IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/esprep/222942.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Diminishing marginal utility and the teaching of economics: A note

Author

Listed:
  • Todorova, Tamara

Abstract

This paper discusses how utility can be taught in undergraduate courses in microeconomics so that to illustrate total and marginal utility, the law of diminishing marginal utility, and consumer rationality. Diminishing marginal utility is essential in describing rational consumer behavior, overconsumption, and oversaturation to students of economics. We demonstrate a quadratic and a logarithmic total utility with the subsequent forms and shapes of marginal utility. From what it seems there is no contradiction between diminishing marginal utility in the univariate context of consuming one good and the indifference curve as the multivariate case of two goods consumed.

Suggested Citation

  • Todorova, Tamara, 2020. "Diminishing marginal utility and the teaching of economics: A note," EconStor Preprints 222942, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:zbw:esprep:222942
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/222942/1/Marginal%20utility.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Timothy Dittmer, 2005. "Diminishing Marginal Utility in Economics Textbooks," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(4), pages 391-399, October.
    2. Philippe Steiner, 2011. "The creator, human conduct and the maximisation of utility in Gossen's economic theory," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(3), pages 353-379.
    3. Chung‐Cheng Lin & Shi‐Shu Peng, 2019. "The role of diminishing marginal utility in the ordinal and cardinal utility theories," Australian Economic Papers, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(3), pages 233-246, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Haase, Michaela, 2020. "Considering Value-related Concepts in Service-oriented Approaches to Marketing Studies in Light of Philosophical and Economic Value Theories," SMR - Journal of Service Management Research, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, vol. 4(2-3), pages 133-144.
    2. Alvino, Letizia & Constantinides, Efthymios & Franco, Massimo, 2018. "Towards a better understanding of consumer behavior : Marginal utility as a parameter in neuromarketing research," Other publications TiSEM b3e61951-9032-4cb4-b075-1, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    3. Letizia Alvino & Efthymios Constantinides & Massimo Franco, 2018. "Towards a Better Understanding of Consumer Behavior: Marginal Utility as a Parameter in Neuromarketing Research," International Journal of Marketing Studies, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 10(1), pages 90-106, March.
    4. Mohajan, Devajit & Mohajan, Haradhan, 2022. "Sensitivity Analysis among Commodities and Coupons during Utility Maximization," MPRA Paper 115554, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 04 Oct 2022.
    5. Mohajan, Haradhan, 2021. "Utility Maximization of Bangladeshi Consumers within Their Budget: A Mathematical Procedure," MPRA Paper 109993, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 20 Jul 2021.
    6. Jane E. Ihrig & Scott A. Wolla, 2020. "Let's Close the Gap: Revising Teaching Materials to Reflect How the Federal Reserve Implements Monetary Policy," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2020-092, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    7. Hyein Shim & Won Seok Lee & Joonho Moon, 2023. "The Relationships between Food, Recreation Expense, Subjective Health, and Life Satisfaction: Case of Korean People with Disability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(11), pages 1-11, June.
    8. Joonho Moon & Won Seok Lee & Jimin Shim, 2022. "Effect of Travel Expenditure on Life Satisfaction for Middle-Aged and Older Adults in Korea: Moderating Effect of COVID-19 Pandemic," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(20), pages 1-8, October.
    9. Mohajan, Devajit & Mohajan, Haradhan, 2022. "Utility Maximization Analysis of an Organization: A Mathematical Economic Procedure," MPRA Paper 115791, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 15 Oct 2022.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    total utility; marginal utility; indifference curve;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B13 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought through 1925 - - - Neoclassical through 1925 (Austrian, Marshallian, Walrasian, Wicksellian)
    • B41 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology - - - Economic Methodology
    • D01 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Microeconomic Behavior: Underlying Principles
    • D11 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Theory

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:esprep:222942. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/zbwkide.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.