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How much total labor time do you think goes into a single pencil? And if it's a non-trivial amount, then how in the world are pencils remotely as cheap as they

How much total labor time do you think goes into a single pencil? And if it's a non-trivial amount, then how in the world are pencils remotely as cheap as they actually are? Yes all those steps take work but you get a truly ridiculous amount of ore out of one person labor hour, enough for God knows how many thousands of pencils. I think you're confusing total labor volume involved in an entire supply chain that makes billions of pencils each year, and then what the person is responding to which is that you divide the total amount of labor spent by the total number of swords produced and it still ends up being hundreds to thousands of hours of labor per sword. This isn't remotely true of pencils using modern automated factory production.

CydeWeys 6y ago
And for what it's worth, it seems like you can get bulk pencils for 6 cents on Amazon. It's probably half that by the pallet from a wholesaler. 3 cents means that the labor cost embedded in a single pencil is less than 1 cent. These production lines are entirely automated.
- tsjq 6y ago
  also we need to account for the labour and cost that's gone into the production automation equipment .
  - imtringued 6y ago
    Labor and cost are exactly the same thing. If something is expensive it means it took lots of people's time to work on it. If you produce a pencil for 5 cents then you may spend 3 cents on materials and 2 cents on manufacturing equipment. The cost of the materials represent the wages of the people who extracted the graphite and harvested the wood. The cost of the manufacturing equipment represents the wages of the people who built it.
    - littlestymaar 6y ago
      Labor and cost are almost the same thing: cost is labor costs + capital costs (how much the woodland owner and the factory shareholders are making). Usually the labor cost represents most of the cost, but not always (for regular oil, it's not the case). You could also add taxes and other government-related costs, but since most governments run on a deficit, it would account as a negative cost overall.
  - CydeWeys 6y ago
    That's already accounted for in the price of a pencil. They're not being sold for a loss.

CydeWeys 6y ago

And for what it's worth, it seems like you can get bulk pencils for 6 cents on Amazon. It's probably half that by the pallet from a wholesaler. 3 cents means that the labor cost embedded in a single pencil is less than 1 cent. These production lines are entirely automated.

tsjq 6y ago
also we need to account for the labour and cost that's gone into the production automation equipment .
- imtringued 6y ago
  Labor and cost are exactly the same thing. If something is expensive it means it took lots of people's time to work on it. If you produce a pencil for 5 cents then you may spend 3 cents on materials and 2 cents on manufacturing equipment. The cost of the materials represent the wages of the people who extracted the graphite and harvested the wood. The cost of the manufacturing equipment represents the wages of the people who built it.
  - littlestymaar 6y ago
    Labor and cost are almost the same thing: cost is labor costs + capital costs (how much the woodland owner and the factory shareholders are making). Usually the labor cost represents most of the cost, but not always (for regular oil, it's not the case). You could also add taxes and other government-related costs, but since most governments run on a deficit, it would account as a negative cost overall.
- CydeWeys 6y ago
  That's already accounted for in the price of a pencil. They're not being sold for a loss.