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Chapter 2
Economics
19
Economics
Undergraduate 1
01/31/2011

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Term
scarcity
Definition
A situation in which the ingredients for producing the things that people desire are insufficient to satisfy all wants at a zero price.
Term
production
Definition
Any activity that results in the conversion of resources into products that can be used in consumption.
Term
land
Definition
the natural resources that are available from nature. land as a resource includes location., original fertility and mineral deposits, topography,climate, water, and vegetation.
Term
labor
Definition
productive contributions of humans who work.
Term
physical capital
Definition
all manufactured resources, including buildings, equipment, machines, and improvements to land that are used for production.
Term
human capital
Definition
the accumulated training and education of workers.
Term
entrepreneurship
Definition
the component of human resources that performs the functions of raising capital, organizing, managing, and assembling other factors of production, making basic business policy decisions, and taking risks.
Term
services
Definition
mental or physical labor or help purchased by consumers. examples are the assistance of physicians, lawyers, dentists, repair personnel, housecleaners, educators, retailers, and wholesalers; items purchased or used by consumers that do not have physical characteristics.
Term
opportunity cost
Definition
the highest-value, next-best alternative that must be sacrificed to obtain something or satisfy a want.
Term
production possibilities curve
Definition
A curve representing all possible combinations of maximum outputs that couls be produced assuming a fixed amount of productive resources of a given quality.
Term
technology
Definition
society's pool of applied knowledge concerning how goods and services can be produced.
Term
efficiency
Definition
the case in which a given level of inputs is used to produce the maximum output possible. Alternatively, the situation in which a given output is produced at minimum cost.
Term
inefficient point
Definition
Any point below the production possibilities cuve, at which the use if resources is not generating the maximum possible output.
Term
law of increasing relative cost
Definition
the fact that the opportunity cost of additional units of a good generally increases as society attempts to produce more of that good. this accounts for the bowed-out shape of the production possibilities curve.
Term
consumption
Definition
the use of goods and services for personal satisfaction.
Term
specializtion
Definition
The organization of economic activity so that what each person (or region) consumes is not identical to what that person (or region) produces. An individual may specialize, for example, in law or medicine. A nation may specialize in the production of coffee, computers, or digital cameras.
Term
comparative advantage
Definition
the ability to produce a good or service at a lower opportunity cost compared to other producers.
Term
absolute advantage
Definition
the ability to produce more units of a good or service using a given quantity of labor or resource inputs. Equivalently, the ability to produce the same quantity of a good or service using fewer units of labor or resource inputs.
Term
division of labor
Definition
the segregation of resources into different specific tasks; for example, one automobile worker puts on bumpers, another doors, and so on.
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