Firms, market structures, and pricing power

By the end you’ll be able to

• Explain the economic goal of the firm and distinguish accounting profit from economic profit, including the role of explicit and implicit costs.
• Describe and interpret total, average, and marginal product; total, fixed, variable, average, and marginal cost; and the relationships among short-run cost measures.
• Explain the firm’s short-run and long-run profit-maximizing decisions using marginal revenue and marginal cost and identify shutdown and breakeven conditions.