AP Macro Study Guide
AP Macro Study Guide
AP Macro Study Guide
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Examples:
1.2: Opportunity Cost and the Production Possibilities Curve FRQ Example:
1.3: Comparative Advantage and Gains from Trade FRQ Example:
2.3: Unemployment FRQ Example:
2.4, 2.5, 2.6 FRQ Example:
3.2: Multipliers FRQ Example:
4.2: Nominal v. Real Interest Rates FRQ Example:
4.1, 4.3, & 4.4 FRQ Example:
5.3: Money Growth and Inflation FRQ Example:
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1.1: Scarcity
- Economics: the study of scarcity and choice (unlimited wants, limited resources)
- Economic choice: involves the personal choice of choosing one thing over another
- Scarcity: unlimited wants but limited resources
- e.g.: time = limited supply
- Scarce: not enough for everyone
- Causes us to make choice
1.2: Opportunity Cost and the Production Possibilities Curve (PPC / PPF)
- All choices have tradeoffs
- Opportunity Cost: next-best alternative that you lost out on doing something
else
- The PPC (or PPF) curve graphically represents opportunity costs
- Also a representation of an economy’s maximum sustainable capacity
-
- Types of PPCs:
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-
- Factors of Production
- Land (natural resources)
- Raw materials used to produce finished goods
- Labor (workers)
- Human effort/work
- Capital (anything used to make anything else)
- finished goods used to produce other goods (machines, tools, factories,
etc.)
- Entrepreneurship (creating something of value from the prior 3)
- Consumer vs. Capital Goods
- Focusing on consumer goods does not allow for an increase in the factors of
production
- Focusing on capital goods expands future production possibilities for both
consumer and capital goods.
- PPC Determinants
- Shift outward
- Increase in:
- Economic growth
- Technology
- Population
- Capital investment
- Shift inward
- Decrease in above
- Terms of Trade
- Terms of trade are beneficial if they fall inside two entities’ relative opportunity
costs.
1.4: Demand
- Demand - curve/schedule showing various quantities demanded at various prices
- Change in demand - a shift of the whole demand curve
- Quantity demanded - one specific point showing one quantity demanded at one price
- Change in quantity demanded - a movement along the demand curve between
data points
- The Law of Demand
- Inverse relationship between price and quantity
- ↑P → ↓QDemanded; ↓P → ↑QDemanded
- Non-Price Determinants of Demand
- Number of buyers (direct)
- Income (normal = direct, inferior = inverse)
- Price of related goods (substitute = direct, complement = inverse)
- Future expectations of price changes (direct)
1.5: Supply
- Supply - curve/schedule showing various quantities sellers are willing to produce at
various prices
- Change in supply - a shift of the whole supply curve
- Quantity supplied - one specific point showing o
ne quantity produced at one price
- Change in quantity supplied - a movement along the supply curve between data
points
- The Law of Supply
- Direct relationship between price and quantity
- ↑P → ↑QSupplied; ↓P → ↓QSupplied
- Non-Price Determinants of Supply
- Number of sellers (direct)
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2.3: Unemployment
- Employed - Everyone currently working, including part-time workers.
- Unemployed - People looking for work or temporarily laid off work.
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- Civilian Labor Force - # of people older than 16 who are employed or actively seeking
work (excluding members of the military, homeless, and discouraged workers)
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- Unemployment rate - the % of people in the labor force w/o jobs looking for jobs.
-
- The unemployment rate calculation method is often criticized for understating
the level of joblessness, as it excludes discouraged / part-time workers.
- Types of Unemployment:
- Frictional - Caused by the normal search time required by workers with
marketable skills who are changing jobs
- Initially entering the labor force
- Reentering the labor force
- Seasonally unemployed
- Structural - unemployment due to a mismatch of skills of out-of-work workers
and the skills required for existing job offers (ex: manufacturing job losses)
- Cyclical - unemployment due to a recession
- Full employment = Natural Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU)
- Frictional & structural unemployment exist, but no cyclical unemployment
3.2: Multipliers
- Marginal propensity to consume (MPC) = the portion/percentage of a dollar of income
that gets spent.
- Marginal propensity to save (MPS) = the portion/percentage of a dollar of income that
gets saved.
- MPC + MPS = 1 (there are no other uses for income)
- Spending Multiplier
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- The degree to which an initial change in spending multiplies into further rounds
of spending, as spending becomes income, some of which gets spent.
-
- Tax Multiplier
- Since people save a portion of their income and tax changes aren’t a form of
spending, the tax multiplier is always smaller than the spending multiplier.
- Fractional reserve banking - a system in which banks keep only a percentage of their
deposits on reserve as vault cash or on deposit with the Fed.
- Total reserves = (required reserves) + (excess reserves)
- Required reserve ratio (RR) - The % of deposits that the Fed requires to hold in vault
cash or on deposit with the Fed.
-
- Money Multiplier (MM)
- Due to the fractional reserve banking system, a portion of all deposits gets held
in reserve while the rest is loaned out, expanding the money supply.
- Consumer deposits vs Fed bond purchase
- Some of a consumer deposit needs to go to required reserves, so not all of the
consumer deposit is given out.
-
- When the Fed purchases bonds, it’s the banks’ “securities” assets directly going
into excess reserves. Therefore, it “bypasses” the required reserves and can all
be given out.
-
- ΔMS may be less than predicted as it does not take into account a bank’s desire to hold
excess reserves or the public holding more currency.
4.6:
Monetary Policy
- The Fed indirectly affects the nominal interest rate in order to achieve macroeconomic
goals.
- Tools of monetary policy:
- Open market operations: Buying/selling bonds
- Most common form of monetary policy
- Reserve requirement: decrease/increase required reserve ratio
- Discount rate (interest rate from borrowing from Fed): decrease/increase rate
- Banks can also borrow from other banks at the federal funds rate. The
federal funds rate, however, is directly related to the discount rate.
- Expansionary monetary policy:
- Buy bonds → ↑MS → ↓NIR → ↑C & ↑I (interest sensitive) → ↑AD → ↑rGDP
& ↑PL
- Contractionary monetary policy:
- Sell bonds → ↓MS → ↑NIR → ↓C & ↓I (interest sensitive) → ↓AD → ↓rGDP
& ↓PL
- Long run:
- Money neutrality - in the long run, changes in MS can affect PL, but not rGDP.
- In the long run, interest rates don’t change.
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-
- Rule of 70 - approximate time it takes to double a nation’s output/income
-
- Change in LRAS:
- ↑NIR or RIR → ↓I → ↓capital formation → ↓LRAS
- ↓NIR or RIR → ↑I → ↑capital formation → ↑LRAS
- Increase/decrease in LRAS corresponds to outward/inward shift of PPC.
Examples:
1.2: Opportunity Cost and the Production Possibilities Curve FRQ Example:
2013 #2
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Rayland 1200 (AA) 300 300 / 1200 = 1/4 (CA) 1200 / 300 = 4
Opportunity cost Opportunity cost
More output → AA; Lower opportunity cost → CA (foregone bikes) (foregone hats)
(a) 2 (hats)
(b) Rayland will import bikes because it has a comparative disadvantage in bike production.
(Many other explanations were accepted - basically any correct observation about
comparative advantage/disadvantage or opportunity cost will work.)
(c) (i) Artland can either forego ½ of a bike producing 1 hat themselves or forego ⅕ of a
bike by trading for 1 bike. Trading has a lower opportunity cost, so trade is
advantageous for Artland.
(ii) Rayland can either forego 4 hats producing 1 bike themselves or forego 5 hats by
trading for 1 bike. Trading has a higher opportunity cost, so trade isn’t advantageous
for Rayland.
(d) Multiplying productivity in both hats and bikes doesn't change the ratio with respect to
each other (aka their opportunity cost.) So Rayland still would have the CA in hats.
(b)
P op. unemployed 10000+5000+5000
Labor f orce × 100% = 180000+10000+5000+5000 × 100% = 10%
(c)
labor f orce 180000+10000+5000+5000
P op. 16+ years old × 100% = 180000+10000+5000+5000+100000 × 100%
= 66.67%
(a) (i) Use current year price for nominal GDP (2010) → 8 × $2.5 + 10 × $10 + 5 × $5 = $145
(ii) Use base year price for real GDP (2009) → 8 × $2.5 + 10 × $6 + 5 × $4 = $100
CP I(2)−CP I(1) 55−50
(b) Inflation rate = CP I(1) × 100% = 50 × 100% = 10%
(c) By definition, inflation reduces real income. Thus, real wages will be lower.
(d) Sara benefits from the unexpected inflation because her fixed loan payments are worth
less real dollars.
1 1
(d) (i) ΔrGDP = Initial ΔrGDP x 1−M P C → $300 billion = Initial ΔrGDP x 1−0.8
→ Initial ΔrGDP = $60 billion
(ii) Greater, because the tax multiplier (4) is smaller than the spending multiplier (5) due to
part of the initial increase in disposable income caused by the decrease in income tax being
saved rather than spent.