Essentials of Economic Theory: As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public PolicyClark, John Bates
General
Essentials of Economic Theory: As Applied to Modern Problems of Industry and Public Policy
Clark, John Bates
Economics
A man pays seventy-five dollars for an overcoat, but if he could not
get the service that the coat as a whole renders without paying five
hundred dollars for it, he would pay it; for otherwise he could hardly
get through a winter. No man who buys an overcoat worth seventy-five
dollars would refuse to pay more if that were the necessary condition
of having an overcoat at all. The garment as a whole is far from being
a "marginal utility" to any one; and yet there is something in it that
is so. This element is like the article D in the fourth bundle
referred to in our illustration. There is a particular utility in the
composite good for which the man pays all that it is worth to him; and
he would go without that utility if the seller charged more than he
does. The most important service that the coat renders is that of
keeping the man warm; but a very cheap garment would render that
service, and six dollars will buy such a garment. The man does not
need to pay more than six dollars for that one service. The supply of
cheap coats is such that the final one must be offered for six dollars
in order to induce certain poor purchasers to buy it, and that,
moreover, is all that it costs to make it. No one, therefore, is
obliged to pay more than six dollars for something that will keep him
warm, however much such a service may be worth to him. Coats of
another grade have a second utility combined with this one, since they
are made of better cloth and are more comely in appearance. Utilities
of an aesthetic kind are combined with the crude qualities represented
by the cheapest coats. The supply of coats of this grade is such that
they must be offered for twenty dollars in order to induce some one to
take the final or marginal one. What does this mean? It means that
this purchaser will pay fourteen dollars and no more in order to have
the second utility, consisting in comeliness, added to the first
utility, capacity to keep him warm. This man would give more than
twenty dollars rather than go uncloaked; for it is plain that, if he
will pay fourteen dollars for comeliness, he will give more than six
for warmth. Probably he would pay one hundred dollars for the article
if he had to, and in getting it for twenty he gets a large consumers'
surplus. This is because he secures the first utility (1) for less
than it is worth to him, (2) for just what it costs in the making, and
(3) for just what it is worth to the poorer purchasers. He is willing
to pay only fourteen dollars for the comeliness, which is the second
utility that the garment contains, and he is therefore a marginal
purchaser of this second utility. It costs only the sum of fourteen
dollars to add the second utility to the first, and enough coats of
the second grade are made to catch the patronage of the class of
buyers who will give so much and no more for it. They are the persons
whose demand figures in adjusting the market price of this second
utility.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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