An article in the wall street journal discussing the federal reserve's monetary policy included the following observation: "fed officials have been signaling since last year that they expected to raise rates in 2015 pushing up the value of the currency and contributing to the economic slowdown officials now confront."
a. what does "pushing up the value of the currency" mean?
b. why would the fed’s increasing u. s. interest rates cause the value of the currency to increase?
c. why would an increase in the value of the currency contribute to a slowdown in the growth of the u. s. economy?

Oerstman, inc. uses a standard costing system and develops its overhead rates from the current annual budget.the budget is based on an expected annual output of 120,000 units requiring 480,000 direct labor hours.(practical capacity is 500,000 hours)annual budgeted overhead costs total $772,800, of which $556,800 is fixed overhead.a total of 119,300 units, using 478,000 direct labor hours, were produced during the year.actual variable overhead costs for the year were $260,400 and actual fixed overhead costs were $555,450.required: 1. compute the fixed overhead spending variance and indicate if favorable or unfavorable.2. compute the fixed overhead volume variance and indicate if favorable or unfavorable.