IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/jeduce/v36y2005i4p391-399.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Diminishing Marginal Utility in Economics Textbooks

Author

Listed:
  • Timothy Dittmer

Abstract

Many introductory microeconomics textbook authors derive the law of demand from the assumption of diminishing marginal utility. Authors of intermediate and graduate textbooks derive demand from diminishing marginal rate of substitution and ordinal preferences. These approaches are not interchangeable; diminishing marginal utility for all goods is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for diminishing marginal rate of substitution, and the assumption of diminishing marginal utility is inconsistent with the assumption of ordinal preferences. In this article, the author argues that demand curves should not be derived from diminishing marginal utility in introductory textbooks and suggests that introductory text authors begin their treatment of demand with diminishing marginal value.

Suggested Citation

  • Timothy Dittmer, 2005. "Diminishing Marginal Utility in Economics Textbooks," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(4), pages 391-399, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:jeduce:v:36:y:2005:i:4:p:391-399
    DOI: 10.3200/JECE.36.4.391-399
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.3200/JECE.36.4.391-399
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.3200/JECE.36.4.391-399?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Todorova, Tamara, 2020. "Diminishing marginal utility and the teaching of economics: A note," EconStor Preprints 222942, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    2. 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.).
    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. 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.

    More about this item

    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:taf:jeduce:v:36:y:2005:i:4:p:391-399. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/VECE20 .

    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.