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Income Elasticities of Demand

Question:

(a)  Suppose the income elasticity of demand for pre-recorded music compact disks is +4 and the income elasticity of demand for a cabinet maker's work is +0.4.  Compare the impact on pre-recorded music compact disks and the cabinet maker's work of a recession that reduces consumer incomes by 10 per cent.

(b)  How might you determine whether the pre-recorded music compact discs and MP3 music players are in competition with each other?

(c)   Interpret the following Income Elasticities of Demand (YED) values for the following and state if the good is normal or inferior; YED= +0.5 and YED= -2.5

(d)   Interpret the following Cross-Price Elasticities of Demand (XED) and explain the relationship between these goods. XED= + 0.64 and XED= -2.6

Answer:

a) A positive elasticity means that an increase in income will lead to an increase in the consumption and fall in income will lead to a fall in consumption. If the income of the consumer declines by 10%, then there will be a 40% (4 x 10) fall in the consumption of pre-recorded music CDs and 4%(10 x 0.4) decline in the demand of cabinet maker's work.

b) This can be determined by the cross elastic of the two goods. If the cross elasticity of demand is negative then the goods will be complements to each other and hence they will not be in competition. However, if the cross elasticity of demand is positive then the goods are substitutes and they are in competition.

c) For first good the income elasticity of demand is 0.5 which means that if income increases by 1% then the demand will increase by 0.5%. This makes the food a normal good.

For the second good, the income elasticity of demand is -2.5, which means that an increase in income by 1% will lead to a fall in demand by -2.5%. This means that the good is inferior good.

d) A positive elasticity means that increase in price of one good leads to an increase in demand of the other good. This is the case of substitute goods.

A negative cross elasticity of demand, on the other hand, means that an increase in price of one good leads to a decrease in the demand for the other good. This happens in the case of complements.

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