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Treating Direct Labor as Variable Cost

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Throughout the corporate world, businesses are transforming labor into a more flexible (and variable) cost. Among such companies are Hewlett-Packard, General Electric, DuPont, Sun Microsystems, and British Airways. Discuss whether direct labor is a fixed or a variable cost. What are the pros and cons of management treating direct labor as a variable cost? Are there ethical issues to be considered here?

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This response details the pros and cons of management treating direct labor as a variable cost in 325 words with 1 reference.

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Throughout the corporate world, businesses are transforming labor into a more flexible (and variable) cost. Among such companies are Hewlett-Packard, General Electric, DuPont, Sun Microsystems, and British Airways. Discuss whether direct labor is a fixed or a variable cost. What are the pros and cons of management treating direct labor as a variable cost? Are there ethical issues to be considered here?

Let us first understand the distinction between fixed costs and variable cost. Fixed costs are the ...

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