Question

A movie theater company obtains the following estimated elasticity of demand.

Answer 1

Answer:

Explanation:

Given:

Short-run price elasticity = - 0.85

Long-run price elasticity = - 3.2

Cross-price elasticity = - 0.26

Income elasticity = 0.75

a. If the theater raises movie ticket prices by 10 percent it means that percentage of price change is 10%.

$Elasticity = \frac{Percentage change in Quantity demanded}{Percentage change in price} \\\\-0.85 = \frac{Percent change in Quantity demanded\\}{10} \\\\Percent change in Quantity demanded = -0.85*10\\ \\ = -8.5$

Thus, quantity demanded falls by 8.5 percent.

b. Short-run price elasticity is different from long-run elasticity due to the time horizon. When individuals have more time they can switch to cheaper alternatives. While, it takes time to adjust in the short-run as the time horizon is not much. So short-run elasticity is less elastic than in the long-run.

c.

In the long-run demand for movie tickets is very elastic. So as price rises in the long-run, quantity demanded falls by a greater proportion. This will cause total revenue to fall in the long-run.

d. Normal goods are goods which have a positive income elasticity. This means for normal goods demand increases as income increases. But in case of inferior goods, demand is inversely related to income. As income rises demand for inferior goods decreases.

Since in this case, income elasticity is 0.75 (positive) it can be concluded that movie tickets are normal goods.

e. Good X is the related good to movie tickets. As cross price elasticity is -0.26 it means that as price of movie tickets rises by 1 percent demand for good X will fall by 0.26 percent.

Thus, as demand for good X and price of movie tickets are inversely related to each other it can be said that they are complementary goods.