Chapter 4 Elasticity What is elasticity? Elasticity means the ability of an object to resume its normal shape after being stretched, or the ability of something to change and adapt. Some examples of elasticity is a bungie cord and rubber bands. Then there things that can be the opposite of elastic; which is called inelastic. Some examples that are inelastic are keyboards and pens. This concept of things being elastic or inelastic can also be incorporated into macroeconomics. Price elasticity of demand refers to the responsiveness of the consumers to a price change. For example some products that consumers are highly responsive to would be buying coffee at a coffee shop because a small price change can affect a large change in the quantity purchased. Since this product is highly responsive it correlates to this product being elastic. An example of a product that customers being less responsive to would be buying mouthwash because if there was a major price change it would only cause a small change in the amount …show more content…
Elastic demand is when the coefficient of price elasticity will be greater than one. Inelastic demand is when the coefficient of price elasticity is less than one. Unit elasticity is when the percentage of the price dropping equals the same percentage that the quantity of the product is demanded. So that means the price elasticity coefficient would be equal to one. Perfectly inelastic is when a price change does not result in a change in the quantity demanded. So the coefficient of the price elasticity would be equal to zero. Perfectly elastic is when a small price reduction causes the buyers to increase their purchases to as much as possible. In return this would make the price elastic coefficient would be infinite. Perfectly inelastic and perfectly elastic are in extreme cases