Kinney 8e SM Ch03

Absorption costing is used for all outside reports. All non-direct fixed costs are allocated using various allocation bases as indicated throughout the project. The Company does not use a full ABC costing system; however, it does employee some of the ABC concepts in the budgeting process.

The type of activity to estimate behavior of costs depends on the cost. Macy’s would use the number of labor hours to estimate labor costs and sales dollars to estimate cost of goods sold. The fixed costs remain unchanged in total as the level of activity changes however; fixed costs are divided evenly per finance period.

According to this method, every unit of the product is assigned all direct, fixed, and variable costs. This method includes the cost of direct materials and labor as well as a portion of the overhead costs associated with it in the final costing of every unit of the product.

Preparing different income statements captures information in diverse ways to facilitate decision making on internal matters. The management needs to understand cost behavior in order to control the costs. Besides the production costs, changing sales patterns affects profitability and there is a need to achieve better sales accuracy after understanding cost behavior. Variable costing also captures information about the impact of changing operation on profitability and the management is better placed to make pricing decisions to maximize

In cost accounting, the lack of understanding of the accounting and finance process by the business manager is an incentive for the unethical employee to manipulate the system. Ethics help management in: · Providing factual and true information to its users, · Determining the nominal price of its products, · Maintaining appropriate professional relationships, and · Maintaining efficacy In today?s world of corporate scandals, an appreciation of ethical standards and a commitment to the proper reporting and disclosure of financial information needs to be constantly reinforced within the area of accounting. Absorption and Variable Costing: Absorption Costing: All costs (fixed and variable) of production are product costs. Which means under absorption costing, both variable and fixed manufacturing costs are included as a part of the cost of the product manufactured.

Because the absorption-costing model only deducts the fixed manufacturing overhead costs for units sold in the current period, the COO was able to show an increase in profits between 2002 and 2003. What the COO failed to report to the stakeholders on the 2003 income statement was the outstanding fixed manufacturing overhead costs for the remaining 35,000 units

All the costs by a company can be broken into two categories, fixed costs and variable costs. Costs that are independent of output are called fixed costs. Fixed costs remain constant throughout the relevant range and are usually considered sunk for the relevant range. Buildings and machinery are included inputs that cannot be adjusted in the short term. They are only fixed in relation to the quantity of production for a certain time period. The cost of all inputs is variable, in the long run.

In determining the fixed costs per unit for the period for absorption costing (not needed for variable costing since the entire fixed cost is expensed as a cost of the month, not a cost of units), you spread the fixed costs across all the units made. Since production was increased substantially, the fixed cost per unit was reduced:

Under the new cost system, two broad sources of costs were identified: manufacturing and SM&A. All costs within these categories were reclassified as either volume driven or order driven. Hence, four cost pools were set up.

One example of this fixed vs. variable costs transition would be telesales, instead of hiring 45 people to work inbound and outbound phone calls one could pay a service to answer the phones at a cost per minute. Using a phone service and experiencing high call volumes, the cost would a variable cost as a reflection of sales. Having 45 salaried telesales employees and only

The keen competition requires companies to consider the cost variable. But traditional budgeting method separates the cost into variable and fixed, put the emphasis on the variable cost and consider the fixed cost implacable.

In a traditional, volume-based product-costing system, only a single predetermined overhead rate is used. All manufacturing-overhead costs are combined into one cost pool, and they are applied to products on the basis of a single cost driver that is closely related to production volume. The most frequently used cost drivers in traditional product-costing systems are direct-labor hours, direct-labor dollars, machine hours, and units of production.

We will examine the given data from the case and compare the unit costs from the company’s current costing system (traditional costing) and from activity-based costing. We will also highlight other qualitative data in consideration with the numerical factors that may result to a significant change on our recommendation.

There are different costs that respond to the different activities like variable costs are directly associated with the products sold. The cost behavior patterns of selling, general, administrative, and other operating expenses are determined, and these expenses are budgeted accordingly. For example, sales commissions will be a function of the forecast of either sales dollars or units. The historical pattern of some expenses will be affected by changes in strategy that management may plan for the budget period. In a participative budgeting system, the manager of each department or cost responsibility center will submit the anticipated cost of the department 's planned activities, along with descriptions of the activities and explanations of significant differences from past experience. After review by higher levels of management, and perhaps negotiation, a final budget will be established. Because of the necessity to recognize cost behavior patterns for planning and control purposes, overhead costs will be classified as variable or fixed.

INTRODUCTION Target costing originated in Japan in the 1960s, though it remained a secret for years. Since the 1980s, however, when target costing was widely recognized as a major factor for the superior competitive position of Japanese companies, extensive efforts have been made to convey target costing to Western companies. Many large companies in North America and Europe have tried to adopt target costing to enhance their cost management and, thus, increase their competitiveness. Consequently, many variations of target costing have been developed and are being used in different countries. Since target costing, like many other management