Costs, costs, costs, how are they different, or are they different?  Well according to the textbook, there are several different costs associated with a firm.  One of which is known as the fixed cost to produce products.  Fixed costs are what they sound like, fixed.  These costs do not change according to how many products are being produced.  Some examples of fixed costs would be the costs of materials to produce the product, doesn't matter the number of products being produced, the cost of the material is always the same.  Another type of cost is the variable costs.  Variable costs, according to the book, are costs that fluctuate with relation to the number of products being produced.  An example of such would be when a firm is producing more products in a given day and running more shifts to do so, the cost rises with the increased production, but the material costs for more products would remain the same-fixed cost.  To determine the average fixed costs, one would be to divide the fixed costs by the number of units produced.  And to determine the average variable costs, you would take the variable costs divided by the number of units produced as well.  To determine the important cost, the total cost, you would simply add the variable cost to the fixed cost.