Ten Principles of Economics
Thinking Like An Economist
Interdependence and the Gains From Trade
The Market Forces of Supply & Demand
100

The limited nature of society’s resources.

What is scarcity?

100

A visual model of the economy that shows how dollars flow through markets among households and firms.

What is the circular flow diagram?

100

The ability to produce a good using fewer inputs than another producer does.

What is absolute advantage?

100

A market in which there are so many buyers and so many sellers that each has a negligible impact on the market price.

What is a competitive market?

200

The study of how society manages its scarce resources.

What is econonomics?

200

A graph that shows the combinations of output that the economy can possibly produce given the available factors of production and the available production technology.

What is the production possibilities frontier?

200

The ability to produce a good at a lower opportunity cost than another producer.

What is comparative advantage?

200

The amount of a good that buyers are willing and able to purchase.

What is quantity demanded?

300

Whatever must be given up in order to obtain some item.

What is opportunity cost?

300

When the economy is producing less than it can from the resources it has available.

What is inefficient?

300

Goods produced abroad and sold domestically.

What are imports?

300

The claim that, other things being equal, the quantity demanded of a good falls when the price of the good rises.

What is the law of demand?

400

The quantity of goods and services produced by each unit of labor input.

What is productivity?

400

They are sellers in the market for factors of production.

What are households?

400

For both parties to gain from trade, the price at which they trade must lie between these costs.

What are opportunity costs?

400

A good for which, other things equal, an increase in income leads to a decrease in demand.

What is an inferior good?

500

It can make everyone better off.

What is trade?

500

They are buyers in the market for factors of production.

What are firms?

500

They distort price signals and misallocate resources in an economy.

What are tariffs?

500

A situation in which quantity supplied is greater than quantity demanded.

What is a surplus?

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