Thus, the company’s weighted average cost of capital is 8.21 percent.
Next we need to know the amount of capital employed. Clearly, the amount paid for buildings, land, and machinery must be included. However, other expenditures meant to have a long-term payoff, such as research and development, employee training, and so on, should also be included. Despite the fact that the latter are classified by GAAP as expenses, EVA is an internal management accounting measure, and therefore, these expenses can be thought of as the investments that they truly are. Cornerstone 10.3 shows the how and why of calculating the weighted average cost of capital, the total dollar amount of capital employed, and EVA.