AP Macroeconomics

Unit 5

Long-Run Consequences of Stabilization Policies

8 practice questions · Free response

Notes

The Phillips curve

  • The short-run Phillips curve (SRPC) shows a trade-off: lower unemployment comes with higher inflation, and vice versa. Moving along it corresponds to AD shifting.
  • The long-run Phillips curve (LRPC) is vertical at the natural rate of unemployment. In the long run, there's no trade-off.
  • A shift in SRAS shifts the SRPC (a negative supply shock shifts SRPC right: higher inflation and unemployment).
  • Inflation expectations shift the SRPC: if people expect more inflation, SRPC shifts up.
Unemployment rateInflation rateSRPCLRPCNatural rate
In the short run there's a trade-off; in the long run, unemployment returns to its natural rate.

Money, growth and inflation

  • Quantity theory of money: $MV = PQ$ (money supply × velocity = price level × real output). If $V$ and $Q$ are stable, increasing $M$ raises $P$.
  • In the long run, money is neutral: changes in the money supply affect prices but not real output.
  • Printing money too fast can cause hyperinflation.

Deficits and debt

  • A budget deficit happens when spending exceeds tax revenue in a year. The national debt is the total of past deficits.
  • Large deficits can raise interest rates (crowding out), reducing investment and long-run growth.

Economic growth

  • Long-run growth comes from more physical capital, human capital (education and skills), technology, and natural resources. Growth shifts LRAS and the PPC outward.
  • Productivity (output per worker) is the key to rising living standards.
  • Supply-side policies (tax incentives for investment, education, research) aim to increase long-run aggregate supply.

Practice

The short-run Phillips curve shows:
The long-run Phillips curve is vertical at:
A sudden increase in oil prices causes the short-run Phillips curve to:
According to $MV = PQ$, if velocity and real output are constant, doubling the money supply will:
The national debt is:
Which policy would most likely increase long-run economic growth?
Long-run economic growth is shown by:
If people come to expect higher inflation, the short-run Phillips curve:

Free response

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Free-response question

The government increases spending, financed by borrowing.

(a) Show the effect on the loanable funds market (describe it).

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Demand for loanable funds shifts right, so the real interest rate rises.

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(b) Explain how this could affect private investment.

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Higher real interest rates make borrowing more expensive, so businesses invest less (crowding out).

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(c) Explain how reduced private investment could affect long-run economic growth.

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Less investment means less new physical capital, so productivity grows more slowly, and LRAS shifts out less than it otherwise would.

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