Econ 157 HW #1
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Econ 157
HW #1
Instructions: You may work in groups of up to four students. If you choose to work in groups, I ask you to write down the names of the other students you worked with. Please, keep in mind that every student must write and turn in his/her own work. Please, be clear, concise, and NEAT. I should tell you that if I cannot understand what you write, then, I will assume that it is wrong.
1. According to the US Census, what was the urban population in the US in 2000? What percentage of the US population lived in Metropolitan and Micropolitan areas? Why are these different? Explain.
You may find the answer to this question on O’Sullivan at the end of Chapter 1.
2. On pages 31 - 35 of O’Sullivan, do exercises 2, 4, 5, 7 and 11
2. Matter Transmitter and Trading City
a. The labor used in transporting products from production sites to trading firms will [increase, decrease, not change] because the transmitter, with zero marginal cost, replaces the wagons.
b. The volume of trade in the region will [increase, decrease, not change] because the transmitter decreases the unit transport cost to zero, allowing the full exploitation of differences in comparative advantages that generate comparative advantage and trade.
c. The labor used in processing transactions (banking, accounting, insuring) will [increase, decrease, not change] because the volume of trade increases.
d. The trading city will grow if the gains in the labor used in processing transactions exceed the losses in labor used in transportation.
e. Suppose the transmitter technology changes, and it becomes economical for an individual household. The trading city will [grow, shrink, disappear] because the absence of scale economies in exchange means that individual households will engage in direct trade.
4. Spring-Loaded Sneakers
a. The slope of the net-price curve changes to 1/8 loaf and the market area changes from 16 miles (8 on each side) to 24 miles (12 on each side).
b. Using Figure 2–2 as a starting point, the spring-loaded sneakers change the number of factories in the 48-mile region from 3 to 2, each with a market area 24 miles wide.
5. Innovation and Market Areas
a. An innovation in production that doubles labor productivity in factories will [shorten, lengthen, not change] the stem of the martini glass from 4/12 loaves to 2/12 loaves because cost per shirt equals the labor cost per hour (2 loaves) divided by the output per hour (12 loaves).
b. The width of the market area increases from 16 miles (8 miles on each
side) to 20 miles (10 on each side) because 2/12 + 10/12 = 12/12.
c. An innovations in transportation that doubles consumer travel speeds will [decrease, increase, not change] the slope of the martini glass from 1/12 loaf per mile to 1/24 loaf per mile.
d. The width of the market area increases from 20 miles (10 on each side) to 40 miles (20 on each side) because 2/12 + 20/24 = 1.
7. Singing and the Internet
a. The equilibrium price for choral music-- the price paid by each person who listens-- is 1/4 loaves because 1/4 times 80 listeners covers the opportunity cost of 20 loaves for the singers.
b. The stem of the martini glass is 1/4 loaf and the slope is 1/8 loaf per mile, so the market area is 6 miles on each side because 1/4 + 6/8 = 1.
c. The horizontal cost of home production is now at 1/2 loaf instead of 1 loaf. The market area is 2 miles on each side because 1/4 + 2/8 = 1/2.
11. Beer and Wine
Consider the locations of breweries and wineries.
a. Most breweries locate close to their customers (far from their primary input sources) because beer production is a weight-gaining activity because breweries add local water (a ubiquitous input) to other ingredients. Brewing is a market-oriented industry, so it locates close to its consumers to economize on transport cost.
b. Most wineries locate close to their input sources (far from their consumers) because wine production is a weight-losing activity (the skins are not used) and the grapes are costly to transport because of spoilage. Firms in the materials-oriented industry locate close to input suppliers to economize on transport cost.
c. There are two evenly spaced wineries and two evenly spaced breweries. The wineries will locate at mile 15 and mile 45, splitting the western region. The breweries will locate at mile 30 and mile 90, splitting the nation.
3. On pages 62 - 65 of O’Sullivan, do exercises 4 and 7.
4. Mr. Mullet’s Carnival
a. In the left panel of Figure 3-2 (small city), the wages are $6 and $12 and the quantiity is 20 workers. In the right panel of Figure 3-2 (large city) the wage is $9, and the quantities are 10 and 30 workers.
b. In the typical big city with high demand, his profit is $135 computed as (1/2) x ($18 - $9) x 30 workers.
c. In the typical big city with low demand, his profit is $15 computed as (1/2) x $12 - $9) x 10 workers.
d. In the typical small city with high demand, his profit is $60 computed as (1/2) x $18 - $1) x 20 workers.
e. In the typical small city with low demand, his profit is $60 computed as (1/2) x $12 - $6) x 20 workers.
f. His expected profit is $75 in a big city, compared to $60 in a small city.
7. Advertising and Corporate Clusters
Number of Advert Labor Total
firms Cost Cost Total Cost Revenue Profit Profit Gap
1 120 30 150 200 50 0
2 60 60 120 200 80 30
3 40 90 130 200 70 20
4 30 120 150 200 50 0
5 24 150 174 200 26 -24
6 20 180 200 200 0 -50
a. The profit gap is shown in the fourth column of the table, rising from $0 for one firm to $30, then dropping to zero for a four-firm cluster.
b. If initially all corporations are isolated and then one joins another to form a two-corporation cluster, other firms [will, won’t] have an incentive to join the cluster because the second firm earns $30 more in profit.
c. In the long-run equilibrium, there will be a cluster of four corporations, each of which will earn a profit of $50 differing from the profit of an isolated site by zero.
4. When households want to consume coffee and fruit juice at home, they behave rather differently. Coffee is normally brewed in the home while fruit juice is purchased in bottles and transported to the home. Please discuss how location theory explains this difference in behavior.
Production of coffee and juice can take place at the source of spatially scarce inputs: roasted coffee beans or fruit, or at the point of consumption in the home. Juice factories will locate near their inputs, because input transportation costs are higher than output transportation costs. For example, if it takes 10 oranges to produce an 8 ounce can of juice, it is evident that the firm will save on transportation costs by transporting the final product. The opposite is true with coffee. Using our model:
Let Y, be coffee, X the coffee beans and assume that Y=aX. As we discussed in class, it is reasonable to assume that a>1 (since we need little beans to produce a large amount of coffee). Furthermore, it is also plausible to assume that the unit transportation cost of coffee beans, tx, is lower than the transportation costs of coffee, ty. That is tx < ty. Thus,
a * ty > tx
Thus, production should be held “at the market”, that is at home.
With this explanation, you should be able to do a similar reasoning and explain why the production of juice is located “by the inputs” instead.
5. Consider a region that produces lemons and ice and consumes lemonade (lemons and ice together). All resources are distributed uniformly throughout the region, and all people are equally productive in producing lemons and ice. There are scale economies in the production of ice, causing the development of an ice factory and a factory city. Suppose that a small refrigerator is introduced and imported into the region, providing an alternative to the ice purchased from ice factories. Assume that the cost of purchasing these refrigerators is zero (free refrigerators!). Explain the effects of the refrigerator on (a) the market area of the ice factory and (b) the size of the city surrounding the ice factory. Use a graph, to explain your
answers.
• The use of a refrigerator decreases the household’s opportunity costs of producing ice from A to B (see graph).
• Thus, some households will produce ice themselves, rather than buying from the factory. Particularly, those who live far away.
A: Old Opport. Cost
WO refrigerators
B: New Opport. Cost. With refrigerators
Price of ice
New Market Area
Old Market Area
• Market area of the ice factory decreases.
• Size of the city decreases because there is less demand for ice and, thus, less workers are needed.
6. Consider old McDonald, who must carry a dozen eggs from the barn to the house. The ground between the barn and the house is slippery, so there is a 50 percent chance that McDonald will slip on a given trip and break all the eggs in his basket. Consider two strategies: a one-basket strategy (a single trip with all 12 eggs) and a
two-basket strategy (two trips, with 6 eggs per trip). McDonald can sell each egg for 10 cents.
a. List all of the possible outcomes under each of the strategies.
b. What is the expected number of delivered (unbroken) eggs under each strategy?
c. What is his expected revenue under each strategy?
d. What strategy is better?
a. List all of the possible outcomes under each of the strategies.
Strategy one: Number of eggs delivered = { 0, 12 }
Strategy two: Number of eggs delivered = { 0, 6, 6, 12 }
b. What is the expected number of delivered (unbroken) eggs under each strategy?
Strategy one: E[Eggs] = (1/2)* 0 + (1/2)* 12 = 6
Strategy two: E[Eggs] = (1/4)* 0 + (1/4)* 6 + (1/4)* 6 + (1/4)*12 = 6
c. What is his expected revenue under each strategy?
Using the same method as in (b), we get that:
Strategy one: E[Revenue] = $ 0.6
Strategy two: E[Revenue] = $ 0.6
d. What strategy is better?
Depends on transportation costs, and risk aversion!
First, it is clear that the first strategy is riskier. Since the expected profit is the same, and assuming transportation costs are negligible, it makes sense to pick the second strategy (unless McDonald is a risk lover).
7. The table below summarizes the productivity of workers in bread and shirt production in two parts of a region.
Output per Hour
Bread
Shirts
East
1
1
West
5
10
a. What are the opportunity costs of producing bread and shirts in the East and the West. For which good does the East have a comparative advantage? What about the West ?
Opportunity Cost of producing one unit
East West
Bread
Shirts
1
1
2
1/2
The East has a comparative advantage in the production of ___Bread_______. The West has a comparative advantage in the production of ___Shirts_______.
b. Assume that transport costs are zero and that the exchange rate is five shirts
for three loaves. If a western household switches one hour from bread production to shirt production and exchanges all the additional shirts for bread, will the household be better off? What are then any gains from trade (if any)?
Yes, see table below
|
Hours worked |
Bread |
Shirts |
Change in the number of hours of work dedicated to bread production |
- 1 |
|
|
Change in the number of bread produced |
|
-5 |
|
|
|
|
|
Change in the number of hours of work dedicated to shirt production |
+1 |
|
|
Change in the number of shirts produced |
|
|
+10 |
|
|
|
|
Change 10 shirts with six loaves of bread (at current exchange rate) |
|
+6 |
- 10 |
|
|
|
|
Gains from trade |
|
+1 |
|
The household has one additional shirt!
c. Suppose that the time required to execute the trade in (b) is twenty minutes hour. Is trade still beneficial ? No. The opportunity cost of twenty minutes of work for this household is 5/3 loaves of bread which is greater than the gains from trading.
d. At what transaction cost (time per trade) would the net gain from trade be zero? If the transaction cost is 1/5 hours (12 minutes), then the household’s opportunity cost from trading will be (1/5)*5 = 1 loaf of bread. Thus, if the time spent to make a transaction is below 12 minutes, households will benefit from trading.
2022-06-21