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December 11, 2025 

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DEMERIT GOOD: A good that society, usually government, deems is overvalued by consumers in normal market exchanges. As such, governments typically restrict the consumption of demerit goods through policies such as taxes or direct government control. Demerit goods are often have characteristics of quasi-public goods or externality by-products. Examples include tobacco and narcotic drugs. The counter type of good is a merit good.

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AUTOMATIC STABILIZERS: A feature of the federal government's budget that tends to reduce the ups and downs of the business cycle without the need for any special legislative action, that is stabilization policies. The two key automatic stabilizers are income taxes and transfer payments. When our economy drops into a recession, unemployment rises, aggregate output declines, and people have less income. But with less income, they pay fewer income taxes, and thus there's less of a drain on consumption than their might have been. Likewise, many who are unemployed get transfer payments in the form of unemployment compensation, welfare, or Social Security. This lets them consume more than they would have otherwise. During an expansion, both of these go in the other direction. As a result, a recession sees more spending and fewer taxes, while an expansion has less spending and more taxes, all occurring quite automatically.

     See also | business cycle | stabilization policies | fiscal policy | transfer payment | unemployment compensation | welfare | income tax | business cycle | contraction | expansion | consumption | income | aggregate output |


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AUTOMATIC STABILIZERS, AmosWEB GLOSS*arama, http://www.AmosWEB.com, AmosWEB LLC, 2000-2025. [Accessed: December 11, 2025].


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INELASTIC

The general relation between two variables in which relatively large changes in one variable (A) cause relatively small changes in another variable (B). In other words, large changes in variable A cause relatively small changes in variable B or the percentage change in variable B is smaller than the percentage change in variable A. This characterization of elasticity is most important for the price elasticity of demand and the price elasticity of supply. Inelastic is one of two general elasticity relations between two variables. The other is elastic.

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Today, you are likely to spend a great deal of time looking for a downtown retail store trying to buy either a set of serrated steak knives, with durable plastic handles or a pair of blue silicon oven mitts. Be on the lookout for empty parking spaces that appear to be near the entrance to a store.
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Potato chips were invented in 1853 by a irritated chef repeatedly seeking to appease the hard to please Cornelius Vanderbilt who demanded french fried potatoes that were thinner and crisper than normal.
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