1. Sweetwater Nursing Home has 150 beds. Its cost and volume data are as follows. Calculate its average and marginal costs for volume ranging from 100 to 140. What patterns do you see?
2. It takes a phlebotomist 15 minutes to complete a blood draw. The supplies for each draw cost $4, and the phlebotomist earns $20 per hour. The phlebotomy lab designed to accommodate 20,000 draws per year. Its rent is $80,000 per year. What are the average and incremental costs of a blood draw when the volume is 20,000? 10,000? What principle does your calculation illustrate?
3. How would the average and marginal costs change if the phlebotomist’s wage rose to $24 per hour? What principle does your calculation illustrate?
4. A new computer lets the phlebotomist complete a blood draw in 10 minutes. The supplies for each draw cost $4, and the phlebotomist earns $20 per hour. The phlebotomy lab is designed to accommodate 20,000 draws per year. Its rent is $80,000 per year. What is the marginal cost of a blood draw? What principle does your calculation illustrate?
5. Use the data in Exercise 5.7. How would the average and marginal costs change if the rent rose to $100,000? What principle does your calculation illustrate?