Material needs and economic benefits. Economic needs and economic benefits

2 Quot. by: McConnell K.R., Brew S.L. Economics / Per. from English. In 2 vol. M., 1992. T. 1. S. 18.

It is impossible to reduce modern economic theory to this alone. However, the contradiction between the limitlessness of needs and the limited resources forms the axis around which economic life revolves, and the core of economics as a science. Households, firms, the entire national economy have to constantly make a choice on the purchase or production of what goods to spend their resources, which are almost always limited.

Interweaving, mobility and fungibility of economic resources

Resources are intertwined. For example, such an economic resource as knowledge is used when natural resources tend to be consumed more rationally based on new knowledge (scientific achievements). Knowledge is an important element of such a resource as labor, when it is evaluated from a qualitative point of view and attention is paid to the qualifications of workers, which depends primarily on the education (knowledge) they have received. Knowledge (primarily technological) provides an increase in the level of equipment use, i.e. real capital. Finally, they (especially managerial knowledge) allow entrepreneurs to organize the production of goods and services in the most rational way.

Economic resources are mobile (mobile), as they can move in space (within the country, between countries), although the degree of their mobility is different. The least mobile natural resources, the mobility of many of which is close to zero (land is difficult to move from one place to another, although it is possible). More mobile labor resources, which can be seen from the internal and external migration of the labor force in the world on a noticeable scale (see Ch. 36). Entrepreneurial abilities are even more mobile, although often they do not move on their own, but along with labor resources and / or capital (this is due to the fact that the carriers of entrepreneurial abilities are either hired managers or owners of capital). The last two resources are the most mobile - capital (especially monetary) and knowledge.

The interweaving of resources and their mobility partly reflect their other property - interchangeability (alternativeness). If a farmer needs to increase grain production, then he can do it this way: expand the sown area (use additional natural resources), or hire additional workers (increase the use of labor), or expand his fleet of machinery and equipment (increase his capital), or improve the organization work on the farm (expand your entrepreneurial skills), or, finally, use new types of seeds (apply new knowledge). The farmer has this choice because economic resources are fungible (alternative).

Usually this interchangeability is not complete. For example, human resources cannot completely replace capital, otherwise workers will be left without equipment and inventory. Economic resources replace each other easily at first, and then more and more difficult. Thus, with the same number of tractors, it is possible to increase the number of workers on the farm by requiring them to work in two shifts. However, it will be very difficult to hire more workers and organize systematic work in three shifts, except by sharply increasing their wages.

The entrepreneur (the organizer of production) constantly encounters and uses the indicated properties of economic resources. Indeed, in the conditions of limited resources, he is forced to find the most rational combination of them, using interchangeability.

Cobb-Douglas model

An illustration of the interweaving and alternativeness of economic resources can be a simple Cobb-Douglas model based on only two factors of production (named after two American economists).

The concept of resource markets

5. On the basis of economic resources, the production of economic goods is carried out. With limited (rare) resources, one has to choose what goods to produce and what production possibilities are for this. In this case, the concept of alternative (imputed) cost (costs) is used, which means what has to be abandoned in order to produce the desired good.

6. The increase in opportunity cost as each additional unit of output is produced is the essence of the law of increasing opportunity cost. Closely related to it is the law of diminishing returns, which means that the increase in output becomes smaller as new units of an economic resource are added, combined with an unchanged number of others. economic resources.

7. Economic theory and practice widely use the concept of marginal (marginal) values, which is understood as an increase in one value caused by an increase in another value per unit (provided that all other values ​​remain unchanged). They talk about marginal cost, marginal revenue, marginal utility. The concept of limit values ​​is based primarily on two ideas. First, at a certain stage, the costs of producing a good (production costs) begin to grow faster than the production of this good itself. Secondly, the more abundant the good, the less it is valued.

8. Economic efficiency is obtaining the maximum possible benefits from available resources. To do this, you need to constantly correlate benefits (benefits) and costs (costs), or, in other words, behave rationally. Rational behavior consists in the fact that the producer and consumer of goods strive for the highest efficiency and for this they maximize benefits and minimize costs. Efficiency is calculated in various ways.

9. The division of production between various workers, enterprises and their divisions, industries, regions of the country, as well as between countries is called the division of labor. Accordingly, there are professional, inter-firm and intra-factory, inter-industry, inter-regional and international division labor. Based on the division of labor, the orientation of producers to the manufacture of individual products and their elements is called specialization.

Terms and concepts
economic benefits
Economic Needs
Goods and services (goods)
Essential Products
Engel's law
Economic resources
Interchangeability (alternativeness) of economic resources
Production Capabilities
Alternative (imputed) cost (costs)
Law of Increasing Opportunity Cost
Law of diminishing returns
Economic efficiency
Pareto efficiency (Pareto optimum)
Division of labor
Specialization

Questions for self-examination

1. How is the law (principle) of the rise of needs formulated?

2. List the economic resources known to you.

3. What are the consequences of the combination of limitless needs and limited resources?

4. What gives an entrepreneur such a property of economic resources as their interchangeability (alternativeness)?

5. Explain what the production possibilities curve shows?

6. What are the similarities and differences between the law of increasing opportunity costs and the law of diminishing returns?

7. Where in the economic life, in your opinion, can the ideas of marginalism be used?

8. What economic efficiency indicators do you know and how are they calculated?

9. What is the difference between corporate and national economic efficiency?

10. Prove that specialization is related to the division of labor.

Introduction

The economic life of society is based on the need to satisfy people's needs for various economic benefits. In turn, these benefits are produced on the basis of economic resources that are at the disposal of society and its members.

The current stage of development of the world economy is characterized by an ever-increasing scale of consumption natural resources, a sharp complication of the process of interaction between nature and society, the intensification and expansion of the sphere of manifestation of specific natural and anthropogenic processes arising from the technogenic impact on nature. Aggravation of raw materials, fuel, energy, water and in general environmental issues crossed the borders of individual regions and acquired a global scale. In this regard, the study of natural resource potential of the world as a whole, individual continents and countries, analysis of the systems of their economic use that have developed in various socio-economic structures of the modern world community, development of ideas about the regional and optimal development of natural resources.

The issue of limited resources and benefits in modern world is one of the most relevant. It is known that the stocks of many natural resources are already in short supply, and the fact that some have been preserved in sufficiently large quantities does not mean their infinity. Satisfying the needs of society directly depends on the creation of goods, and goods, in turn, require an increasing amount of resources for their production. It is clear that with a constant increase in the population of the earth, the benefits and resources will be limited, they will not be enough to meet all needs. At present, it can already be seen that a huge amount of resources is spent on the production of goods. It is necessary to limit the use of resources, because in the future the problem of their scarcity may turn out to be insoluble and lead to fatal consequences.

The scientific literature touches on this topic, because it directly affects the further development of society. Some authors emphasize that the scarcity of resources and goods is relative, not absolute, that is, how long this or that resource is not exhausted is determined by how effectively it will be used by society. Others believe that resources are both absolutely limited and relatively limited. Regarding the relatively limited, they agree with the opinion of the former, and about the absolutely limited, they say that there are such resources that cannot be replaced by others and they will be exhausted sooner or later. The opinion of the first authors seems to be more convincing, because modern technologies are improving at a tremendous speed and already now allow using, for example, waste-free production, that is, they help to save resources.

The subject of the work is the limited resources and benefits, and the object is the resources and benefits.

Thus, the purpose of this term paper is the study of the problem of absolute and relative scarcity of resources and goods.

The objectives of the work are to consider and reveal the concepts of economic benefits, needs and resources, determine their role in the reproduction process, consider the causes of the theory of limited resources and unlimited needs, determine the main directions of the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan in relation to solving the problem of limited economic resources in the country.

Chapter 1. Economic needs, benefits and resources: essence and classification.

1.1. Economic needs and their classification.

The driving force of human society is needs - objectively existing needs (desires) of people related to ensuring their life and development.

A need is a special psychological state of a person, felt or realized by him as "dissatisfaction", a discrepancy between the internal and external conditions of life. Therefore, the need induces activity aimed at eliminating the discrepancy that has arisen.

Needs are so diverse that there are many options for classifying them. Classical economic science usually distinguishes three groups of needs: material, spiritual, social. In the first place, she puts the satisfaction of people's material needs: food, water, housing, clothing. These needs are met both by material goods (essentials, luxury items) and services (car repair, doctor's, lawyer's, etc.). Spiritual needs are associated with the development of a person as a person and are satisfied by getting an education, getting involved in art, reading books, and possessing information. Social needs are realized through the participation of people in collective and public activities - in parties, trade unions, "quality circles", in public funds, charitable organizations.

According to the types of subjects that have needs, the latter are divided into individual, family, collective, public.

Representatives of neoclassical economics (for example, the English economist A. Marshall) divided needs into absolute and relative, higher and lower, urgent and those that can be postponed, direct and indirect.

According to the areas of activity, the needs of labor, communication, recreation (rest, restoration of working capacity) and economic ones are distinguished. Let's take a closer look at the last type of needs. Economic Needs – it is part of human needs, the satisfaction of which requires the production, distribution, exchange and consumption of goods and services. It is these needs that are involved in the active interaction between production and the unsatisfied needs of people.

In modern Western literature, the theory of the American sociologist A. Maslow has become very popular, according to which all needs are arranged in ascending order from “lower” material to “higher” spiritual;

Physiological (in food, drink, etc.);

• safe (protection from pain, anger, fear, etc.);

· in social relations (family, friendship, religious, etc.);

in the acquisition of a certain social status (in recognition, approval);

in the self-expression of the individual (in the realization of abilities).

The listed forms of human needs can be depicted in the form of a pyramid (see Fig. Rice. one ).

The first two groups of needs, according to A. Maslow, are of the lowest order, the last two are of the highest order. As long as lower-order needs are not satisfied, higher-order needs do not arise.

Need

in self-development

The need for respect

Need in

social contacts

The Need for Security

Physiological Needs

Ri c .1 Pyramid of needs of modern man

The classification of needs can be supplemented by highlighting the needs of rational and irrational, abstract and concrete, conscious and unconscious, misunderstood, etc. However, it should be remembered that any classification of needs is rather conditional, since all needs are interconnected and interdependent. Material demands are formed not only under the influence of the functions of human life, but also to a large extent under the influence of the level of economic and scientific and technological development of society, spiritual and social guidelines. In turn, special, specific for each person and social stratum, spiritual, intellectual and social needs are formed under the influence of material needs and especially the degree of their satisfaction.

The needs of people are historical in nature. Their size and methods of satisfaction depend on the socio-historical conditions, with what habits and life demands, individuals, social strata and society as a whole were formed. The needs of people are dynamic. They change under the influence of social progress, the intensity of information exchange, the improvement of the person himself. The continuous change in needs in quantitative and qualitative terms, their increase in the process of evolution of human society is characterized as the law of the rise of needs. For many hundreds and thousands of years, the growth and change in needs occurred smoothly, relatively rapidly. IN modern conditions demand has accelerated significantly. At the same time, there is a social uniformity in the rise of needs, the emergence of needs of a higher order among ever wider sections of the population.

1.2. Economic benefits and their classification

The satisfaction of the numerous, constantly growing needs of people occurs through the consumption of a variety of goods, which can be divided into two large groups: natural and economic. The first are in the human habitat (air, sunlight) and do not require the efforts and costs of people for production and consumption. The second - economic - are the result economic activity person. Before they can be consumed, they must be produced. Therefore, the basis of the life of human society and the ultimate goal of all economic activity of people is the production of economic goods.

Economic goods, like economic resources, have a complex classification. Depending on the criterion underlying them, they are divided into:

long-term, involving reusable use (car, book, electrical appliances, videos, etc.), and short-term, disappearing in the process of one-time consumption (bread, meat, drinks, matches, etc.).

Interchangeable (substitutes) and complementary (complementary). Substitutes include not only many consumer goods and production resources, but also transport services (train - plane - car), leisure activities (cinema - theater - circus), etc. Examples of complementary goods are a table and a chair, a car and gasoline, pen and paper.

· the present, which are at the direct disposal of the economic entity, and the future - the creation of which is expected.

tangible and intangible;

public and private;

direct and indirect;

commodities and means of production.

Wealth - the result of the functioning of material production (industry, Agriculture, construction, etc.): these are buildings, machinery, food, clothing, sporting goods, household appliances, etc.

Intangible goods (services) - benefits that exist in the form of activity; education, treatment, transport, household, public services for the population, etc. The fundamental difference between intangible goods and material goods is that the consumption of material goods is preceded by the process of their creation; these two processes are separated both in time and space. The production of services is at the same time their consumption, i.e. there is usually no time gap here.

public goods - goods that are in general, collective consumption: national defense, public order, sanitary and epidemiological control services, street lighting, etc. Distinctive features of public goods are their non-selectivity and non-exclusion from consumption.

Non-selectivity means that a public good cannot be provided to one person in such a way that it does not simultaneously satisfy the needs of other people for this good. Non-excludability in consumption means that public goods are indivisible and consumers who have not paid for their production cannot be excluded from using them. Giving non-payers the right to use public goods, the state - the producer of these goods - uses in relation to them special methods impact. Producers of private goods behave differently.

Private goods are goods that come into private consumption of an individual person (clothes, shoes) or a group of people (equipment, electricity, fuel). The consumption of private goods is preceded by their purchase on the market, as a result of which the buyer reimburses the producer for the costs of their creation. Only when this condition is met, the private good becomes the property of the consumer, and the further fate of the good, as a rule, ceases to interest the producer.

Sometimes, when characterizing goods, they are distinguished as direct and indirect. Direct - these are benefits that come into human consumption directly, indirect - indirectly, through participation in the production of direct benefits. Therefore, economic goods are classified as commodities and means of production. Consumables - these are goods used for personal, family, household and other types of social consumption. Means of production - these are the means of labor created by people and used in labor activity (machines, equipment, buildings, structures, tools, devices) and objects of labor (materials, energy).

According to Marx's theory, the cost (value) of an economic good is determined by the costs of socially necessary labor, i.e. labor performed under average socially normal conditions of production and average labor intensity. According to neoclassical views, the value of goods depends on their rarity, primarily on the intensity of the need and the number of goods that can satisfy this need. It is assumed that any need can be satisfied by several benefits, and any economic good can be used to satisfy different needs. If q 1 ,q2...,q n- a set of certain quantities of each of the n goods, and p 1 ,p 2 ...,p n- their prices, then the cost of the total set of goods can be written as S=p i q i, where i = 1,2, ..., n.

To obtain the missing consumer goods, as a rule, indirect economic benefits - resources - are needed.

1.3. Economic resources

To meet the needs in the process of economic activity, people use a variety of economic resources. Modern economic science identifies five main types among them; land, labor, capital, entrepreneurship and information.

Earth - the most important economic resource - includes everything useful that is given by nature: mineral deposits, forests, fields, arable lands, water resources etc. Man uses them in different ways: arable land - for the production of crops; pastures - for breeding animals; areas rich in minerals - for the mining industry; seas and rivers - for fishing, etc. A feature of land as a type of economic resource is its limited and irreproducible nature. Land properties can be divided into natural (location, climatic conditions, fertility) and artificial, obtained as a result of human activity (for example, in the course of land reclamation, drainage, etc.). However, human impact on natural resources and their transformation is not unlimited. Sooner or later, the law of diminishing returns comes into force, which states that if capital and labor are invested in a certain piece of land, then, in the end, a moment will come when additional investments of funds will not give an increase in the resulting product (harvested, mining, etc.). etc.).

Labor, the second most important economic resource of human economic activity, is an intellectual or physical activity aimed at producing goods and providing services. The time during which a person works is called a working day, or working time. Its duration is determined by the physiological capabilities of a person, as well as the requirements of a moral and social nature, i.e. the need to satisfy the spiritual needs of people. The actual duration of working time is influenced by the intensity of work, the unemployment rate, the agreement between employees and employers on working conditions. The characteristics of labor are its intensity and productivity.

The intensity of labor is the intensity of labor, the degree of expenditure of physical and mental energy per unit of time. It increases with the acceleration of the conveyor, an increase in the number of simultaneously serviced equipment. A high level of labor intensity is equivalent to an increase in the length of the working day.

Labor productivity - output per unit of time. The unit of time, as a rule, is considered to be an hour, although daily or weekly productivity, etc., can also be considered. Labor productivity comes first natural indicator(meters per hour, kilograms per hour), but sometimes a cost indicator is also calculated: goods and services measured in monetary terms are divided by time costs. Such a calculation is carried out for cross-country comparisons. To measure the cost per unit of production, the indicator of labor intensity is used. Labor intensity shows how long it takes to produce one product (in physical terms) or to produce products in value terms.

Capital - an economic resource created by man for the production of goods and services. Capital comes in various forms. It is called the main one if it is materialized in buildings, structures, equipment and functions for a long time and in parts transfers its value to the cost of the product created with its help. Capital materialized in raw materials, materials, energy resources, which is completely spent in one production cycle and wholly transfers its value into the cost of the finished product, is called working capital.

When characterizing capital as an economic resource, it should be taken into account that there are several interpretations of capital in economic theory:

Physical capital (this is an economic resource) is a stock of production goods created by the economy for the production of other goods.

Money capital (not an economical resource) - put into circulation cash, securities(shares, bonds...), any financial assets.

Human capital is the accumulated knowledge and experience of a person, allowing him to receive a higher income (a special form of the labor factor).

Common in all interpretations: capital is something that is put into circulation, returned to the owner on an increased scale (with profit, with wage increases, with a dividend).

An increase in the amount of capital, i.e. increasing the supply of material resources is called investment. Investment means giving up current consumption in favor of the future. Distinguish the following types investments: public (formed from funds state budget), private (formed from the funds of private, corporate enterprises, as well as from the funds of citizens), foreign (invested foreign investors, other states, foreign banks companies, entrepreneurs).

Entrepreneurship is a specific economic resource. This special kind human activity, which consists in the ability to use all other economic resources in order to achieve commercial success. Entrepreneurship covers production, intermediary, trade, innovation, advisory and other types of initiative activities. It is based on following principles:

Economic autonomy in making economic decisions;

property liability for the results of economic activity;

competition as a factor in stimulating production;

free pricing in the market;

the right to carry out foreign economic operations.

Persons leading entrepreneurial activity, has a special type economic thinking ability to take risks, make innovative decisions, overcome resistance environment have the gift of foresight. In the civilized world, success in business is ensured by high work and professional ethics, business integrity, and respect for the laws of economic behavior. With a low culture and degradation of moral values, entrepreneurship takes on wild, uncivilized forms. A feature of this type of resource is that, unlike labor, land, capital, entrepreneurial abilities are never sold. An entrepreneur - the owner of entrepreneurial abilities - uses them to organize his own business and receive economic benefit. If he offers his entrepreneurial abilities to another person, he will turn into a hired (albeit highly paid) manager, and his abilities will be transformed into a workforce.

Chapter 2. Economic needs and benefits in the process of reproduction.

2.1. The relationship of needs with production.

There is a certain relationship between production and needs. First, the needs and demands of the consumer stimulate production, and it, in turn, by creating new values ​​and benefits, affects the volume and structure of consumption. Thus, in order to consume more, it is necessary to produce more. If production falls, then consumption also inexorably decreases.

Secondly, production, creating specific types of material goods and services, generates a specific need for them. For example, the public need for televisions and tape recorders arose only after the creation and organization of their sufficient production.

Thirdly, the interaction of production and needs is specific in different economic systems.

Thus, production forms the general objective conditions in which needs arise and develop, which guide the reproductive activity of society, individuals and social groups.

In economic life different countries there are three main variants of quantitative proportions (ratio) between production - on the one hand, and the needs and consumption of the population - on the other. The first option is regressive (from Latin regressus - backward movement). It arises in those countries and regions where a prolonged decline in the economy leads to a curtailment of consumption, and thereby to a quantitative and qualitative decrease in needs. There is a backward movement to the lowest level of human needs. Such negative changes in the economy can be likened to a spiraling movement with decreasing circles, such as we see in, say, a whirlpool. This leads to an exceptionally sharp manifestation of the contradiction between the elementary needs of people and the impossibility of satisfying them at the expense of the domestic production of a country that has found itself in a distressed situation. Such a situation can now be seen, in particular, in a number of countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Thus, in about 2/3 of the developing countries during the 1980s and the first half of the 1990s there was a reduction in the per capita income of society.

The second option is stagnant. Under him, the output of a relatively limited set of products grows extremely slowly, the needs are stably traditional and only gradually expand.

Movement along the track "production - distribution - exchange - consumption - needs" resembles a vicious circle. Creative activity and the needs of people are in a highly inhibited and essentially consistent state. This implies the duration of the general stagnation in the economy, which, moreover, is often reinforced by the primitive customs and traditions that have developed among the people. Today, a similar situation can be observed in certain countries and regions of Asia and Africa.

The third option is progressive. In this case, production grows quantitatively and improves qualitatively, the level of consumption and needs rises. All this can be likened to moving upwards in a spiral with expanding turns.

Despite some unevenness of such a movement in recent decades, it has been taking place in the leading industrial developed countries Oh. It is noteworthy that in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which includes 24 countries - the USA, Japan, Great Britain, Germany, France and other Western countries, the average annual growth rate of the gross national product (the value of the final results of material and non-material material production) amounted to in 1971 - 1980. 3.3%, in 1981 - 1990 - 2.9%. Personal consumption of the population increased on average per year in 1971-1975. by 3.6%, in 1976 - 1980. - 3.1. in 1981 - 1985 - 2.6 and in 1986 -1990. by 3.4%.

What do all of these options indicate?

The first and second options show that in many countries the rise in needs is strongly opposed by a number of factors that paralyze social and economic progress. These include, in particular, the following circumstances:

The low level of the material and spiritual culture of society limits the range of human needs to their lower order types, which change the slowest;

The very weak development of the division of labor does not allow increasing the variety of material goods and raising the level of consumption and needs;

The meager cash incomes of the masses of people with high level prices hinder the satisfaction of even the most elementary requests;

In many cases, the population of countries increases at a faster rate than the material conditions of its existence expand.

Of all the varieties of correlations between needs and production considered, probably only the third variant can be recognized as normal. In it, the rise of needs naturally relies on the progressive development of material and spiritual culture, on the growing division of labor, the increase cash income and real wealth per inhabitant.

However, the third option is also characterized by a contradiction between needs and production: a discrepancy between what people would like to have and what economic activity can actually give them.

2.2. Circulation of economic goods

Functioning of any economic system associated with the movement of economic goods. The economic cycle in market economy represents Roundabout Circulation real economic benefits, accompanied by a counter flow of cash income and expenses. Economic goods do not move by themselves, but act as a means of communication between economic agents.

Economic agents - subjects economic relations involved in the production, distribution, exchange and consumption of economic goods. The main economic agents in a market economy are households (consumers) and firms (producers). Since we are considering a market mechanism, we do not include in the analysis the activities of such an economic agent as the state.

The model consists of the following elements:

1. Households - directly or indirectly own all economic resources, but need commodities (consumers, not producers.)

2. Firms - produce commodities, but for this they need economic resources.

3. The resource market - this is where households offer their resources to firms that demand these resources. As a result of the interaction of supply and demand in the market, resource prices are formed, resources are transferred from households to firms (counterclockwise lines at the top of the figure show this movement). In turn, a cash flow moves from firms to households - firms pay the prices of resources in the form of expenditures on production costs that households receive as factor income(lines clockwise)

4. Product market - this is where firms offer manufactured products (consumables) to households that demand them. As a result of the interaction of supply and demand in the market, the prices of products are formed, which are transferred from firms to households (counterclockwise lines at the bottom of the figure). Households pay the prices of products in the form of consumer spending, which firms receive in the form of income from the sale of their products (clockwise lines).

The model, firstly, represents the economic circulation, since there is a circular movement of real economic goods - resources and products (counterclockwise lines), accompanied by an oncoming movement cash flows- expenses and incomes of firms and households (lines clockwise). Secondly, the model shows that it is the functioning of markets that gives impetus to this movement, since it is there that the price of products and resources is formed, which, by virtue of this, become commodities.

Chapter 3 market system RK: problems and possible solutions.

3.1. The problem of unlimited needs and limited economic benefits in the Republic of Kazakhstan

In life, we often face the fact that economic resources are limited. It should also be emphasized that economic needs are limitless.

This combination of two situations typical of economic life - limitless needs and limited resources - forms the basis of the entire economy, economic theory. In essence, it is a science that “studies how a society with limited, scarce resources decides what, how and for whom to produce”, or, in other words, it “explores the problems of efficient use or management of limited production resources in order to achieve maximum satisfaction of the material needs of man.

Modern economic theory cannot be reduced to this alone. However, the contradiction between the limitlessness of needs and the limited resources forms the axis around which economic life revolves, and the core of economics as a science. A household, a firm, the entire national economy has to constantly make a choice on the purchase or production of which goods to spend their resources, which are almost always limited.

Thus, the problem of resource provision with such economic resources as land and labor is brewing in Kazakhstan. We will take natural resources as the basis of "land", and "labor" - the employment of jobs in the country able-bodied population. Thus, limited natural resources and unemployment become problems. Let's consider these problems using the Message to the people of the President of Kazakhstan dated January 29, 2010.

In his Message, Nursultan Nazarbayev noted that the sustainable and balanced development of the country in the next decade should be ensured through accelerated diversification and increasing the competitiveness of the national economy. Support for non-commodity exporters and access to world markets with a wide range of domestic brands were named as the main vector for the implementation of these areas.

Development is not commodity exports It is designed to change the structure of Kazakhstan's foreign trade turnover, which today is characterized by a high share of mineral raw materials in exports and the dominance of high-tech products (machinery and equipment) in imports. At the same time, over the past 10 years, the share of mineral products in total exports has increased from 56 to 77.3%. The second largest item of Kazakh exports are metals and products from them (since 2000, their specific gravity in exports decreased from 29 to 12.3%). The share of exports of agricultural products also decreased from 7 to 2.2%. The remaining export items in total amount to about 10%, while the share of manufacturing products practically does not change and remains at an extremely low level: about four percent for chemical products and one or two percent for machinery and equipment.

However, we note that high rates of raw material exports are characteristic of countries with significant reserves of natural resources, which undoubtedly include our republic. The dominance of the raw material component is an objective, justified and quite rational strategy of the foreign trade policy of resource-provided countries.

Today, Kazakhstan positions itself as one of the largest and most promising exporters of the three most important commodities on the world market: oil, metals and grain. In this regard, it is necessary to recognize the fact that it is the income from the sale of raw materials in the most difficult years that act as a “safety cushion” for our economy, ensuring that the state not only fulfills its social obligations, but also allows the implementation of development programs. So it was in the difficult 90s, and during the last global financial crisis.

It follows from this that at this stage economic development Kazakhstan has a high potential for endowment with natural resources, but such intensive consumption may lead to a shortage of the latter. This problem will become relevant in the near future if there is no reorientation of the country's foreign economic policy.

As for unemployment, it should be noted that according to the Statistical Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan for the period of the third quarter of 2010, the unemployment rate in the country reached 5.6%, which, of course, indicates a decrease in unemployment compared to the pre-crisis and crisis period, but as a problem , unemployment, remains relevant at the present time.

3.2. Solving the problem of limited economic benefits and resources in the Republic of Kazakhstan

Natural resources, of course, served for Kazakhstan as a launching pad for economic growth. But objectively, there is a need for structural changes in the country's economy that would make it possible to realize the gains from the possession of natural resources through the development of its own high-tech industries, reducing the import of consumer goods, primarily agricultural and food industry products.

The structure of exports must also change. World experience shows that the export of industrial goods, technologies and services usually stimulates the economy to a much greater extent than the export of commodity group goods, which is what characterizes the current foreign economic policy of Kazakhstan in the world market.

At the same time, analysis successful development countries rich in natural resources, such as Australia, Canada, Norway, shows that it is export-oriented mining companies that have diversified and modernized their activities that can become “points of growth” for national economies. This is explained by the fact that commodity corporations have the opportunity to attract the best personnel, advanced technologies, investment resources, accumulate capital and develop innovations.

Such a model of transition from the level of extractive resource economy to the innovative-industrial level can be very useful for Kazakhstan. The analysis shows that, along with significant exports of raw materials from resource-rich industrial countries there is also a significant share of non-commodity exports.

Therefore, despite the acceptability and objective predetermination of the current structure of exports, the vector of development of the economy of Kazakhstan should shift towards a consistent and balanced growth of not only the mining, but also the processing, innovation, technology and social sectors. It is necessary to gradually move away from the dominance of exports of raw materials and increase the supply of high value-added goods. The value of mineral products can be significantly increased by their competent and rational use, by investing funds from their sale in improving the quality of human capital, reducing the country's dependence on imports of goods, the production of which can be carried out on its own, primarily oil refining and petrochemical products, as well as food.

On the this moment we observe a pronounced regional economic asymmetry in the economy of Kazakhstan. The western regions of the republic have a distinct raw material specialization. In essence, these are zones of avant-garde development, the locomotives of the Kazakh economy, the backbone of the entire country. They don't deform national economy but support and insure it in crisis situations. The rest of the regions could well develop in an innovative way, following the example of non-resource-based Japan, be "nurseries" of breakthrough technologies, form an innovative industrial complex and the service sector. The essence of the problem is not that the raw materials sector prevails in the economy of Kazakhstan - in absolute terms, it is much less than that of developed countries, and there are areas of raw material specialization in any country. The fact is that the rest of the regions, which have opportunities for the development of light and food industries, tourism, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, have not advanced enough in these areas.

Kazakhstan, in our opinion, should strive to become an energy leader, not a raw material leader. To do this, it is necessary not so much to increase the export of hydrocarbons as to actively develop the production and export of electricity, energy-saving technologies, innovative energy projects, and increase the participation of Kazakhstani companies in regional and global international programs.

In other words, our country should have healthy ambitions aimed at reorienting the raw vector of economic development towards the creation of a new transport and technological infrastructure, modern educational, medical, fundamental scientific and innovation centers. This policy should ensure the leadership of the country not only in the Central Asian region, but also in the Eurasian space.

In addition, the policy of diversifying the direction of economic development will make it possible, if not to completely extract natural resources from the sphere of export, then at least to significantly reduce their consumption. And in the field of domestic consumption - to rationalize the methods of processing and use in order to save and reduce consumption.

In addition, it is possible to reduce the amount of consumed resources using a resource-saving environmental approach to this problem. That is, it is necessary to intensify the policy of rational use of natural resources in the field of environmental education. Thus, a program of nature management is being implemented in our republic.

As for unemployment, to reduce it, the main projects of the country are created and implemented, for example, such as the "Road Map of Kazakhstan", as one of anti-crisis projects. According to the results of 2009, the Ministry of Labor and social protection of the population of the republic, about 248 thousand people were employed within the framework of the "road map".

Upon completion of the road map program, the implementation of the Business Road Map - 2020 program begins. As part of the implementation of the Business Road Map 2020 program, measures are envisaged to create social jobs, youth practice and retraining of personnel.

The Business Roadmap 2020 program was approved by the Decree of the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan dated April 13, 2010 No. 301. For its implementation this year from republican budget 30 billion tenge has been allocated. It consists of three main areas: support for new business initiatives, improvement of the business sector and support for export-oriented industries. Thus, it is aimed at increasing the employment of the population and supporting entrepreneurship as the main economic resources.

Conclusion.

Each state shows concern for the preservation, economical use and reproduction of the country's natural resources, works to resolve the contradiction between the needs of society and the possibilities of nature, is engaged in environmental education and upbringing of its citizens. As in other states, in the Republic of Kazakhstan, the state legislative, executive and legal branches of government, citizens' associations and other public organizations deal with the management of environmental protection and rational nature management.

Ensuring rational nature management and nature protection depends on the further improvement of administrative, legal, socio-psychological and economic methods management.

The state sets the goals of environmental policy, determines its priorities and develops norms for relations with nature users, i.e. those rules of the game, which are called the economic mechanism. This mechanism itself operates on market basis with elements of coercive measures of both economic and non-economic nature.

The basis of environmental policy standards and its functioning in most developed countries was the principle of the normative qualitative state of the environment, which is achieved by setting standards for pollution of various kinds. The transition to these standards is ensured by the appropriate tax policy which is both punitive and sparing, stimulating, using subsidies, concessional lending, introducing into practice systems of pollution trading or payments for their normative or excess levels, fines. Among the external economic levers are direct production costs, administrative decisions to close enterprises, as well as criminal liability.

In this way, modern stage The development of the economy of the Republic of Kazakhstan is characterized by changes in the structure of production, forms of ownership, the nature of industrial relations, the peculiarities of the distribution of productive forces, in relation to the quality of manufactured and consumed products, in the possibilities of rational use of natural resources and improvement of the quality of the natural environment. For the implementation of these tasks, an optimal combination of economic and environmental interests of society is necessary. economic mechanism management of nature and in the future will play a paramount role in solving many environmental problems of the country, which, in turn, will affect the preservation of the economic benefits of our republic and solve the problem of limited resources to meet the economic needs of economic agents of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Changes in the structure of production, which were mentioned earlier, are characterized by a focus on diversifying the direction of the foreign and domestic economic policy of the Republic of Kazakhstan in order to reduce the volume of exports of raw materials, raising the innovative and technological level of production of final products in our country on our own, reorienting to the production of final products in order to increase the value of the country's natural (raw) resources.

Needs and Resources

As follows from the previous topics, modern economics is the science of the rational distribution of society's limited resources to meet the needs of people. In this topic, we will analyze the needs of people and ways to satisfy them, the target function of people's economic activity, consider what resources are needed to produce economic goods, what resources are limited and what consequences it leads to, the problem of choice and the main issues of any economic system.

The main questions of the topic:

Question 1. Economic needs and benefits.

Question 2. Production and factors of production.

Question 3. Production possibilities.

Question 4. The problem of choice and economic systems.

Economic Needs and Benefits

Needs- this is an expression of the need for something necessary to maintain life and develop the individual and society as a whole. It is the needs that motivate people to production, to economic activity.

Needs are formed under the influence of many factors. The needs are influenced by the biological nature of a person, his spiritual world, the socio-economic conditions of his life, scientific and technological progress, the natural and climatic environment, etc.

There are many options for grouping, classifying needs. Needs can be identified:

− primary(the need for means of subsistence that cannot be replaced by anything - food, clothing, housing) and secondary(choice needs - cars, entertainment, travel);

− material(in food) and spiritual(in reading books);

− personal(education) and public(defense of the country, environmental protection).

When characterizing needs and assigning them to a particular group, one must keep in mind the conditional (relative) nature of a particular grouping. The boundaries between the types of needs are rather unsteady.

For example, in highly developed countries, the need to be able to read and write is a primary need, while in backward countries it is a secondary need.

The classification of needs developed by the American scientist A. Maslow is widely known. In the system he proposed, all needs are presented in the form of a pyramid, at the base of which are physiological needs. The spiritual needs of a person rise above them (Fig. 3.1 A. Maslow's Pyramid of Needs).

According to A. Maslow, the first two lower groups of needs are the needs of the lower order, and until they are satisfied, the needs of the higher order are irrelevant (the three upper groups of needs).

As society develops, people's needs are constantly expanding and becoming more complex, while the share of spiritual and intellectual needs is increasing.

The increase in needs creates a constant incentive for productive work.

The needs of people are satisfied with the help of goods.

Good Everything that is useful to a person and satisfies his needs. Goods can have a material form (material object) or act as a service. A service is an intangible good that has the form of an activity that is useful to people. Services cannot be accumulated because the processes of their creation and consumption coincide.

All the goods with which a person satisfies his needs are divided into limitless- gifts of nature and limited (economic), most of which are created during the manufacturing process.

economic benefits limited- it means that:

- not enough to satisfy all people's needs;

- the volume of goods can be increased only by the cost of factors of production;

Wealth has to be distributed in one way or another.

Economic benefits are divided into two large groups:

− consumer goods that directly meet the needs of people (food, clothing, housing, etc.);

− means of production- goods of a production nature that satisfy the needs of people indirectly (machines, machines, equipment, minerals).

Many economic goods are interconnected: they can either substitute for each other or complement each other. In this regard, there are:

− fungible goods(substitute goods) - goods that have the ability to satisfy needs at the expense of each other (oil - gas, margarine - butter, wood - brick, etc.) At the same time, interchangeability can be complete (absolute), when one good can completely replace other (ballpoint - capillary pen; sweets - sugar - jam, etc.), and relative, when goods can be equated to a greater or lesser extent (natural and artificial fabrics, roses and carnations, gasoline or fuel oil);

− complementary(complimentary) good- goods that satisfy the needs of people only in combination with each other (tape recorder and cassette, camera and film, car and gasoline, etc.). Complementarity can be rigid (absolute) and relative. In the first case, one good must correspond to a certain amount of another good (tape recorder - cassette), in the second - there is no such rigid certainty (coffee and sugar, shirt and tie).

Understanding the complementarity and interchangeability of goods is of great importance for the analysis of the behavior of economic entities and pricing patterns in a market economy.

Questions for self-examination

1. What is a need? What influences the formation of needs?

How can needs be grouped?

2. Analyze A. Maslow's pyramid of needs.

3. How are needs evolving?

4. What are benefits? What are economic benefits? How can they

boons (goods) - means of satisfying needs. They can be free - what is given by nature (land, forests, natural resources, air, water in rivers, seas, etc.), and economic - what is mined or created by human labor (cultivated land, planted forest, produced oil, cars, machine tools, equipment, roads, bridges, services, etc.).

The classification of goods is shown in fig. 1.1.

Rice. 1.1.

Benefits can be classified in a number of ways.

According to the material (property) sign, they distinguish:

• o material, or property, benefit - a commodity (thing), having the ability to satisfy any human need and exchange for other goods or money;
• o intangible, or non-property, good is a service(car repair, doctor's appointment, teacher's work, legal advice, etc.), which has the same properties as the product.

The difference between goods and services is only one: the goods are first produced and then consumed, and the service is consumed directly at the time of its production (Fig. 1.2).

Rice. 1.2.

IN modern economy it is difficult to determine what is more important: material or non-material good, i.e. product or service. Often they are so connected that one cannot exist without the other, for example, a person cannot do without information, medical services.

A good has two properties: use value (the ability to satisfy any human need) and value (the ability to exchange for other goods). However, there is also the concept of "anti-good" - a product with negative utility (for example, alcohol, cigarettes, drugs, low-quality products).

On the basis of consumer goods are divided into:

• o productive goods, or goods that meet the needs of production: working buildings and structures, machine tools, equipment, etc.;
• o personal items, or goods that satisfy personal needs. In turn, consumer goods are divided into essentials (food, clothing, household items, etc.) and luxury goods that satisfy the needs of rich people.

On the basis of substitution and addition, among the benefits are:

• o fungible goods(substitute goods), or substitutes - goods that can be replaced by others without prejudice to the consumer (for example, tea and coffee, a car and an airplane). For these goods, there is a direct relationship between the price of one of them and the demand for the other, i.e. a decrease (increase) in the price of one good causes a decrease (increase) in the demand for another good;
• o complementary goods(complementary goods), or complementary, in the process of consumption complementing each other (for example, a car and gasoline). For these goods, there is an inverse relationship between the price of one of them and the demand for the other, i.e. a decrease (increase) in the price of one good causes an increase (decrease) in demand for the complementary good.

Depending on ownership or ownership, there are:

• o private good, available to one subject, the use of which excludes the possibility of its consumption by other subjects (for example, any thing belonging to a particular person or company);
• o public good, consumed collectively by the entire population, whether people pay for it or not. A purely public good is characterized by two properties: it is needed by everyone and always. Such properties have, for example, information, roads, bridges, electricity, national defense.

From the standpoint of production, there are:

• o final goods- economic goods purchased for final consumption;
• o intermediate goods, which are used in production (for example, steel as an intermediate product for mechanical engineering).

In a market economy, there are so-called goodness Giffen(Giffen good) goods on which the bulk of the budget of poor consumers is spent. Ceteris paribus, the demand for such goods changes in the same direction as the price, since the income effect exceeds the substitution effect.

Goods are created to satisfy human needs.

Needs(in the broad sense of the word) - the desire of people to acquire and use those benefits that bring them usefulness.

Common to all types of needs is their direct dependence on human activity in general and on production in particular. The relationship between needs and production lies in the fact that needs, being an active principle, affect the conditions of existence, thereby determining their specificity, stimulating certain ways activities.

Economic Needs These are needs mediated by industrial relations. They are divided into personal and industrial (Fig. 1.3).

Rice. 1.3.

Consumer goods are divided into durable and non-durable items, as well as luxury goods.

In addition to material needs, the system of needs includes social needs - in labor, education, health protection.

In conditions market relations economic needs are mediated by money and take the form of demand. This primarily refers to personal needs. Public needs, i.e. needs for public goods are realized partially out of demand - through the social functions of the state (for example, the use insurance policy in the healthcare system).

Any economic need- the result of real contradictions of social production. It expresses the discrepancy between economic needs and the existing productive forces. The resolution of these contradictions ultimately leads both to the growth of productive forces and to the satisfaction of ever-increasing needs.

As one need is satisfied, a person develops another, which allows economists to argue that needs are limitless those. at this stage of their development, it is impossible to fully satisfy them. Moreover, over time, as a result of the emergence of new goods, needs change. The ultimate goal of any economy is to seek to satisfy these manifold needs. But this can be done if the economy has sufficient resources.

What determines our needs, our desires? What needs are more important for us, priority? This question was answered by A. Maslow, an American sociologist of Russian origin, who built a pyramid of human needs in order of their priority (pyramid of needs by BUT. Maslow). According to his theory, a person will not need to satisfy the needs of the highest level (spiritual) until he satisfies the needs of a lower level (physiological).

Needs can be satisfied if the economy has certain resources.

Resources are all that is used for the production and sale of goods and services.

Resources, or factors of production, are divided into (Fig. 1.4):

material resources- land (natural resources) and capital;

human resources- labor and entrepreneurial ability (entrepreneurship).

1. Economic resources
2. Economic efficiency

The economic life of society is based on the need to satisfy people's needs for various economic benefits. At the same time, these benefits are produced on the basis of economic resources, which are at the disposal of society and its members.

Economic Needs and Benefits

All people have different needs. They can be divided into two parts: spiritual and material needs. Although the ϶ᴛᴏ division is conditional (for example, it is difficult to say that a person's need for knowledge belongs to spiritual or material needs), but for the most part it is possible.

The concept of economic needs and benefits

Material needs can be called economic needs. It is worth noting that they are expressed in the fact that we want various economic benefits. At the same time, economic benefits are ϶ᴛᴏ material and non-material objects, more precisely, the properties of these objects that can satisfy economic needs. Economic needs are one of the fundamental categories in economic theory.

At the dawn of mankind, people satisfied their economic needs at the expense of ready-made goods of nature. In the future, the vast majority of needs began to be satisfied through the production of goods. In a market economy, where economic goods are bought and sold, they are called goods and services (often simply goods, products, products)

Mankind is arranged in such a way that its economic needs usually exceed the possibilities for the production of goods. They even talk about the law (principle) of the rise of needs, which means that needs grow faster than the production of goods. In many ways, ϶ᴛᴏ happens because as we meet some needs, we immediately have others.

Thus, in a traditional society, the majority of its members feel the need primarily for essential products. These are the needs mainly for food, clothing, housing, and the simplest services. At the same time, even in the nineteenth century. Prussian statistician Ernest Engel proved that there is a direct relationship between the type of goods and services purchased and the income level of consumers. According to his statements, confirmed by practice, with an increase in the absolute amount of income, the share spent on essential goods and services decreases, and the share of spending on less necessary products increases. The very first need, and a daily one, is the need for food. For ϶ᴛᴏmu Engel's law finds expression in the fact that with the growth of incomes, their share goes to the purchase of food decreases, and that part of the income increases, which is spent on the purchase of other goods (especially services), which are non-essential products.

Ultimately, we come to the conclusion that if the growth of economic needs constantly overtakes the production of economic goods, then these needs are completely insatiable, limitless.

Another conclusion is that economic benefits are limited (rare, in the terminology of economic theory), i.e. less need for them. This limitation is due to the fact that the production of economic goods is faced with a limited supply of many natural resources, frequent shortages of labor (especially skilled), insufficient production capacity and finance, cases of poor organization of production, lack of technology and other knowledge for the production of a particular good. In other words, the production of economic goods lags behind economic needs because of the limited economic resources.

Economic resources

The concept of economic resources

Economic resources are understood as all types of resources used in the process of production of goods and services. In essence, ϶ᴛᴏ those goods that can be used to produce other goods. Therefore, they are often called production resources, factors of production, factors of production, factors of economic growth. At the same time, the rest of the goods are called consumer goods.

Types of economic resources

To economic resources ᴏᴛʜᴏϲᴙ are:

• natural resources (land, subsoil, water, forest and biological, climatic and recreational resources), abbreviated as land;
• labor resources (people with their ability to produce goods and services), abbreviated as labor;
• capital (in the form of money, i.e. money capital, or means of production, i.e. real capital);
• entrepreneurial abilities (the ability of people to organize the production of goods and services), in short - entrepreneurship;
• knowledge necessary for economic life.

Even Aristotle, and after him, medieval thinkers considered labor to be one of the main economic resources. This approach was shared by the first economic school in the world - mercantilism. The physiocratic school attributed special importance to the land as an economic resource. Adam Smith considered such economic resources as labor, land and capital. At the same time, the theory of the three factors of production was most clearly formulated by the French economist Jean Baptiste Say (1767-1832). The English economist Alfred Marshall (1842-1924) suggested adding a fourth factor - entrepreneurial ability. Many modern economists are inclined to believe that now the “knowledge” factor has come to the fore in terms of importance as a factor in economic growth, calling it differently - technology, scientific and technological progress, science, information.

Infinity of needs and limited economic resources as the basis of economic theory.

As noted above, in life we ​​often face the fact that economic resources are limited. It was also emphasized that economic needs are limitless.

This combination of two situations typical of economic life - limitless needs and limited resources - forms the basis of the entire economy, economic theory. In essence, ϶ᴛᴏ is a science that “studies how a society with limited, scarce resources decides what, how and for whom to produce”, or, in other words, it “explores the problems of efficient use or management of limited productive resources in order to achieving maximum satisfaction of human material needs” 2

2 Quot. by: McConnell K.R., Brew S.L. Economics / Per. from English. In 2 vol. M., 1992. T. 1. S. 18.

It is impossible to reduce modern economic theory only to ϶ᴛᴏ. At the same time, the contradiction between the infinity of needs and the limited resources forms the axis around which economic life revolves, and the core of economics as a science. A household, a firm, the entire national economy has to constantly make a choice on the purchase or production of what goods should be spent ϲʙᴏand resources, which are almost always limited.

Interweaving, mobility and fungibility of economic resources

Resources are intertwined. For example, such an economic resource as knowledge is used when natural resources tend to be consumed more rationally on the basis of new knowledge (scientific achievements) Knowledge will be an important element of such a resource as labor, when it is evaluated from a qualitative point of view and attention is paid to the qualifications of workers, which depends primarily on the education (knowledge) they have received. real capital. Finally, they (especially managerial knowledge) allow entrepreneurs to organize the production of goods and services in the most rational way.

Economic resources are mobile (mobile), as they can move in space (within the country, between countries), although the degree of their mobility is different. Natural resources are the least mobile, the mobility of many of them is close to zero (it is difficult to move land from one place to another, although it is possible) Labor resources are more mobile, as can be seen from the internal and external labor migration in the world in noticeable sizes (see Ch. 36) Entrepreneurial abilities are even more mobile, although they often do not move on their own, but along with labor resources or / and capital (϶ᴛᴏ due to the fact that either hired managers or owners of capital will be carriers of entrepreneurial abilities) the last two resources are capital (especially money) and knowledge.

The interweaving of resources and their mobility partly reflect their other function - interchangeability (alternativeness). ), or expand the ϲʙᴏ th park of machinery and equipment (increase ϲʙᴏ th capital), or improve the organization of labor on the farm (wider use of ϲʙᴏ and entrepreneurial abilities), or, finally, use new types of seeds (apply new knowledge) The farmer has a similar choice because economic resources are fungible (alternative)

Usually this interchangeability is not complete. For example, human resources cannot completely replace capital, otherwise workers will be left without equipment and inventory. Economic resources replace each other easily at first, and then more and more difficult. Thus, with the same number of tractors, it is possible to increase the number of workers on the farm by requiring them to work in two shifts. At the same time, it will be very difficult to hire more workers and organize systematic work in three shifts, except by sharply increasing their wages,

The entrepreneur (the organizer of production) constantly encounters and uses the indicated properties of economic resources. Indeed, in the conditions of limited resources, he is forced to find the most rational combination of them, using interchangeability.

Cobb-Douglas model

An illustration of the interweaving and alternativeness of economic resources can be a simple Cobb-Douglas model based on only two production factors (named after two American economists)

The concept of resource markets

In a market economy, each of the economic resources is a large resource market - the labor market, the capital market, etc., consisting, in turn, of many markets for a particular resource. For example, the labor market consists of markets for workers of different specialties - economists, accountants, engineers, etc.

production possibilities. Limit values

As already noted, on the basis of economic resources, the production of economic goods is carried out. With limited (rare) resources, it is necessary to determine what kind of goods to produce and what production possibilities exist for ϶ᴛᴏ.

The concept of production possibilities. Production Possibility Curve

production capabilities are called opportunities for the production of goods (output) The need for a constant choice of what resources and in what quantities to use for the production of goods is clearly demonstrated by a model called the “production possibilities curve”.

Table 2.1. The country's production capacity for the production of cars and aircraft per year

Figure No. 2.1. Production Possibility Curve

To simplify, let's imagine that a country produces only two goods - cars and airplanes. If she concentrates all her economic resources on the production of cars only, she will be able to produce 10 million units in a year. If it also needs to produce 1 thousand aircraft, then ϶ᴛᴏ is possible with a reduction in the production of cars to 9 million units. It is worth saying that for the production of 2 thousand aircraft, it will be necessary to reduce the production of cars to 7 million units, and for the production of 3 thousand aircraft - to 4 million units. With the production of 4 thousand aircraft, the country is forced to completely abandon the production of cars (Table 2.1 and Figure 2.1)

Based on all of the above, we come to the conclusion that in order to increase the production of aircraft, it is necessary to abandon an increasing number of cars. We can say that the cost of aircraft produced is determined by the number of cars, the production of which must be abandoned.

Opportunity cost

Opportunity cost - ϶ᴛᴏ what one has to give up in order to get what one wants.

"Cited by: Mankiw N.G. Principles of economics / Translated from English. St. Petersburg, 1999. P. 32.

It is not for nothing that the opportunity cost is often referred to as the opportunity cost. So, in the example under consideration, the production of 4 thousand aircraft means the rejection of the production of 10 million cars.

Of course, in real life, missed opportunities are not limited to one or even two types of products, the production of which has to be abandoned, they are numerous. Therefore, when determining the opportunity cost, it is recommended to take into account the best of the lost real opportunities. So, when studying at a full-time university after school, a girl misses the opportunity to work during the ϶ᴛᴏt period as a secretary (and not as a loader or watchman) and receive a ϲᴏᴏᴛʙᴇᴛϲᴛʙa living wage. The salary of the secretary will be for her the opportunity cost (opportunity cost) of studying at the full-time department of the university. Opportunity costs in Russia are often called imputed, and opportunity cost - imputed. Note that as the production of a good increases, its opportunity cost increases. So, in our example, the production of 1 thousand aircraft requires the abandonment of the production of 1 million cars, 2 thousand aircraft - already 3 million cars, 3 thousand aircraft - 6 million cars, and for the production of 4 thousand aircraft, it is necessary to completely abandon the production of cars, those. for each additional thousand aircraft, more and more automobiles must be abandoned. We can say that the opportunity cost of the first thousand aircraft is equal to 1 million cars, and the fourth thousand aircraft - already 4 million cars. In other words, for each additional unit of product produced, more and more of another, alternative product must be sacrificed. The reasons for the growth of opportunity costs are primarily in the incomplete substitutability of resources.

The law of increasing opportunity cost. Law of diminishing returns

The increase in opportunity costs as each additional unit of output is produced will be a well-known, tested and taken into account regularity in economic life. Therefore, this pattern is called the law of increasing opportunity costs. .

An even better known law, closely related to the above, is the law of diminishing returns (productivity). It can be formulated as follows: a continuous increase in the use of one resource in combination with a constant amount of other resources at a certain stage leads to the cessation of the growth of returns from it, and then to its reduction. This law is based again on the incomplete interchangeability of resources. After all, replacing one of them with another (others) is possible up to a certain limit. For example, if four resources: land, labor, entrepreneurial abilities, knowledge - are left unchanged and such a resource as capital is increased (for example, the number of machines in a factory with a constant number of machine operators), then at a certain stage there comes a limit, beyond which further the growth of the specified factor of production becomes less and less. The performance of a machine operator who maintains an increasing number of machines decreases, the percentage of scrap increases, machine downtime increases, etc.

Let's say that a farm grows wheat. An increase in the use of chemical fertilizers (if other factors remain unchanged) leads to an increase in yield. Let's study ϶ᴛᴏ using an example (per 1 ha):

We see that, starting from the fourth increase in the production factor, the increase in yield, although it continues, but on an ever smaller scale, and then stops altogether. In other words, the increase in one production factor, while the others remain unchanged at one stage or another, begins to fade and eventually vanishes.

The law of diminishing returns can also be interpreted in another way: the growth of each additional unit of production requires, from a certain point on, ever greater expenditures of the economic resource. In our example, to increase the yield of wheat by 1 quintal, first 0.2 bags of fertilizer are required (after all, one bag is needed to increase the yield by 5 quintals), then 0.143 and 0.1 bags. But then (with an increase in yield over 42 centners), an increase in the cost of fertilizers for each additional centner of wheat begins - 0.11; 0.143 and 0.25 bags. After ϶ᴛᴏ, the increase in fertilizer costs does not give an increase in yield at all. In this interpretation, the law is called the law of increasing opportunity costs (increasing costs)

Limit (margin) values

The marginal (marginal, from French marginal - located on the edge of something) value is understood as the increase in one value caused by the increase in another value per unit (provided that all other values ​​remain unchanged)

In the wheat example, the increase in mineral fertilizer per unit (bag) gives a different increase in yield. All the given values ​​of the increase in yield (5, 7, 10.9, 7.4 q) will be the limit values, more precisely, the limit products of such a factor as mineral fertilizers. Let us once again pay attention to the fact that the value of the marginal product in ϲᴏᴏᴛʙᴇᴛϲᴛʙi with the law of diminishing returns from a certain moment begins to constantly decrease (although ϶ᴛᴏ often occurs from the very beginning)

The law of increasing costs demonstrates that as wheat yield increases, the cost of mineral fertilizers for the growth of each centner of wheat (they are called marginal costs) change, and with a tendency to increase. It can be concluded that in the ϶ᴛᴏm case, the income received from the use of each additional bag of fertilizers also changes (reduces) - it is called marginal income.

Finally, limit values can be used not only by the manufacturer, but also by the consumer. For example, when they evaluate the usefulness of a particular good. The consumer proceeds primarily from the availability (rarity) for him of a particular good. If clean drinking water is rare for him, then he is ready to pay dearly for each liter of it (based on the money he has and their purchasing power). size and is willing to pay much less per liter. Thus, as the quantity of a good increases, its marginal utility decreases.

All ϶ᴛᴏ special cases of the concept of marginal values ​​(marginal analysis, marginal theory, marginalism) It is widely used in economic theory and practice and is based on the constant correlation of produced goods (wheat) or existing goods (drinking water) with the costs of their production or their availability (rarity) Do not forget that the most important idea of ​​the concept is essentially that at a certain stage, the costs of producing a good (production costs) begin to grow faster than the production of the ϶ᴛᴏth good itself. Another important idea of ​​the concept is this: the more abundant the good, the less it is valued. As Marshall narrated, “the more a person has, the less, other things being equal (i.e., with equal purchasing power of money and with an equal amount of money at his disposal), there will be a price that he is willing to pay for a small additional amount of it, or, in other words, his marginal demand price for it is reduced.

"Cited by: Marshall A. Principles of economic science / Transl. from English. In 3 vols. M. 1993. T. 1. S. 158.

In essence, the ϶ᴛᴏ formulation of the principle of diminishing marginal utility (see 6.1)

Economic efficiency

The concept of economic efficiency

Economic efficiency- ϶ᴛᴏ obtaining the maximum possible benefits from the available resources. It is worth saying that for ϶ᴛᴏ it is necessary to constantly correlate benefits (benefits) and costs, or, in other words, behave rationally. Rational behavior lies in the fact that the producer and consumer of goods strive for the highest efficiency and, for this purpose, maximize benefits and minimize costs.

If we turn to the production possibilities curve (see Fig. 2.1), then with the maximum possible efficient production of the point A, B, C, D, E, reflective possible options production of goods, must lie on the surface of the curve, i.e. as if on the verge, the limit of production possibilities. If one or another point lies to the left of the curve, then ϶ᴛᴏ means incomplete use of production capabilities (economic resources), and if to the right - excess of the country's production capabilities, i.e. the unreality of the production of goods in such volumes. It can be concluded that “efficiency takes place when society cannot increase the output of one good without decreasing the output of another good at ϶ᴛᴏm. An efficient economy lies on the edge of production possibilities.” 2

Cit. by: Samuelson P.A., Nordhaus V.D. Economy. Ed. 15th / Per. from English. M., 1997. S. 55.

Pareto efficiency (Pareto optimum)

In essence, the conclusion drawn follows from the formulation of economic efficiency, which was proposed by the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923). cannot improve the first state without worsening the position of at least one of the market participants. This definition of efficiency is often called Pareto optimum, Pareto optimality, Pareto-optimal asset. It is used not only in economics, but also in other sciences, incl. in mathematics.

Measuring the efficiency of production and consumption of goods

When calculating the efficiency of production of goods, the costs of one or all factors are commensurate with the benefit (good) received. It is already clear from here that there can be many indicators of production efficiency. Yes, they measure performance labor (dividing the cost of all manufactured products by the number of employees or by the cost of labor costs), material consumption(dividing the cost of consumed natural resources, including those that have undergone primary processing - raw materials, fuel and energy, materials and semi-finished products, by the cost of manufactured products), capital intensity(dividing the cost of capital employed by the value of output produced) or return on capital(reciprocal indicator obtained by dividing the cost of goods produced by the cost of capital used) If the cost of goods produced is measured with the cost of all factors used, then they speak profitability. Material published on http: // site

When calculating the efficiency of the acquisition and consumption of goods, the consumer usually proceeds from their opportunity cost, i.e. from the cost of those goods, from which he has to give up when receiving the desired good. It is clear that for different consumers this opportunity cost is different, since their tastes are not the same. At the same time, for most goods in society there is a generally recognized, established opportunity cost.

Efficiency at the micro and macro level

Approaches to measuring efficiency at the micro- and macroeconomic levels differ.

The firm considers only those costs that it has incurred in the production of the good, and the buyer usually correlates the good he buys with the market value of those goods, from which he has to give up in order to get the desired good. At the same time, at ϶ᴛᴏm, both do not take into account those costs that are borne by the whole society, but those costs are not always included in the costs of the company for the production of goods and ϲᴏᴏᴛʙᴇᴛϲᴛʙ specifically in its market value. If, for example, the state provides a producer with a subsidy from its budget for the manufacture of cheap goods for children and the elderly, then it underestimates the value of its costs (production costs) for the producer, and the value of the opportunity cost for the consumer. As a result, the production and consumption of these goods will be more efficient for them than in the absence of a subsidy.

At the same time, in this case, the entire society bears the costs in the form of a subsidy provided from the state budget, which is financed by taxes collected from the whole society. Thus, if these costs are taken into account, then the efficiency at the macroeconomic level (the so-called national economic efficiency) will be lower than at the microeconomic level (firm efficiency)

Moreover, at the microeconomic level, other costs are not always taken into account when calculating efficiency. Thus, a firm usually does not include the cost of those resources owned by it (for example, land plot, patents for its own inventions), for the use of which it does not pay anyone (see 10.1)

Division of labor, specialization and exchange

Adam Smith begins his famous work, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776), with the words: a consequence of the division of labour.

"Quoted from: Anthology of economic classics. In 2 vols. M., 1991. T. 1. S. 83.

Smith further shows in the example of pin making that one worker produces no more than 20 pins a day if he makes them himself from start to finish, while ten workers in a pin manufactory, dividing the individual pin-making operations among themselves, produce over 48,000 pins. per day, i.e. over 4,800 pins per worker.

The concepts of division of labor and specialization

The division of production between different jobs, enterprises and their divisions, industries, regions of the country, as well as between countries is called division labor. Accordingly, there are professional, inter-company and intra-factory, inter-industry, inter-regional and international division of labor. There is also a division of labor, detailed and node-by-node, i.e. production of a product that is not finished to the end, but its elements.

In the course of the division of labor, workers, enterprises and their subdivisions, industries, regions, countries are oriented towards the production of a limited range of products. Based on the division of pruritus, the orientation of manufacturers towards the manufacture of individual products and their elements is called specialization.

Specialization gives the manufacturer many advantages. First of all, specializing in the production of a particular product, the manufacturer has the opportunity to most effectively use the economic resources available to him or available to him. Thus, Russia's specialization in world trade in the export of raw materials, fuel and energy, materials and semi-finished products is largely due to the fact that it allows us to use the huge mineral resources available to our country. Secondly, specialization in the production of a limited set of products allows the manufacturer to effectively use his ability to produce them (as in the example with pins)

Exchange

If each participant in economic life specializes in the production of a limited range of products, then all other benefits that he needs as a producer and consumer must be received from outside. It is worth saying that for ϶ᴛᴏ he exchanges the goods at his disposal (production resources and consumer goods) for those goods that he needs. In economic life, the exchange of goods usually takes the form of trade between people, firms, regions, countries.

conclusions

1. Economic life is based on the need to meet people's needs for various economic benefits. The vast majority of these needs are satisfied through the production of goods. In a market economy, where these goods are bought and sold, they are called goods and services.

2. The law of the rise of needs means that needs grow faster than the production of goods. This is due to the fact that economic needs are unlimited, and the production of economic goods is limited due to the limited economic resources.

3. Economic resources are understood as all types of resources used in the process of production of goods and services. They include natural and labor resources, capital (both real and monetary), entrepreneurial abilities, and knowledge. Infinity of needs and limited resources form an axis around which revolves economic life, and the core of economics as a science.

4. Resources are intertwined, mobile and, most importantly, interchangeable (alternative), although not completely. Therefore, an entrepreneur (organizer of production), in conditions of limited resources, is constantly looking for the most rational combination of them, using interchangeability. In a market economy, each of the economic resources is a large resource market.

5. On the basis of economic resources, the production of economic goods is carried out. With limited (rare) resources, one has to choose what goods to produce and what kind of production possibilities there are. When ϶ᴛᴏm, the concept of alternative (imputed) cost (costs) is used, which means that which has to be abandoned in order to produce the desired good.

6. The increase in opportunity costs as each additional unit of output is produced will be the essence of the law of increasing opportunity costs. Closely related to it is the law of diminishing returns, which means that the increase in output becomes smaller as new units of economic resource are added in combination with the same number of others. economic resources.

7. Economic theory and practice widely use the concept of marginal (marginal) values, by which they understand the increase in one value caused by the increase in another value per unit (provided that all other values ​​remain unchanged) They talk about marginal costs, marginal income, marginal utility. The concept of limit values ​​is based primarily on two ideas. First of all, at a certain stage, the costs of producing a good (production costs) begin to grow faster than the production of the ϶ᴛᴏth good itself. Secondly, the more abundant the good, the less it is valued.

8. Economic efficiency - ϶ᴛᴏ obtaining the maximum possible benefits from available resources. It is worth saying that for ϶ᴛᴏ it is necessary to constantly correlate benefits (benefits) and costs (costs), or, in other words, behave rationally. Rational behavior lies in the fact that the producer and consumer of goods strive for the highest efficiency and, for this purpose, maximize benefits and minimize costs. Efficiency is calculated in various ways.

9. The division of production between various workers, enterprises and their divisions, industries, regions of the country, as well as between countries is called the division of labor. Accordingly, there are professional, inter-company and intra-factory, inter-industry, inter-regional and international division of labor. Based on the division of labor, the orientation of producers to the manufacture of individual products and their elements is called specialization.

Note that the terms and concepts
economic benefits
Economic Needs
Goods and services (goods)
Essential Products
Engel's law
Economic resources
Interchangeability (alternativeness) of economic resources
Production Capabilities
Alternative (imputed) cost (costs)
Law of Increasing Opportunity Cost
Law of diminishing returns
Economic efficiency
Pareto efficiency (Pareto optimum)
Division of labor
Specialization

Questions for self-examination

1. How is the law (principle) of the rise of needs formulated?

2. List the economic resources known to you.

3. What are the consequences of the combination of limitless needs and limited resources?

4. What gives an entrepreneur such a property of economic resources as their interchangeability (alternativeness)?

5. Explain what the production possibilities curve shows?

6. What are the similarities and differences between the law of increasing opportunity costs and the law of diminishing returns?

7. Where in the economic life, in your opinion, can the ideas of marginalism be used?

8. What economic efficiency indicators do you know and how are they calculated?

9. What is the difference between corporate and national economic efficiency?

10. Prove that specialization is related to the division of labor.