retail clothing stores and electronic clothing sales, hospitals that perform heart surgery and hospitals that perform cosmetic surgery
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For a given pair of production outputs, the degree of economies of scope
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May increase or decrease with output
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Which of the following is not a reason for average costs to fall according to the learning curve
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Competing firms leave the industry as the learning firm becomes more efficient
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The presence of a learning curve may induce a decision maker in a startup firm to choose
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High levels of output to shift the average cost curve down over time
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A group of friends recently started manufacturing specialty T-shirts. The business has grown rapidly with monthly production up from 50 to 250 in the first 6 months. During this same period, average production cost has been cut in half. The firms long run average cost curve over this range of output
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May be any of the above, downward sloping, horizontal, upward sloping
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The learning curve is graphically represented as a plot of
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Labor per unit on the vertical axis and total number of units produced on the horizontal axis
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A learning curve may be expressed as a relationship between the labor per unit (L) and the total number of units produced (N) which of the following learning curves exhibits a faster reduction in cost of production due to learning (1) L=10+N-1 or (2) L=10+N-.5
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Learning curve one
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A variable cost function of the form VC=23+q+7q2 implies a marginal cost curve that is
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Linear
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A cubic cost function implies
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A U-shaped average variable cost curve, a U-shaped marginal cost curve, a U-shaped average cost curve
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Which of the following is true of cost curves
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The MC curve goes through the minimum of both the AVC curve and the ATC curve
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The scale economies index (SCI) is equal to
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One minus the cost output elasticity
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The key assumption required for us to use a linear variable cost function of the form VC=by is that
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Marginal cost must be constant and equal to b
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A Cobb Douglas production function
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Can exhibit constant, increasing, or decreasing returns to scale
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When we solve the firms cost minimization problem by the method of Lagrange multipliers the optimal value of the Lagrange multiplier equals the
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Marginal cost of production
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When we solve the firms dual production problem by the method of Lagrange multipliers, the optimal value of the Lagrange multiplier equals the
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Marginal product per unit cost of each variable input
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For the firms cost minimization problem, one of the key assumptions for each input is that
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Marginal product is increasing at a decreasing rate