Skip to main content
Back

Perfect Competition and Efficiency definitions

Control buttons has been changed to "navigation" mode.
1/14
  • Perfect Competition
    A market structure where many firms sell identical products, ensuring prices reflect both consumer and producer costs.
  • Productive Efficiency
    Occurs when production happens at the lowest possible cost, specifically at the minimum point of average total cost.
  • Allocative Efficiency
    Achieved when the quantity produced matches consumer preferences, with marginal benefit equaling marginal cost.
  • Average Total Cost
    Represents the per-unit cost of production, minimized when firms operate efficiently in perfect competition.
  • Marginal Benefit
    The value consumers place on the last unit purchased, reflected by the market price at equilibrium.
  • Marginal Cost
    The expense incurred by producers for making one additional unit, matched by price in efficient markets.
  • Equilibrium Price
    The market price where supply meets demand, ensuring both productive and allocative efficiency.
  • Demand Curve
    A graphical representation showing how consumer willingness to pay decreases as quantity increases.
  • Supply Curve
    A graph illustrating how producers offer more goods as price rises, intersecting demand at equilibrium.
  • Marginal Revenue
    The additional income a firm receives from selling one more unit, equal to price in perfect competition.
  • Consumer Preferences
    The desires and priorities of buyers, guiding the allocation of resources in efficient markets.
  • Profit Maximizing Point
    The output level where marginal revenue equals marginal cost, ensuring optimal firm performance.
  • Long Run
    A period in which firms can adjust all inputs, leading to production at minimum average total cost.
  • Monopoly
    A market structure with a single seller, typically failing to achieve both productive and allocative efficiency.