《西方经济学》习题答案—Chapter 21.docVIP

SOLUTIONS TO TEXT PROBLEMS: Quick Quizzes Figure 1 1. A person with an income of $1,000 could purchase $1,000/$5 = 200 pints of Pepsi if she spent all of her income on Pepsi or she could purchase $1,000/$10 = 100 pizzas if she spent all of her income on pizza. Thus the point representing 200 pints of Pepsi and no pizzas is the vertical intercept and the point representing 100 pizzas and no Pepsi is the horizontal intercept of the budget constraint, as shown in Figure 1. The slope of the budget constraint is the rise over the run, or -200/100 = -2. 2. Figure 2 shows indifference curves between Pepsi and pizza. The four properties of these indifference curves are: (1) higher indifference curves are preferred to lower ones because consumers prefer more of a good to less of it; (2) indifference curves are downward sloping because if the quantity of one good is reduced, the quantity of the other good must increase in order for the consumer to be equally happy; (3) indifference curves do not cross because if they did, the assumption that more is preferred to less would be violated; and (4) indifference curves are bowed inward because people are more willing to trade away goods that they have in abundance and less willing to trade away goods of which they have little. Figure 2 Figure 3 shows the budget constraint (BC1) and two indifference curves. The consumer is initially at point A, where the budget constraint is tangent to an indifference curve. The increase in the price of pizza shifts the budget constraint to BC2, and the consumer moves to point C where the new budget constraint is tangent to a lower indifference curve. To break this move down into income and substitution effects requires drawing the dashed budget line shown, which is parallel to the new budget constraint and tangent to the original indifference curve at point B. The movement from A to B represents the substitution effect, while the movement from B to C represents the income ef