3.3: Perfect Competition
The Four Market Structures
Every Product Is Sold In A Market That Can Be Considered One Of The Below Market Structures:
Perfect Competition
- Perfect Competition
- Many Small Firms
- Identical Products (perfect Substitutes)
- Low Barriers To Entry — Easy For Firms To Enter And Exit The Industry
- Seller Has No Need To Advertise
- Firms Are “price Takers” (each Firm Has No Control Over The Price)
→ Eg. Corn, Strawberries, Milk
Monopolistic Competition
- Imperfect Competition
- Relatively Large Number Of Sellers
- Differentiated Products
- Some Control Over Price
- Low Barriers To Entry — Easy For Firms To Enter
- Lots Of Non-price Competition
- Eg. Advertising
→ Eg. Fast Food Chains, Furniture Stores, Shoe Stores
Oligopoly
- Imperfect Competition
- A Few Large Producers (<10)
- Identical Or Differentiated Products
- High Barriers To Entry
- Control Over Price (”price Makers”)
- Mutual Interdependence
- Firms Must Worry About The Decisions Of Their Competitors And Use Strategy
→ Eg. Cell Phones, Service Providers, Cars
Monopoly
- Imperfect Competition
- One Large Firm (the Firm Is The Market)
- Unique Product (no Close Substitutes)
- High Barriers To Entry — Firms Cannot Enter The Industry
- Monopolies Are “price Makers” (set The Industry Price)
→ Eg. The Electric Company, De Beers
Barriers To Entry
- A Monopoly Wouldn’t Last Long If There Weren’t High Barriers To Entry
Types Of Barriers To Entry
Economies Of Scale
- Eg. There Is Only One Electric Company Because They Are The Only Ones That Can Make Electricity At The Lowest Cost; This Is Called A natural Monopoly
Superior Technology
Geography Or Ownership Of Raw Materials
Government-created Barriers
- The Government Issues patents To Protect Inventors And Forbids Others From Using Their Invention
Demand For Perfectly Competitive Firms
- They Must Be Price Takers Because If One Firm Charges Above The Market Price, No One Will Buy; They’ll Just Go To Other Firms Who Offer Lower Prices
- There Is No Reason To Price Low Because Consumers Will Buy Just As Much At The Market Price
- Since The Price Is The Same At All Quantities Demanded, The Demand Curve For Each Firm Is Perfectly Elastic (a Straight Horizontal Line)
- For Perfect Competition, Demand = Marginal Revenue, Average Revenue, And Price
- D = MR = AR = P
Short-run Profit Maximization
- Firms Must Continue To Produce Until The Additional Revenue From Each New Output Equals The Additional Cost → Profit Maximizing Rule
- Profit Maximizing Rule: MR=MC
- Rule Applies To All Market Structures
- Applies Only If The Price Is Above AVC
- Rule Can Be Restated P = MC For Perfectly Competitive Firms (because MR = P)