Question

The European Union can use workers to produce personal protective equipment (P) and medicine (M). The EU can produce 1 ton of P with 6 workers, 1 ton of M with 8 workers. It has 120,000 workers available to allocate between producing these 2 goods. After speaking to several national medical associations you calculate that Europe needs 1000 tons of personal protective equipment to keep hospitals staffed. How many tons of medicine will Europe be able to produce if it produces this required quantity of personal protective equipment?

Answer 1

After allocating the necessary workers to produce the required 1000 tons of personal protective equipment (P), the EU will have enough remaining workers to produce 14,250 tons of medicine (M).

Step-by-step explanation:

The European Union has a total of 120,000 workers available to produce personal protective equipment (P) and medicine (M). According to the provided information, it takes 6 workers to produce 1 ton of P, and 8 workers to produce 1 ton of M. The EU needs to produce 1000 tons of P to keep hospitals staffed. Since 6 workers are required to produce 1 ton of P, we need to calculate how many workers will be allocated for producing 1000 tons of P.

• Number of workers to produce 1000 tons of P = 6 workers/ton * 1000 tons = 6000 workers.
• Number of workers available for M after producing P = Total workers - Workers used for P = 120,000 workers - 6000 workers = 114,000 workers.
• Since it takes 8 workers to produce 1 ton of M, the number of tons of M Europe can produce is = Number of workers available for M / Workers needed per ton of M = 114,000 workers / 8 workers/ton = 14,250 tons.

Therefore, after producing the required quantity of personal protective equipment, the European Union will be able to produce 14,250 tons of medicine with the remaining workers.