Question

A firm is considering moving from the United States to Mexico. The firm pays its U.S. workers $30.00 per hour. Currently, U.S. workers have a marginal product of 45 units, whereas Mexican workers have a marginal product of 9 units. In order for the firm to reduce its wage cost per unit of output by moving to Mexico, the wages in Mexico must be below_________per hour.

Answer 1

Answer: $6.00

Explanation:

From the question, we can see that the productivity in the United States is (45/9) = 5 times higher than that of Mexico.

Therefore, the wages in Mexico should be 5 times lower than the wages paid to the workers in the United States. This will be:

= $30.00 / 5

= $6.00

Therefore, in order for the firm to reduce its wage cost per unit of output by moving to Mexico, the wages in Mexico must be below $6.00 per hour.