Concept of comparative advantage, International Economics

Assignment Help:

The Concept of Comparative Advantage is explained below:

To illustrate the concept of the comparative advantage, we take the instance of two equi-sized equi-endowment countries, which are US and UK. US produces 40 and 60 units of cotton and food p.a. respectively (using all available resources), while the UK produces 30 and 20 units of cotton and food p.a. respectively (using all the available resources). Clearly, the US has complete advantage in the production of both cotton and food. By absolute advantage it is meant that the US is more efficient at producing food and cotton both than the UK. But, upon computing the opportunity costs of producing cotton and food in the either country, is revealed that the opportunity cost of producing one unit of the cotton in the US is 1.5 units of food, while the opportunity cost of producing one unit of food in the US is 0.67 units of cotton. Similarly the opportunity cost of producing one unit of the cotton in the UK is 0.67 units of food, whereas the opportunity cost of producing one unit of food in the UK is 1.5 units of cotton. Hence, the US has a lower opportunity cost (comparative advantage) in production of food while the UK has a lower opportunity cost (comparative advantage) in production of cotton. By specializing in the goods/commodities they have comparative advantage in and then trading between them, both the countries can improve their consumption possibilities beyond those implied by autarky (that is a situation of no trade where the PPF and CPF are the same).

 




 


Related Discussions:- Concept of comparative advantage

Comparatitve advantage, what are the limitation of comparative advantage?

what are the limitation of comparative advantage?

Explain the global firms and the borderless global economy, Explain the Glo...

Explain the Global Firms and the Borderless Global Economy

Protectionism and free trade, why is international trade important for sout...

why is international trade important for south africa

Effects of government deficits on the current account, Q. Discuss the effec...

Q. Discuss the effects of government deficits on the current account. Answer: A difficult and hard issue that during the Reagan administration the creation of twin deficits whe

Effects of a rise in the interest rate, Q. Discusses the effects of a rise ...

Q. Discusses the effects of a rise in the interest rate paid by euro deposits on the exchanger rate.   Answer: For a known U.S. interest rate and a given expectation wi

Discuss the costs and benefits of fdi to host country, Q. Discuss the costs...

Q. Discuss the costs and benefits of FDI to host country? Benefits to host country Availability of scarce factors of production Improvement in the balance of payment Strengthen

Krone free to float against the non-euro currencies, Q. Illustrate why when...

Q. Illustrate why when Norway unilaterally fixes its exchange rate against the euro but leaves the krone free to float against the non-euro currencies, it is unable to keep at leas

Explain the phenomenon of capital flight, Q. Explain the phenomenon of capi...

Q. Explain the phenomenon of capital flight. Answer: The reserve defeat accompanying a devaluation scare is habitually labeled capital flight for the reason that the assoc

Assignment, Road,railway,air and shlping transportation

Road,railway,air and shlping transportation

International trade, the difference between offer curve analysis ,absolute ...

the difference between offer curve analysis ,absolute and comparative advantage model

Write Your Message!

Captcha
Free Assignment Quote

Assured A++ Grade

Get guaranteed satisfaction & time on delivery in every assignment order you paid with us! We ensure premium quality solution document along with free turntin report!

All rights reserved! Copyrights ©2019-2020 ExpertsMind IT Educational Pvt Ltd