Question

The city of New Orleans has 200 advertising companies, 199 of which employ designers of normal ability at a salary of $100,000 a year. The firms that employ designers of normal ability each collect $400,000 in revenue a year, which is just enough to ensure that each earns exactly a normal profit. However, the 200th company employs Janus Jacobs, an unusually talented designer. Because of Jacobs's talent, this company collects $1,000,000 in revenue a year.

Required:
a. How much will Jacobs earn?
b. What proportion of his annual salary will be economic rent?
c. Will the advertising company for which Jacobs works be able to earn an economic profit?

Answer 1

a. $700,000

b. 6/7 or 85.7%

c. No they will not.

Step-by-step explanation:

a. Jacobs will earn the normal salary that the other designers in the other companies are getting in addition to the incremental income he brings to the company as a result of his talents.

Incremental income = Revenue with Jacobs - Revenue without Jacobs

= 1,000,000 - 400,000

= $600,000

Jacobs earnings = Normal designer earnings + incremental income

= 100,000 + 600,000

= $700,000

b. Economic rent is the excess amount that the company is paying Jacobs over what it should normally cost to get a designer.

Normal cost of designer is $100,000. Company is therefore paying an economic rent of $600,000.

Proportion of Jacobs salary that is economic rent =
`(Economic rent)/(Jacobs annual earning)`

=
`(600,000)/(700,000)`

= 6/7 or 85.7%

c. The company hiring Jacobs will not be making an economic profit because for them to make an economic profit they would have to be making more than the $400,000 that the other firms make. They cannot make this amount because for them to do so they would have to reduce the amount they pay Jacobs. If they do so, Jacobs would leave for greener pastures and then they would be making the same $400,000 that the rest are making.