Comparing Market Structure

Below in this table is the 4 market structures:	Perfect Competition	Monopolistic Competition	Oligopoly	Monopoly
Number of Firms	Lots	Many	A few	Only one
Freedom of entry into industry	Easy	Easy	Difficult	Very restricted
Nature of product	Undifferentiated	Differentiate	Differentiate	singular
Implications for demand curve	Horizontal	Downward sloping, elastic	Downward sloping, inelastic	Downward sloping, inelastic
Average size of firm	small	small to medium	Medium to Large	Very Large
Possible consumer demand	Demand is constant because consumers can not tell that differences exist in product	Differentiated products have consumer buying from prefered vendor	Demand is very constant as competition is closing watching each other and prcing is not changed	Demand is constant as no competition, variable of weather
Profit making possibilities	Profit making is at a level that company believe is best output	A break-even business in the long run	Maximizing profits at MR=MC	Does make profit however controlled by government intervention as well
Government intervention	No government intervention	Government involved at taxation level only	Government has higher involvement	Complete control