framleiðsluhagnað

Framleiðsluhagnaður is the profit earned by a producer from producing and selling goods or services. It is the difference between total revenue from sales and the costs of production, and it can be viewed in a narrow sense as accounting profit or in a broader sense as economic profit that includes opportunity costs. A positive framleiðsluhagnaður means the producer covers all costs and gains a surplus; a negative one means losses.

Calculation typically involves the basic revenue and cost functions. If a firm sells Q units at price P, total revenue is TR = P × Q. Total cost is TC = FC + VC, where FC are fixed costs and VC are variable costs. The framleiðsluhagnaður is TR − TC. Profit is often analyzed at the output level where marginal revenue equals marginal cost; producers adjust output to maximize this surplus.

The term is closely related to producer surplus in microeconomics. In economic analysis, framleiðsluhagnaður may refer to economic profit (accounting profit minus implicit costs) or, more narrowly, to accounting profit (explicit costs only). In perfectly competitive markets with free entry, long-run profits tend toward normal profit (zero economic profit). A sustained positive framleiðsluhagnaður typically reflects market power, high barriers to entry, technological advantage, or temporary imbalances between supply and demand.

Factors influencing framleiðsluhagnaður include prices, production costs, technology, input prices, competition, and regulatory conditions. Understanding framleiðsluhagnaður helps explain firm behavior, market structure, and the incentives for investment and production. See also: producer surplus, opportunity cost, economic profit, accounting profit.