The incremental reasoning is used in accepting or rejecting a business proposition or option. Whenever a manager takes decision he asks the question "Is it worthwhile?" The implicit criterion is that incremental benefit of the decision should exceed its incremental costs. Decision or action is worthwhile already if the decision maker or is the firm can expect to be better off than before. Original reasoning forces manager to examine the changes in total revenues and total costs resulting for changes in production, sales, price and related decisions. Wrong decisions may follow if the focus is on the concept of average rather than on marginal analysis.

The two basic components of incremental reasoning are 1) Incremental cost 2) Incremental Revenue