Here is a quick revision note on monopolistic competition. This is a market structure in which there are a large number of firms selling commodities which are very close substitutes. There are weak barriers to entry and firms may enter the industry with ease. Notice on the diagram that the firm initially makes supernormal profit at Q0 – at MC=MR Price = P0 and Cost = AC0. However with weak barriers to entry these profits are competed away and they now produce at Q1 where at MC=MR and the Price and Cost = AC1
Modern capitalism is characterised by a large number of ‘limited’ monopolies. They are sole suppliers of branded goods, but other firms compete with them by selling similar goods with different brand names. This is the market structure described as monopolistic competition. Thus the commodities produced by any one industry are not homogeneous; the goods are differentiated by branding and the use of trade marks. The individual firm has a monopoly position, but it faces keen competition from firms supplying very similar goods. It has, therefore, only a limited degree of monopoly power – how much depends upon the extent to which firms are free to enter the industry. Product differentiation is emphasised (some would say, created) by the practice of competitive advertising which is, perhaps, the most striking feature of monopolistic competition.
Advertising is employed to heighten in the consumer’s mind the differences between Brand X and Brand Y. It is important to realise that we are concerned with the differentiation of goods in the economic sense and not in the technical sense. Two branded products may be almost identical in their technical features or chemical composition, but if advertising and other selling practices have created different images in the consumer’s mind, then these products are different from our point of view because the consumer will be prepared to pay different prices for them.
ECONFIX 