In: Economics
1. Consider a firm with the following production function: Q = KL1/2
(a) Consider an output level of Q = 100. Find the expression of the isoquant for this output level.
(b) Find the marginal product of labor, MPL. Is it increasing, decreasing, or constant in the units of labor, L, that the firm uses?
(c) Find the marginal product of capital, MPK. Is it increasing, decreasing, or constant in the units of capital, K, that the firm uses?
(d) Use your result in parts (b)-(c) to find the marginal rate of technical substitution, MRTS, for this firm.
(e) Is the MRTS increasing or decreasing in the units of labor, L? What does that imply about the shape of the isoquant?
(f) Given your result in part (d), what can you say about the firm’s ability to substitute one input for another? (g) Assume now that the firm were to increase all inputs by a common factor > 0. What happens to the output that the firm produces? [Hint: check whether the firm’s production function exhibits increasing, decreasing, or constant returns to scale.]