Which of the following is true about learning effects?

a. tend to be more significant when a technologically complex task is repeated.

b. tend to be more significant when simple steps in an assembly process are performed over and over again.

c. lead to diseconomies of scale.

d. result in unit manufacturing costs increasing by a certain amount each time output is increased.

e. suggest that production costs increase because of increasing labor productivity.

a. tend to be more significant when a technologically complex task is repeated.

Explanation:

The learning effects consist of observed improvements in the production process that come from learning technologies. This directly reflects the productivity of companies and consequently the average unit cost of products, which become cheaper as learning is assimilated in the production process. This is explained by the reduction in production time resulting from the learning rate in the production of a given product.

For example, think of smartphone production. Initially the production was more expensive and time consuming. Over time, technologies have evolved and corporate employees have become more productive by learning to deal with production process technologies. Thus, the production time of smartphones has decreased, along with the unit cost of production.