Chapter 9: Labor demand (page 327)
What is the difference between demand for labor and supply of labor?
Short Answer
One refers to hours the other to the amount of workers.
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Chapter 9: Labor demand (page 327)
What is the difference between demand for labor and supply of labor?
One refers to hours the other to the amount of workers.
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The United States currently imports all of its coffee. The annual demand for coffee by U.S. consumers is given by the demand curveQ= 250 - 10P, whereQis quantity (in millions of pounds) andPis the market price per pound of coffee. World producers can harvest and ship coffee to U.S. distributors at a constant marginal (= average) cost of \(8 per pound. U.S. distributors can in turn distribute coffee for a constant \)2 per pound. The U.S. coffee market is competitive. Congress is considering a tariff on coffee imports of $2 per pound.
a. If there is no tariff, how much do consumers pay for a pound of coffee? What is the quantity demanded?
b. If the tariff is imposed, how much will consumers pay for a pound of coffee? What is the quantity demanded?
c. Calculate the lost consumer surplus.
d. Calculate the tax revenue collected by the government.
e. Does the tariff result in a net gain or a net loss to society as a whole?
Example 9.6 (page 353) describes the effects of the sugar quota. In 2016, imports were limited to 6.1 billion pounds, which pushed the domestic price to 27 cents per pound. Suppose imports were expanded to 10 billion pounds.
a. What would be the new U.S. domestic price?
b. How much would consumers gain and domestic producers lose?
c. What would be the effect on deadweight loss and foreign producers?
In 2011, Americans smoked 16 billion packs of cigarettes. They paid an average retail price of \(5.00 per pack.
a. Given that the elasticity of supply is 0.5 and the elasticity of demand is -0.4, derive linear demand and supply curves for cigarettes.
b. Cigarettes are subject to a federal tax, which was about \)1.00 per pack in 2011. What does this tax do to the market-clearing price and quantity?
c. How much of the federal tax will consumers pay? What part will producers pay?
You know that if a tax is imposed on a particular product, the burden of the tax is shared by producers and consumers. You also know that the demand for automobiles is characterized by a stock adjustment process. Suppose a special 20-percent sales tax is suddenly imposed on automobiles. Will the share of the tax paid by consumers rise, fall, or stay the same over time? Explain briefly. Repeat for a 50-cents-per-gallon gasoline tax.
In Exercise 4 in Chapter 2 (page 84), we examined a vegetable fiber traded in a competitive world market and imported into the United States at a world price of \(9 per pound. U.S. domestic supply and demand for various price levels are shown in the following table.
Price | U.S. Supply (Million Pounds) | U.S. Demand (Million Pounds) |
3 | 2 | 34 |
6 | 4 | 28 |
9 | 6 | 22 |
12 | 8 | 16 |
15 | 10 | 10 |
18 | 12 | 4 |
Answer the following questions about the U.S. market:
a. Confirm that the demand curve is given by QD = 40 - 2P, and that the supply curve is given by QS = 2/3P.
b. Confirm that if there were no restrictions on trade, the United States would import 16 million pounds.
c. If the United States imposes a tariff of \)3 per pound, what will be the U.S. price and level of imports? How much revenue will the government earn from the tariff? How large is the deadweight loss?
d. If the United States has no tariff but imposes an import quota of 8 million pounds, what will be the U.S. domestic price? What is the cost of this quota for U.S. consumers of fiber? What is the gain for U.S. producers?
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