Can good news for farming be bad news for farmer? Why did OPEC fail to keep the price of oil high? Does drug interdiction increase or decrease drugreleted crime. At first these questions might seem to have little in common. Yet all three questions are about markets and all markets are subject to the forces of supply and demand. Here we apply the versatile tools of supply demand and elasticity to answer these seemingly complex questions. Can Good News for Farming Be Bad News for Farmers ? Let’s return to the question posed at the beginning of this chapter. What happens to wheat farmers and the market for wheat when university agronomists discover a new wheat hybrid that is more productive than existing varieties? Recall from Chapter 4 that we answer such questions in there steps. First we examine whether the supply or demand curve shifts. Second we consider which direction the curve shifts. Third we use the supply and demand diagram to see how the mar...