Reference no: EM132314394

Economics for Business Assignment -

Resources for this assignment - Chapters 7 - 9 from the the prescribed text book A, Robinson. T, and Tucker I. (2015) Economics for Today.

ASSIGNMENT REQUIREMENTS: Various economic and business scenarios are assumed in some of the questions below. You are to apply your understanding of market structure and economic concepts to respond to the questions.

Question 1 - Compare the market structures of Perfect Competition, Monopoly, Monopolistic Competition and Oligopoly under the following headings (About 150 words).

i. number of firms in the market

ii. similarity of the products sold

iii. barriers to entry

Question 2 - Coles is an Australian company providing supermarket, retail and consumer services through its chain of outlets operating throughout Australia. Its main competitors are Woolworths and Aldi. There also the many small vegetable and grocery stores but Coles, Woolworths and Aldi are believed to dominate the Australian market. Coles has over 100,000 employees across Australia.

Identify the market structure Coles operates in. State your reason why.

Question 3 - Coles and its main competitors sell very similar products through their supermarket outlets. These include milk, ice cream, fruits, vegetables, nuts, eggs, frozen meat and a wide range of other products used and consumed by households. Their profit margin on products is very thin as prices are reduced to a minimum.

Discuss how Coles would consider demand for its eggs in terms of elasticity - perfectly elastic; elastic; inelastic or perfectly inelastic? Draw its demand curve to illustrate this. Explain your choice.

The following extract from the New Daily is about Coles. Read it and answer the questions that follow.

Question 4 - What is the term used to describe the new strategy that Coles is adopting to increase market share? Describe how it works.

Question 5 - From the same reading above, identify any two (2) methods used by Coles to compete without reducing price.

Coles sells a considerable amount of vegetables every month to households. Assume that its source of vegetables is mainly from the local farms and that over the last few months these farms have been experiencing unusually dry weather.

Question 6 - Use the Demand Supply model to illustrate the likely effect on the price of vegetables as a result of the weather, ceteris paribus (a diagram is expected here).

Question 7 - Briefly discuss any two differences in the market structure that Coles belongs to with the market structure Monopolistic Competition.

Question 8 - State which market structure that you think each of the following businesses best belongs to. Explain your choice.

i. the only cobbler in a country town

ii. McDonalds Restaurant in your city

iii. Metro Trains in Melbourne and Sydney Trains

iv. National Australia Bank

v. Academies Australasia Polytechnic

vi. A small stall in one of Melbourne/Sydney's Sunday markets that sells souvenirs such as wallets, caps, tee-shirts, key chains

vii. A car workshop or hair salon in your city

viii. Iphone and Samsung in the mobile phone industry.

Attachment:- Assignment File.rar