Of the several uses of standard costing, one of the most controversial is using these standards for performance evaluation of an individual, team, or unit. Consider the labor efficiency variance and assume it is one of the measures for a company’s performance evaluation of a business unit. When might or might not variance from such a standard be an appropriate measure? How would this metric’s effectiveness as a performance measure be affected by a decrease in demand or changes in production volume? Would its effectiveness be different for a service unit than a manufacturing unit? In the event that it is not effective as a performance measure, does it have a strong purpose?

Consider variance analysis in a service industry. Is it a good thing to use or a bad thing to use? Why? What good behaviors could it encourage? What bad behaviors might it encourage? Consider a service industry you are familiar with or something like a call center or tax practice in your discussion.

Which of the following statements is true? O a. Activity-based costs per unit are always greater than volume-based costs per unit. O b. All the statements are false. O c. Different cost allocation methods are constructed so that they typically result in the same or similar estimates of how much it costs to make a product. O d. Activity-based costing typically provides less information about product costs while requiring more recordkeeping. O e. Volume-based costing has typically resulted in overcost for high-volume products and undercost for low-volume products. 11:40 ere to search A D a dx ENG 22-05-2021 hp delete home end an Ed 96 & 7\ 6. + backspace mum lock RO 7 V home g up K enter 50 pause B t shift 2Y end alt ctrl ins

) Why do product-costing systems based on a single, volume-based cost driver tend to over-cost high-volume products? What undesirable strategic effects can such distortion of product costs have?