The Market | Edexcel A-Level Business (9BS0)

The Market

140 questions
5 subtopics
Theme 1: marketing and people
Paper 1 and Paper 3

The market is the second section of Theme 1.

It covers the forces that set a price: what makes demand and supply shift, how the two meet at equilibrium, and the two elasticities that tell a business how sharply its customers react to a change in price or in their own income.

Sample questions from The Market

Answer each one closed book first, then open the answer.

Demand

How does an increase in consumer incomes typically affect demand for normal goods?

Show the answer
An increase in consumer incomes generally leads to an increase in demand for normal goods.
Demand

Give examples of external shocks that can affect demand.

Show the answer
Economic crises, natural disasters, pandemics, political instability, and technological disruption.
Supply

What effect does the introduction of new technology have on a firm's output capacity?

Show the answer
Technology increases output capacity, allowing firms to produce more.
Supply

In which direction does the supply curve shift when a government subsidy is introduced?

Show the answer
The supply curve shifts to the right.
Markets

Explain why a shortage puts upward pressure on price.

Show the answer
When quantity demanded exceeds quantity supplied, competition among buyers allows sellers to raise prices.
Markets

How can a change in consumer income cause the demand curve to shift?

Show the answer
If incomes rise, demand for normal goods increases (rightward shift); if incomes fall, demand decreases (leftward shift).
Price elasticity of demand

Why does brand loyalty reduce price elasticity of demand?

Show the answer
Brand loyalty reduces PED because consumers are less willing to switch to alternatives despite price increases, making demand less responsive to price changes.
Price elasticity of demand

What happens to total revenue when price changes and demand is unit elastic?

Show the answer
Total revenue remains unchanged because the percentage changes in price and quantity are equal.

The 5 subtopics

One subtopic is one session. Work down the list.

Subtopic	What it covers	Questions
Demand	What demand is, substitute and complementary goods, income, tastes, advertising, branding and demographics as influences on demand, external shocks and seasonality, and the difference between a movement along and a shift of the demand curve.	17
Supply	How production costs, technology, indirect taxes and subsidies shift the supply curve, the external shocks that reduce or increase supply, and the difference between a change in supply and a movement along the curve.	23
Markets	The laws of demand and supply and the shape of each curve, equilibrium price, surpluses and shortages, what happens to price and quantity when either curve shifts, and the factors that shift demand and supply rather than moving along them.	36
Price elasticity of demand	What price elasticity of demand measures and how a value is read, the calculation, what determines whether demand is elastic, and what it means for pricing and revenue.	39
Income elasticity of demand	What income elasticity measures, normal, inferior and luxury goods, and why income elastic products swing hardest with the economic cycle.	25

The Market is 140 of the 2,305 questions in the guide.Get the guide, £8

How the guide is worked

Answering a question from memory stores it far better than reading the answer again. The guide runs that as a fixed procedure on one subtopic at a time, about twenty minutes a session.

Step 1 · Closed book
Cover the answers. Work through one subtopic and write down what you can. Leave blanks where you have nothing.
Step 2 · Open book
Go back to the top. Read each printed answer and write it out in full, including the ones you had right.
Step 3 · Closed book again
Same questions, same order, from memory. The gap between pass one and pass three is the session result.

Read the full method, the return schedule and the research behind it.