Daniel Marburger – författare

When major league baseball cancelled its 1994 season following a player strike, fans were shocked that the national pastime could be brought to a standstill by a collective bargaining dispute. The strike was largely responsible for bringing the economics of the game into sports discussions and raising questions about the business of baseball. Will players' rising salaries destroy baseball? How will revenue-sharing and luxury taxes affect competitive balance? Should taxpayers subsidize their local team? This volume answers the basic questions about the economics of the sport, from salary arbitration to baseball's antitrust exemption, in a clear style geared for readers with no formal background in economics.

Perhaps the most confounding characteristic of the competitive marketplace is that everyone wants a piece of the action. If a firm successfully enters a new market, creates a new product, or designs new innovations for an existing product, its just a matter of time before competitors follow suit. And the influx of competition inevitably places downward pressure on both price and profitability. But the speed at which competitors invade ones market is not the same in all industries; some are more resistant to the forces of competition than others.

In 1979, Harvard economist Michael Porter theorized his Five Forces Model (updated in 2008). The Five Forces Model identifies the characteristics that can help insulate a firm from competitive forces. For the firm that seeks to put together a business plan, or for the firm that is considering opportunities for diversification, an understanding of the Five Forces Model is essential.

According to the economic theory of the firm, businesses strive to determine the single price that maximizes profits. In fact, many firms can extract more revenue and increase profits with pricing strategies that are far more innovative than the single-price strategy. However, in the world of pricing, there is no “one size fits all” strategy. Some pricing strategies are better suited to some situations than others. Sam’s Clubs, owned by Walmart Stores, Inc., for example, charge a membership fee for the right to purchase the store’s inventory whereas Walmart Supercenters do not. If Suddenlink Communications bundles Internet, cable, and phone service to increase profits, why does it also sell the same items separately? Is it true that passengers seated next to each other on the same flight might pay dramatically different fares? Inside you’ll learn how various pricing strategies, including price discrimination, two-part tariffs, bundling, peak-load pricing, and dynamic pricing need specific and necessary ingredients in order to succeed. The authors show you how to use microeconomic theory to determine which pricing strategies will succeed, and under what conditions.

According to economic theory, production and costs follow patterns that are common to many firms. In a world of perfect information, managers could utilize this cost data to make production decisions and set prices. In the real world, however, much of this information remains unknown.

Common accounting practices are designed with record-keeping as the end goal rather than to present an accurate assessment of opportunity cost. Many times, managers do not recognize the difference between opportunity costs and accounting costs and, instead, rely upon the readily available accounting costs to make their decisions. This often leads to suboptimal decisions. The purpose of this book is to present production/cost theory, review various cost accounting methods and demonstrate how they may distort production and pricing decisions in light of the differences between accounting costs and economic theory.

Perhaps the most confounding characteristic of the competitive marketplace is that everyone wants a piece of the action. If a firm successfully enters a new market, creates a new product, or designs new innovations for an existing product, it’s just a matter of time before competitors follow suit. And the influx of competition inevitably places downward pressure on both price and profitability.Whether you’re an economics student or a manager with absolutely no background in economics, this book will help you make better decisions and learn more about the Five Forces Model, (first published in 1979 by Harvard economist Michael Porter) which identifies the characteristics that can help insulate a firm from competitive forces.This book brings microeconomic theory into the world of the business manager rather than the other way around. The author expounds on microeconomic theory, enabling economists to take the knowledge back to the office and apply it.