Cost should be viewed in terms of resources and responsibilities.
Cost is the sacrifice of resources necessary to meet responsibilities.
Responsibilities are delegated throughout the University community, and costs are incurred to meet each responsibility. Project costs differ from departmental expenses in that project costs should be a measurement of all the resources sacrificed on behalf of a given project. Only through the measurement of cost can the financial viability of a project be evaluated. Direct costs are those costs that can be identified specifically with a particular responsibility, or that can be directly assigned to a responsibility with relative ease and a high degree of accuracy. Identification with a particular responsibility, rather than the nature of the goods or services involved, is the determining factor in distinguishing a cost as a direct cost.