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marginal utility
noun
: the amount of additional utility provided by an additional unit of an economic good or service
Examples of marginal utility in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
As consumers consume more of a product, the marginal utility tends to diminish.
—Abdo Riani, Forbes, 29 Feb. 2024
But in this case the main beneficiaries are likely the intermediaries, the for-profit institutions which provide trivial marginal utility to many students while charging for nearly worthless credentials.
—Discover Magazine, 5 Nov. 2019
Income gains can overcome diminishing marginal utility.
—Bill Conerly, Forbes, 26 Aug. 2022
Perhaps, Berwald opines, the popularity of the move to ban oxybenzone owes as much to a desire to do something in the face of the threats to coral reefs, even if that something is of marginal utility.
—Tim Flannery, The New York Review of Books, 4 Nov. 2021
Iguodala still had marginal utility as a back-end rotation piece.
—The Salt Lake Tribune, 6 Feb. 2022
His central idea of marginal utility was simultaneously developed in England by W.S. Jevons and on the Continent by Léon Walras.
—Edward Chancellor, The New York Review of Books, 14 May 2020
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Word History
First Known Use
1890, in the meaning defined above
Dictionary Entries Near marginal utility
Cite this Entry
“Marginal utility.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/marginal%20utility. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.
More from Merriam-Webster on marginal utility
Britannica.com: Encyclopedia article about marginal utility
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