Introduction:    An important part of understanding economics is understanding how individual consumers or households make purchase decisions. Purchase decisions by consumers are determined by available budget and individual tastes.

   We use budget constraints to illustrate the goods and services that can be afforded at current prices and income, and how the available choices change when income and/or prices change.

   Tastes or preferences are a little more complex to represent. Economists represent tastes graphically with indifference curves, but many professors prefer not to introduce indifference curves in introductory course. We've created a separate section (link below) titled Advanced Consumer Choice Material in which we employ indifference curves.

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