No Free Lunch: Economics for a Fallen World: Third Edition, Revised

Appendix A Definition Index 485 P Perpetuity: an investment that promises a constant return forever into the future. (Chapter 16—Valuing the Future—Concepts in Capital and Finance) Plan coordination: the continual process of adjusting our individual economic plans and associated actions with the plans of others (as represented by the market realities each individual faces.) (Chapter 1—Assumptions) Pork-barrel legislation: legislation that includes many unrelated projects favored by individual members with the goal of securing enough additional votes to pass the entire bill. (Chapter 14—Government Failure) Positive externality: A benefit to a 3rd party from a market transaction. (Chapter 13—Flower Power!) Post hoc fallacy: an error in reasoning that, because an event (A) preceded another event (B), (A) caused (B). Or, after this , therefore because of this . (Chapter 1— Uncertainty vs. Risk) Price ceiling: a form of governmental price controls which restricts the maximum amount that can be charged for a good or service, resulting in a shortage. (Chapter 6— Price Ceilings) Price discrimination: occurs when a producer is able to charge differing prices to customers according to their differing demands. (Chapter 8—Monopoly) Price elasticity of demand: a measure of the responsiveness of the quantity demanded to a change in price. (Chapter 3—A Deeper Dive into Concepts for Demand/Elasticity) Price floor: a form of governmental price controls which restricts the minimum amount that can be charged for a good or service, resulting in a surplus. (Chapter 6— Market Process Application: Minimum Wage Legislation and Price Floors) Price searchers: These firms are either a monopoly or, through product differentiation, have the ability to set the price of their products. These firms are called price searchers as they must search to find the consumer demand for their product. (Chapter 8— Monopoly) Price system: Markets coordinate the allocation of scarce resources via changes in consumer and producer behavior due to changes in relative prices. Relative prices contain sufficient information for economic agents to make socially optimal choices. (Chapter 5—Prices as Information Signals)