Price Theory and Applications

Extensive sections are devoted to topics excluded from many standard intermediate textbooks, such as alternative normative criteria, efficient asset markets, contestable markets, antitrust law, mechanisms for eliciting private information regarding demand for public goods, human capital, increasing returns in economic growth, the Capital Asset Pricing Model, and the pricing of stock options.

This text contains an extended analysis of market failures, property rights, and rules of law (Chapter 13), including a detailed development of market failure using a series of extended examples as well as actual court cases. It also covers various legal theories from the point of view of economic efficiency.

Price Theory includes an excellent assortment of both fictional and real-world examples. Many examples and exercises are based on fictional organizations. This encourages students to focus on the economic principle, application, and problem involved rather than the mechanics of a particular company. For instructors who prefer real-life situations, the seventh edition also includes 20 new real-world business examples, giving students an up-close view of microeconomics in the context of actual organizations.

The cutting-edge ninth edition thoroughly develops the standard topics of intermediate price theory as well as such innovative topics as the economics of information, alternative normative criteria, efficient asset markets, contestable markets, antitrust law, human capital, and the demand for public goods. It also uses the timely topic of social welfare as a unifying concept throughout.