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Maximizing Profits in Market Structures

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According to business definition, market structures are described as the makeup of a particular market. Market structure can be described with reference to different characteristics of a market, including its size and value, the number of providers and their market share, consumer and business purchasing behavior, and growth forecasts. The description may also include a demographic and regional breakdown of providers and customers and an analysis of pricing structures, likely technological impacts, and domestic and overseas sales (BNET 2003). The four elements to be discussed in this assignment are competitive markets, monopoly, oligopoly, and monopolistic competition. Each of these market structures produce differing results based on specific characteristics. Since the goal of all business is to maximize profits, it is up to each individual business to determine which market structure makes sense. A competitive market, also known termed perfectly competitive market, has two distinct characteristics. There are numerous buyers and sellers in the current market and the goods that are offered by the sellers are very similar in value and product. A competitive market is a market with many buyers and sellers trading identical products so that each buyer and seller is a price taker. In this market environment, no one participant holds any market power or influences the price of the product it buys or sells.
An example of this type of market structure could be street food vendors in a metropolitan area. There are relatively few barriers to entry/exit exist for street vendors. Furthermore, there are often numerous buyers and sellers of a given street food, in addition to consumers/sellers possessing perfect information of the product in question. It is often the case that street vendors may serve a similar product, in which little to no variations in the product's

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