Group items tagged

This article discusses the impact of business franchises in the US economy. The output and production of the franchises has been increasing and maturing as the economy gets better. This contributes to the national output, and the capacity for that output known as aggregate supply.  "The franchise industry is a unique business sector and a vitally important contributor to the U.S. economy spanning some 300 lines of business, supporting nearly 18 million jobs, 825,000 establishments and providing for over $2.1 trillion in economic output,"

Most of you all already know about RIM's decision to cut the selling price of their tablet, the Playbook, by more than half (presumably because they are discontinuing the product). This is an example of a large firm cutting costs and reducing its output (from their inventories). We can also relate it to the concept of economies of scale, since Blackberry was able to afford to lose the Playbook as their other products are more successful.

This article describes the recent growth in a number of firms producing Greek Yogurt in the United States. As a result of this growth, the firms are experiencing economies of scale and they are all expanding their factories to increase their output. As the article states: "The Chobani plant today bustles with 14 production lines mechanically squirting yogurt into plastic cups that zip down conveyor belts." - this shows a technological improvement that is an economy of scale: due to the increase in size in the firm, it can employ more efficient, lower cost methods of production.

This article describes the cell phone costs that one small business owner is experiencing. These cell phone costs could be both fixed and variable costs - she still has to pay her basic cell phone bill no matter how many clients she has, so that cost is fixed regardless of output, in that sense, because at a certain rate the costs are constant. However, if she has a larger number of customers, and needs to call to deal with more of these customers, therefore going over her monthly plan limits, than the cost will begin to vary, so in that sense it is a variable cost. Overall, she needs to attempt to reduce this production cost in order to gain a better profit for her business.

This article talks about the effect production costs have had on the number of episodes in a season. In an attempt to be productively efficient as production costs per episodes rise, show producers have simply had to cut down the output of episodes. This makes sense because if we shift the AC curve left, the cost will decrease, but so will the output when AC=MC (productive efficiency).

Hello, In this article it talks about how South Sudan has suspended its oil production due to a disagreement with the Republic of the Sudan. South Sudan says it will stop its oil production because it does not want to share its revenue with Sudan. Sudan has accused the south for not paying transport fees, because the south has all the oil fields however, it relays on the north because south Sudan does not have a port and uses Sudan's port to export their oil. South Sudan claims that Sudan has stolen $350,000,000 worth of crude oil as an exchange of their transport fees. The two countries are know in Ethiopia trying to settle an agreement in which the south can use the north in order to export their oil.

The Government of Canada is currently spending lots of money sustaining and improving Canada's universities (and creating more scholarships to help students pay for school) - this demonstrates oppurtunity cost because funding and creating more scholarships, stimulates competition between students, thus raising the level of achievement, thus the universities output more valuable students...