The following pension-related data pertain to Metro Recreation's noncontributory, defined benefit pension plan for 2018: ($ in 000s) Jan. 1 Dec. 31 Projected benefit obligation $ 4,800 $ 5,080 Accumulated benefit obligation 3,750 4,020 Plan assets (fair value) 5,580 6,025 Interest (discount) rate, 7% Expected return on plan assets, 10% Prior service cost?AOCI (from Dec. 31, 2017, amendment) 910 Net loss?AOCI 578 Average remaining service life: 10 years Gain due to changes in actuarial assumptions 52 Contributions to pension fund (end of year) 410 Pension benefits paid (end of year) 365 Required: Prepare a pension spreadsheet that shows the relationships among the various pension balances, shows the changes in those balances, and computes pension expense for 2018. (Enter credit amounts with a minus sign and debit amounts with a positive sign. Enter your answers in thousands (i. e. 200,000 should be entered as 200).)

Jameson manages a well-known cell phone company. this company has been voted as having the best cell-phone service. consumers appreciate the fact that they can call from almost anywhere in the world and the service still gets through. jameson knows that the company's product far surpasses that of the competition. one thing has been bothering him, though. in order to put so many resources into ensuring the best service, jameson has cut back on employees at the firm's customer call center. recently, consumers have begun complaining about long wait times when they call in with a problem or concern. although its cell phone service is still considered one of the best, customer satisfaction with the firm's customer service has plummeted. jameson does not understand why consumers are getting so upset. he believes the exceptional cell phone service more than makes up for long waiting periods and other issues with its customer service. "after all," he says, "they can't have it all. if i invest more in customer service, that means less investment on ensuring the quality of our product offering."refer to scenario. jameson has asked you, a marketing consultant, to give him advice. he cannot understand how a cell-phone company with the best product offering in the cell-phone service industry could get such low satisfaction ratings simply because the customer service is not up to par. you suggest that jameson has a narrowly defined view of the company's product offering. you tell jameson that successful marketers should define their products as what they

Best burger is a major fast food chain. its managers are motivated to grow the firm in order to increase their market power and change the industry structure in their favor. which of the following strategies is most associated with their motive for growth? a. employing celebrity spokespeople b. implementing automated burger-making machinery c. purchasing competitors d. increasing executive salaries

Aproduction line has three machines a, b, and c, with reliabilities of .96, .86, and .85, respectively. the machines are arranged so that if one breaks down, the others must shut down. engineers are weighing two alternative designs for increasing the line’s reliability. plan 1 involves adding an identical backup line, and plan 2 involves providing a backup for each machine. in either case, three machines (a, b, and c) would be used with reliabilities equal to the original three. a. compute overall system reliability under plan 1. (round your intermediate calculations and final answer to 4 decimal places.) reliability b. compute overall system reliability under plan 2. (round your intermediate calculations and final answer to 4 decimal places.) reliability c. which plan will provide the higher reliability? plan2plan1