EconS 301 – Intermediate Microeconomics

Review Session #1

1. Suppose the market demand curve for a product is given by Q d = 1000 − 10 P and the
market supply curve is given by Q s = −50 + 25P .
a. What are the equilibrium price and quantity?
b. What is the Inverse Form of the demand curve?
c. At the market equilibrium, what is the price elasticity of demand?
d. Suppose the price in this market is $25. What is the amount of excess demand?

2. Suppose demand for good A is given by QAd = 500 − 10 PA + 2 PB + 0.70 I where PA is the
price of good A, PB is the price of some other good B, and I is income. Assume that PA
is currently $10, PB is currently $5, and I is currently $100.
a. What is the elasticity of demand for good A with respect to the price of good A at the
current situation?
b. What is the cross-price elasticity of the demand for good A with respect to the price of
good B at the current situation?
c. What is the income elasticity of demand for good A at the current situation?

3. Consider two goods, A and B. For each of the following scenarios, develop the utility
function U(A,B) that matches the given information.
a. The consumer believes that good A and B are perfect substitutes with one unit of A
equivalent to four units of B.
b. The consumer believes that good A and B are perfect compliments and always uses three
unites of B for every unit of A.

4. Consider the utility function U ( x, y ) = 3 x 2 + 5 y with MUx = 6x and MUy = 5.

a. Is the assumption that “more is better” satisfied for both goods?
b. What is the MRSx,y for this utility function?
c. Is the MRSx,y diminishing, constant, or increasing as the consumer substitutes x for y
along an indifference curve?

5. For the following sets of goods draw two indifference curves, U1 and U2, with U2 > U1.
Draw each graph placing the amount of the first good on the horizontal axis.
a. Hot dogs and chili (the consumer likes both and has a diminishing marginal rate of
substitution of hot dogs for chili).
b. Sugar and Sweet’N Low (the consumer likes both and will accept an ounce of Sweet’N
Low or an ounce of sugar with equal satisfaction).
c. Peanut butter and jelly (the consumer likes exactly two ounces of peanut butter for every
ounce of jelly).
d. Nuts (which the consumer neither likes nor dislikes) and ice cream (which the consumer
likes).
e. Apples (which the consumer likes) and liver (which the consumer dislikes).
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 Answers

Exercise 1.
a. In equilibrium, we know the quantity supplied must equal the quantity demanded.
So we simply set the supply equal to demand, and solve for price.

Qd = Qs
1000 − 10 P = −50 + 25 P
1050 = 35 P
⎛ 1050 ⎞
⎜ ⎟=P
⎝ 35 ⎠
30 = P

Now that we know the equilibrium price, we can plug it into either the demand or
supply to solve for the equilibrium quantity.

Plugging price into Q d yields:

Q d = 1000 − 10(30)
Q d = 1000 − 300
Q d = 700
Plugging price into Q s yields:
Q s = −50 + 25(30)
Q s = −50 + 750
Q s = 700

Calculating the equilibrium quantity using both Q d and Q s is a simple way to

check your algebra, as the quantity demanded should equal quantity supplied.

b.

The inverse demand curve can be useful when drawing the supply and demand
graph.

Qd=1000 – 10P

10P=1000 - Qd

P= 100 - .1Qd

 
 b. Price elasticity can be thought of as the percentage change in quantity demanded
as a result of a one percent change in price. So we have,
ΔQ
percentage change in quantity demanded Q ΔQ Q −1 ΔQ P
ε Q,P = = = =
percentage change in price ΔP ΔP P −1 ΔP Q
P
ΔQ ∂Q ∂Q P ∂Q
where = . Thus ε Q , P = . In our exercise , the partial derivative of
ΔP ∂P ∂P Q ∂P
quantity with respect to price, is equal to -10.

∂Q P ⎛ 30 ⎞
ε Q,P = = −10 ⎜ ⎟ = −0.429
∂P Q ⎝ 700 ⎠

So given a one percent increase in the price, we will have e 0.429 percentage
decrease in quantity demanded.

c. Plugging the price of $25 into the demand function:

Q d = 1000 − 10(25)
Q d = 1000 − 250
Q d = 750

Plugging the price of $25 into the supply function:

Q s = −50 + 25(25)
Q s = −50 + 625
Q s = 575

So we have a demand of 750 units and a supply of 575 units. Thus, the excess
demand is simply Q d – Q s = 750 – 575 = 175.

Exercise 2.
a. We know the current market prices and income, so we can calculate the market
quantity for good A.

QAd = 500 − 10(10) + 2(5) + 0.70(100) = 480

Using that quantity, we can now calculate the price elasticity of demand for good
A.

 
 ∂QA PA
εQ =
A , PA
∂PA QA
⎛ 10 ⎞
εQ A , PA
= −10 ⎜ ⎟
⎝ 480 ⎠
εQ A , PA
= −0.208

b. The cross-price elasticity determines how the quantity demanded of good A varies
with the price good B.
∂Q P
ε QA , PB = A B
∂PB QA
⎛ 5 ⎞
εQ A , PB
= 2⎜ ⎟
⎝ 480 ⎠
εQ A , PB
= 0.021
Simply put, from the price elasticity of demand, we just replace PA with PB in
both the partial derivative and the numerator of the second term.

c. Similarly, income elasticity determines how the quantity demanded varies with
income.

∂QA I
εQ =
A ,I
∂I QA
⎛ 100 ⎞
εQ A ,I
= 0.79 ⎜ ⎟
⎝ 480 ⎠
εQ A ,I
= 0.146
Exercise 3.
a.  These types of questions are more intuitive than anything. We know that one unit of
good A will provide the same level of utility as four units of good B. That is, good A
provides four times the utility as good B. And we know the goods are perfect substitutes,
so the MRS will be constant, and the utility function will be linear. So the utility function
can be characterized by,

U(A,B)= 4A+ B
 

b.    Recall the indifference curves for perfect compliments are straight vertical and horizontal
lines at a right angle to each other (with the right angle closest to the origin). This is
because a consumer does not derive any extra utility from additional units of one good
without the other. In our exercise, one unit of good A is always used with three units of
good B. The utility function will take the form,

U ( A, B ) = min(3 A, B )
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 The “min” simply means “take the minimum” of 3A and B.

For example, suppose we have 10 units of good B and 3 units of good A. Then we will
have,

U ( A, B ) = min(9,10) = 9 .

So we use 9 units of good B and 3 units of good A.

Exercise 4.

a. It’s worth nothing that the marginal utility of a good is simply the partial derivative of
utility function with respect to the good. The marginal utilities are given, and both are
positive, so increasing consumption of either good will increase utility. Thus, more is
always better.

∂U
b. MRS x , y = ∂x = MU x = 6 x  
∂U MU y 5
∂y

c. The MRS is increase as the consumer substitutes towards more x and less y. This is
simply because x appears in the numerator of the MRS.

d. We know the utility function is not linear, so the indifference curves will not be straight
lines. And we know that the MRSx,y is increasing, so the indifference curve will be bowed
away from the origin, thus concave to the origin.

Exercise 5 (next page).

 
5.