Because restaurants engaging in monopolistic competition need to differentiate themselves, they use their menu language to show their high or low price qualities.
Where Have All the Milkmen Gone?
Structural change in the economy involves new technology replacing old and eliminating jobs like milkmen, icemen, gas lamplighters and typists.
Will Conspicuous Consumption Add to iPhone 6 Sales?
As an oligopoly, through pricing power and product differentiation, Apple takes advantage of the conspicuous consumption customers could experience.
The Nudge Toward a Goldilocks Savings Rate
We need to raise the low U.S. savings rate with new incentives like a lottery on savings deposits because households and business investment need savings.
Weekly Roundup: From Vodka to Tax Dodgers
Our weekly roundup includes stories from everyday economics that relate to creative destruction, taxation, price floors, labor markets and entitlements.
Why Would a Firm Not Want 50 Employees?
Economist Casey Mulligan says that the Affordable Care Act will impact labor markets by diminishing productively through perverse incentives.
How Much Do You Care About Your Independent Book Store?
The price floor in France’s Anti-Amazon Law protects independent booksellers and their cultural contribution but diminishes efficiency and raises prices.
How To Catch Tax Dodgers With a Lottery
The lottery that Slovakia uses to catch VAT tax dodgers reflects fiscal challenges that eurozone countries like Germany and the Netherlands do not face.
Why the Russian Government Loves Vodka
For 350 years, the Russian government has optimized the money it gets from vodka sales by creating a monopoly that takes advantage of inelastic demand.
The Long Life of the 3 to 4 Minute Song
Moving from records to digital, the music industry has undergone creative destruction but the length of a song between 3 and 4 minutes has been the same.
