AA: defaults (auto-saved)
USD / std min, Cameroon
Cambodia 0.0251 · Cameroon efficiency 45.0%
CAMEROON / EARNED STANDARD MINUTE
USD
paid minute 0.0058 · efficiency 45.0%
CAMBODIA / EARNED STANDARD MINUTE
USD
paid minute 0.0163 · efficiency 65.0%
Parity at 23.1% Cameroon efficiency. At 45.0% Cameroon costs 48.7% less per standard minute than Cambodia.
GFT instruments / Work and value
Price the minute.
Then price the garment.
A lower wage can buy a more expensive minute. Compare historical Cameroon and Cambodia wage benchmarks through your own hours, efficiency and exchange-rate assumptions.
Operate the instrumentProcedural visualisation. Schematic, not a facility.
Cameroon 0.0129Cambodia 0.0251USD / std min
01 / The bench · wages only, scenario model
Is a low wage a low cost per garment?
At the illustrative operating assumptions, Cameroon costs 0.0129 USD per standard minute and Cambodia costs 0.0251 USD. These are calculated examples, not observed factory performance. Change the inputs. Read the result. Keep the assumptions visible.
Cameroon / cost per standard minute
USD / min
Cameroon is 48.7% lower in cost per standard minute than Cambodia under these assumptions. This is an output-adjusted wage comparison, conditional on the efficiency and hours you entered.
0.012890 USD × 5,616.0 standard min = 72.39 USD monthly wage. Calculated using unrounded values.
Move across the chart to read a cost and the Cameroon efficiency that would match it. Hover a table row to light its markers.
The crossover point
Efficiency decides where the advantage ends.
Cameroon reaches Cambodia’s entered cost at 23.1% efficiency. Above this crossing Cameroon costs less; below it Cameroon costs more.
Parity Cameroon
| Benchmark | Nominal / min | Effective / min | Per garment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cameroon | 0.0058 | 0.0129 | 0.155 |
| Cambodia | 0.0163 | 0.0251 | 0.302 |
All outputs are derived scenarios. Wage benchmarks are historical. The thread between bead and diamond measures the efficiency penalty, not a second wage.
02 / Hold the baseline, change the plan
Save A. Test B. Keep the assumptions.
Save the current inputs as A, then edit B above. Compare a ramp-up plan, a wage change or a different product. A stays in this page’s memory until reset or navigation. A shared link contains both scenarios when A is saved.
BB: current scenario
USD / std min, Cameroon
Cambodia 0.0251 · Cameroon efficiency 45.0%
Delta 0.0000 USD, no change yet: A and B both hold the programme defaults. Move B above, or tap a ghost tick to apply that preset to B.
| Input or result | Saved A | Current B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cameroon efficiency (%) | 45.0 | 45.0 | 0.00 |
| Cambodia efficiency (%) | 65.0 | 65.0 | 0.00 |
| Cameroon effective (USD/min) | 0.0129 | 0.0129 | 0.0000 |
| Cambodia effective (USD/min) | 0.0251 | 0.0251 | 0.0000 |
Step
72.39USD / month
0.0058USD / paid min
45.0%of paid time
0.0129USD / std min
0.155USD / garment
XAF 43,969 ÷ 655.957 × 1.08 = 72.39 USD
Cameroon 72.39 and Cambodia 204.00 USD on one scale.
12,480 paid minutes: 208 hours × 60. The bead lands on the cost axis.
5,616 earned of 12,480 paid minutes light up. The rest is paid time without standard output.
Penalty ×2.22. Cambodia’s thread runs 0.0163 to 0.0251.
Twelve diamonds strung as one garment of 12 standard minutes. Cambodia’s strand: 0.302.
- Wage72.39
- Paid minutes12,480
- Efficiency45.0%
- Standard minute0.0129
- Garment0.155
03 / Method · a common denominator
A standard minute is earned, not elapsed.
Comparing monthly wages alone silently assumes equal standard output in equal paid time. Five steps remove that assumption.
01 / 05
Start with the monthly wage.
One worker’s cash wage for the month. Cameroon’s XAF figure converts to USD through the euro peg and your USD per EUR assumption. Cambodia’s benchmark is already in USD.
wage in USD = wage in XAF ÷ 655.957 × USD per EUR02 / 05
Divide by paid minutes.
Paid minutes are the month’s paid hours times sixty. The wage divided by them is the nominal rate: the price of a minute on the clock.
nominal rate = wage ÷ (paid hours × 60)03 / 05
Apply efficiency.
Efficiency is earned standard minutes divided by paid minutes. Only that share of the paid time produces standard work, so the earned minutes are fewer than the paid ones.
earned minutes = paid minutes × efficiency04 / 05
Price the standard minute.
Divide the same wage by the earned minutes. The result equals the nominal rate divided by efficiency. The gap between the two rates is the efficiency penalty.
effective rate = wage ÷ earned minutes05 / 05
Price the garment.
Multiply the effective rate by the garment’s standard minutes. Both rows use the same garment, so the per-garment comparison keeps the ranking of the minute costs.
garment cost = effective rate × standard minutes
04 / Provenance · the model on one thread
The model stays visible.
Every default says where it comes from.
Monthly wage ÷ (monthly paid hours × 60 × efficiency). Standard garment minutes multiply the effective minute rate. All currencies reconcile through XAF 655.957 per EUR and your USD per EUR assumption.
04 / Standard minute 72.39 ÷ 5,616 = 0.0129 USD per standard minute
Method source
Programme evidence: R14 (Cameroon, 2024), R17 (Cambodia, 2024), R32 (euro peg). Operating assumptions are illustrative.
A planning aid. Not investment, legal or tax advice. Verify inputs and boundaries before an operational decision.
Read the model’s limits
The crossing holds Cambodia’s wage, hours and efficiency fixed while varying Cameroon’s efficiency. A crossing above the efficiency ceiling cannot be reached inside this model. Zero wages are accepted for sensitivity analysis; a zero reference wage has no finite relative cost percentage. A zero efficiency is rejected because no productive denominator exists.
Calculations retain full precision; the displayed monthly reconciliation uses rounded terms and therefore may show a small rounding difference. Reconciliation: effective rate × earned standard minutes = monthly wage.
The source record and the presets
The source record is the programme evidence register. Its domain references are not independent verification of a current law or a full article. No additional national wage benchmark has been introduced. Changing a wage makes that input your scenario assumption; the historical source remains the explanation of the reset value. The equal-efficiency preset uses an illustrative common efficiency of 65%. The reversal preset uses an illustrative Cameroon efficiency of 15%, leaving the other defaults fixed.
Keep dated evidence beside the assumption.
Three defaults carry a dated source. Five are illustrative operating choices and three rows summarise the derived outputs. Select or hover a row to light its thread in the sticky mini-loom.
| Input / Output | Default / Value | Status | Feeds knot | Action |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01Cameroon wage | XAF 43,969 / month | Sourced, dated | knot 01 · wage | |
| 02Cambodia wage | USD 204 / month | Sourced, dated | knot 01 · wage | |
| 03Euro peg | XAF 655.957 / EUR | Sourced, dated | knot 01 · wage | |
| 04USD per EUR | 1.08 | Illustrative | knot 01 · wage | |
| 05Paid hours | 208 / month, each row | Illustrative | knot 02 · paid minutes | |
| 06Efficiency | Cameroon 45%; Cambodia 65% | Illustrative | knot 03 · efficiency | |
| 07Garment work content | 12 standard min | Illustrative | knot 05 · garment | |
| 08Optional benchmark | USD 150; 208 hours; 55% | Illustrative | off by default | |
| D1Effective minute rate | Cameroon 0.0129; Cambodia 0.0251 USD | Derived output | knot 04 · standard minute | |
| D2Garment wage cost | Cameroon 0.155; Cambodia 0.302 USD | Derived output | knot 05 · garment | |
| D3Parity crossover | 23.1% Cameroon efficiency | Derived output | knot 03 · efficiency |
05 / On the floor · illustrative
Not every paid minute is an earned minute.
Earned view: the price of the minutes that produced standard work.
Each month is woven from its paid hours: 26 paid days across, 8 paid hours down, one cell per hour. Lit cells are earned standard minutes; dim cells are paid time that produced no standard output. Slide the efficiency and watch the cloth fill.
Cameroon / one worker, one paid month
USD per earned standard minute
5,616 of 12,480 paid minutes earned · about 468 garments of 12 standard minutes per month (illustrative). 55.0% of paid time produced no standard output.
Cambodia / one worker, one paid month
USD per earned standard minute
8,112 of 12,480 paid minutes earned · about 676 garments of 12 standard minutes per month (illustrative). 35.0% of paid time produced no standard output.
Cameroon cost per garment, now and after a ten-point efficiency gain
0.1550.127USD / garment
−0.028, 18.2% lower, with wages and hours held fixed.
Paid hours include whatever paid idle time the wage covers; excluding that time would understate the denominator’s relationship to the actual payroll boundary.
Garments one paid month covers, at the standard minutes you set
standard minutes per garment
The ceiling and the bounds
A measured result above that ceiling calls for a separate study of the standard and the time boundary. It does not justify silently clamping a factory’s data. The accepted hour and wage bounds are numerical modelling limits, not statements about lawful pay or working time.
Cameroon cost per garment at seven efficiencies, against Cambodia’s line
Cambodia 0.302
Cameroon at 45.0% costs 0.155 USD per garment. Press a column to set the efficiency; wages and hours stay as entered.
A low result therefore supports a question for diligence, rather than a location recommendation or an investment return forecast.
Wages only: 0 of 13 named costs flagged for your own data.
06 / Operating interpretation
Measure comparable output before choosing a wage.
01 / Factory manager / the ramp-up
Use the crossing as a ramp-up milestone, not as a target to push people harder.
Record paid minutes and earned standard minutes for the same operators, product and period. If training improves measured efficiency, change that input and see how much wage cost per garment falls. Do not treat the crossing as a target to increase work pressure. Check safe work practices, downtime, skill mix, staffing balance and standard accuracy together.
02 / Engineer / the standard
Check the standard minute before you interpret the efficiency ratio.
If two factories use different operation bulletins, allowances or quality definitions, their reported efficiencies are not directly comparable. This tool caps efficiency at the nominal standard ceiling for clarity.
03 / Investor / the sensitivity
Save A, edit B, and read one narrow component of conversion cost.
An investor can compare the illustrative ramp-up scenario with a later operating scenario by saving A and editing B. The result isolates wage cost only. Standard garment minutes must represent comparable accepted work; quality differences require an explicit additional model.
04 / What the wage leaves out
A wage-only bar is not a cost comparison.
Press a cost to flag it for your own data. Each flagged cost sits outside this wage-only bar. The bar is a schematic, not a cost share.
07 / Follow the measurement
Read labour alongside skills and utilisation.
The related research catalogue holds three papers on the work around this wage model. Each card below draws a figure from the model on this page. Each paper page states its own status.
WP09 · read from the model 0.0387 · 0.0129 · 0.0089 USD per standard minute at 15, 45 and 65% Cameroon efficiency
OEE line instrument ↗Availability, performance and quality under an explicit production-time boundary. Its denominator differs from this model’s paid-time denominator.The measurement approach ↗Why a result should travel with its assumptions and evidence. Export the CSV with any comparison so the inputs stay reviewable.
Current scenarioCameroon 0.0129Cambodia 0.0251Parity 23.1%
08 / The crossing · where the advantage ends
A wage advantage must survive the production floor.
Use measured standard work, consistent paid hours and comparable quality. This instrument isolates wages; it does not establish total factory competitiveness or a lawful payroll.
Cameroon is 48.7% lower in cost per standard minute than Cambodia under these assumptions. This is an output-adjusted wage comparison, conditional on the efficiency and hours you entered.
Open the instrument with this scenarioCameroon / garment0.155
Cambodia / garment0.302
USD per garment at Cameroon efficiency 45.0% · Parity 23.1%
Final parity scrubber · carry the garment thread forward
Parity 23.1% · Current efficiency 45.0% · Carry-over 0.155 USD / garment
Next instrument in the thread · resource intensityWater, energy and carbon per garment calculator ↗
0.155 USD / garmentCarry 0.155 USD (Cameroon) and 0.302 USD (Cambodia) per garment into the resource-intensity boundary.