IB DP Microeconomics · SL & HL

PPF & opportunity cost

Drag the production point — inside, onto, and past the frontier — and watch what scarcity actually means. Then shift the whole frontier out and see what growth buys.

Capital goodsConsumer goodsPPF
This point is
inefficient
Opportunity cost of one more consumer good
0.46

Inside the frontier: resources are unemployed or misallocated — both goods could increase without giving anything up.

The bowed-out shape is the point: resources aren't equally suited to both goods, so each extra consumer good costs more capital goods than the last.