-
Economics
The study of how scarce or limited resources are used to satisfy unlimited wants and needs; the study of decision making in a world of scarcity
-
Scarcity
The result of not enough goods and services to satisfy all wants and needs
-
Tradeoff
Giving up one thing for something else
-
Value judgement
The relative importance one assigns to an action or alternative.
-
Opportunity Cost
The cost of a purchase or decision measured in terms of forgone alternative; what was given up to make a purchase or carry out a decision.
-
Efficiency
Producing the largest attainable output of a desired quality with a given set of resources, producing at the lowest possible cost.
-
Equity
Justice or fairness in the distribution of goods and services.
-
Resources (factors of production)
Persons and things used to produce goods and services; limited in amount; categorized as labor, capital, land and entrepreneurship.
-
Labor
Physical and mental human effort used to produce goods and services.
-
Capital
Items, such as machinery and equipment, used in the production of goods and services
-
Land
Productive inputs that orginate in nature, such as coal and fertile soil.
-
Entrepreneneurship
The function of organizing resources for production and taking the risk of success or failure in a productive enterprise.
-
Wages
Income return to labor
-
Interest
Income return to owners of capital
-
Rent
income return to owners of land resources
-
Profit
Income return to those performing the entrepreneurial function.
-
Economic theory
A formal explanation of the relationship between economic variables.
-
Model
The setting within which an economic theory is presented.
-
Assumptions
Conditions held to be true within a mode.
-
Econometrics
The use of statistical techniques to describe the relationships between economic variables.
-
Economic Policy
A guide for a course of action.
-
Graph
An illustration showing the relationship between two variables that are measured on the vertical and horizontal axes.
-
Direct Relationship
Two variables move in the same direction; when one increases, so does the other; graphs as an upward sloping line.
-
Inverse Relationship
Two variables move in opposite directions; when one increases, the other decreases; graphs as a downward sloping line
-
Production Possibilities Table (or curve)
Gives the various amounts of two goods that an economy can produce with full employment and fixed resources and technology
-
Unemployment
Resources available for production are not being used.
-
Economic Growth
An increase in an economy's full employment levle of output over time.
-
Capital Goods
Goods such as machinery and equipment that are used to produce other goods and services.
-
Consumer Goods
Goods, such as food and household furniture, that are produced for final buyers.
-
Macroeconomics
The study of the operation of the economy as a whole
-
Microeconomics
The study of individual decision making units and markets within the economy
|
|