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Concept
Inventory investment
Summary
Inventory investment is a component of gross domestic product (GDP). What is produced in a certain country is naturally also sold eventually, but some of the goods produced in a given year may be sold in a later year rather than in the year they were produced. Conversely, some of the goods sold in a given year might have been produced in an earlier year. The difference between goods produced (production) and goods sold (sales) in a given year is called inventory investment. The concept can be applied to the economy as a whole or to an individual firm, however this concept is generally applied in macroeconomics (economy as a whole). Unintended unsold stock of goods increases inventory investment.
Inventory investment = production – sales
Thus, if production per unit time exceeds sales per unit time, then inventory investment per unit time is positive; as a result, at the end of that period of time the stock of inventory inventories on hand will be greater than it was at the beginning. The reverse is true if production is less than sales.
In discrete time, the end-of-period stock of inventories minus the beginning-of-period stock of inventories equals the flow of inventory investment per time period.
In continuous time, the time derivative of the stock of inventories equals the instantaneous flow of inventory investment.
A positive flow of intended inventory investment occurs when a firm expects that sales will be high enough that the current level of inventories on hand may be insufficient—perhaps because in the presence of very short-term fluctuations in the timing of customer purchases, there is a risk of temporarily being unable to supply the product when a customer demands it. To avoid that prospect, the firm deliberately builds up its inventories—that is, engages in positive intended inventory investment by deliberately producing more than it expects to sell. Economists view this positive intended inventory investment as a form of spending—in effect, the firm is buying inventories from itself.
Official source
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