Consider the following production and cost data for two products, L and C: Product L Product C Contribution margin per unit $24 $18 Machine-hours needed per unit 3 hours 2 hours The company can only perform 14,200 machine hours each period, due to limited skilled labor and there is unlimited demand for each product. What is the largest possible total contribution margin that can be realized each period?

Whenever a company is faced with a limiting factor i.e a resource in short supply, the company should allocate the resource to the product with he highest contribution per unit of the scare resource

The highest contribution from the 4,200 machine hours could be determined as follows:

Step 1 : Contribution per hour

Contribution per machine hour = contribution per unit/ machine hour

Product L Product C

$ $

Contribution 24 18

Machine hour 3 2

Contribution per hour 8/ hr 9/hr

Ranking 2nd 1st

Product C would be produced using the entire machine hours. Doing so would generate the highest contribution possible.

Contribution = contribution per hour × machine hours

= 9 × 14,200 = $127,800

Largest possible total contribution margin = $127,800