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Wikipedia: "a shortage occurs when for some reason the price does not rise to reach equilibrium" In your example, the price is at equilibrium, even though one
by thedevil 10y ago
Wikipedia: "a shortage occurs when for some reason the price does not rise to reach equilibrium"
In your example, the price is at equilibrium, even though one buyer cannot buy at market price. Thus there is no shortage.
If we define shortage as one buyer not being able to buy at market price, then you are technically correct.
- arjie 10y agoThat's just a problem with Wikipedia being Wikipedia. That's not a definition. If you read the actual source that's used in that section§, you'll see that what he uses as a definition is the following: > A shortage is a market condition existing at any price where the quantity supplied is less than the quantity demanded. He then goes on to talk about how the shortage provides a signal to sellers to move the price closer to equilibrium (upwards, in this case) but that doesn't make it not a shortage. In questions of definitions, it's also informative to try an alternative source. I propose the website of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (simply because they have a convenient online glossary): https://www.stlouisfed.org/education/glossary https://www.stlouisfed.org/education/glossary > Shortage: When the quantity demanded of a good or service exceeds the quantity supplied at a particular price. I'm not going to update the Wikipedia page because the Definition section needs quite some rewording and citation to make it authoritative and if I just add this in, it will make that part incoherent. § Tucker's Economics for Today, which is also wrongly named in that section as Economics Today. In the 7th edition, this is on Page 80