Educational Inequality Essay

All through history of America education has served very crucially in both the political and economic needs. The goals of education in America include: all children have access toll start school ready to learn, 90 percent increase in High school graduates, development of graduates who demonstrate competency in various areas, create a lead in mathematics and science achievement in the world, literacy among all the adults and possession of the knowledge and skills essential to strive in a global economy and exercise the rights and duties of citizenship, schools free of substance abuse, and full of discipline, access to professional equipping programs and lastly promotion of partnerships in schools that will intensify the parental participation in the whole dimension of the children . The US established an Act of Parliament in 2001 known as The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) that aims at bringing reforms in the education system. It aims in maintaining high standards and strategies in order to improve education system and eliminate the educational inequality. Education dates many eras back in history and quite surprisingly so do education inequality. Educational inequality refers to the nonexistence of equal chances that individuals have as a result of differences in quality education among other factors. Generally in America and the entire world a variety of educational inequalities exist. The imbalances continue along socioeconomic and cultural lines. Research shows that slightly in the across the world more than one billion adults illiterate. The United Nations indicates that of these one billion uneducated grown-ups more than 2/3rds are women. Further it shows that the fourth grade learners who grow up in lesser, low-income societies are already about three grade levels behind their peers in high-income societies (TFA, 2008). By the time these students are 18 they have not yet completed in their high school, with only a ratio of one is to ten. These educational imbalances dishonorably limit the life scenarios of the children who grow up in poor societies who are over 13 million children. The disparities incline inexplicably affect minority groups comprising African-American, Latino/Hispanic, and Native American children, who are three times as probable to live in low-income regions (TFA, 2008). Children in low-income societies and areas in the world regularly face trials such as underprivileged healthcare, nourishment, and insufficient housing. While their counterparts enjoy concerted cultivation, exposure to the information and resources, better nutrition and recreation facilities all of which are important in better performance. Schools and school systems time and again lack the same resources to encounter and cope with the students’ full potential. Various factors are precursors of inequality, and on the other hand education inequality becomes a factor in propagation of the factors themselves, these include economic, social, political, technological and cultural influences and the education system, delivery of education etc. The factors can either be endogenous or exogenous: either external or factors within the education system itself that cause inequality: nonexistence of schooling facilities, poor administrative environment of the school-system. Absenteeism, truancy, low attainment in school and dropouts are several of the outcomes of pitiable structural environment of school-system. Segregation has been named as the greatest cause of inequality. Segregation actually means stratification or classification of people in a society due to a predominant attribute they possess. Racial, gender, social, economic segregation among others have an adverse effect on education. The discrimination that arises hinders people from accessing better and desired education. In the history of America the inequality of education has existed in regard to race, gender and sociocultural and economic factors. Through the transitory of slavery, equality of education was one of the rights that were formerly withdrawn from the Black people. The grant of equality was a factor that would help in social integration attainment. Its over one hundred and twenty years but still the black children have not really achieved the amount of financial success White children have in life after school. The objective of education is to reserve the present class structure. Ever since the eradication of servitude, racist whites have used the educational classification to retain their sovereignties and to preserve blacks unfortunate. Philosophies of marginal subservience are spread, and the misrepresented fall into the trap of believing that race defines astuteness, by means of lopsided test statistics to aid back their thoughts. Ranking in social achievement simulations adopt social movement in an exposed challenge, based on distinction as measured by years of schooling and practical capability. This open challenge assumes an identical rudimentary education. The Supreme Court governed that â€Å"separate but equal† schools were unauthorized, those who would avert incorporation had to find new methods to negate this elementary education. This is so equivalent to tracking where by children are separated in terms of their social classes. Various sociological schools of thoughts have arisen to explain this phenomenon. Some of the dominant include the functionalist theory; this paradigm aims in delineating the functions of education and asserts that education serves the requirements of the society. In its manifest form education communicates elementary knowledge and skills across generations and on the other hand it socializes people into the society’s mainstream through its latent aims: the â€Å"moral education,† which helped forms a more-cohesive social arrangement by bringing together people from assorted backgrounds. It echoes the historical apprehension of â€Å"Americanizing† settlers. This theory was formulated by Emile Durkheim and has since been advanced by other scholars. Functionalists argue that other underlying roles of education are such as transmission of core values and social control. Functionalist hold that education serves the purpose of socializing individuals to learn the social norms, beliefs, knowledge, attitudes and values that they will require as industrious citizens at the different (unequal) levels of society this is achieved mainly through â€Å"the hidden curriculum†, at the same time education sorts and rank persons for engagement in the labor market, individuals who achievement highly are trained for the most important jobs and in recompense, earn very high incomes. Thereby the most capable individuals get the greatly aspired occupations. The sensibly constructed educational goals and curriculum assists in develop identities and self-esteem. However, Sennet and Cobb (2005) cites that to have confidence that aptitude single-handedly determines who is to be rewarded is unfounded. Meighan concurs, adding that a majority of in dividuals who are capable of performing but are limited by their working class background fail to achieve the status they deserve limited by the cultural experiences and deprivations. The cycle persists with schooling backing continuity, which in turn maintains social order. Lucas, 2009 supposed that this progression, whereby some schoolchildren were named and labeled educational failures, is an essential activity which education as a part of the social system, performed for the whole and smooth functioning of the society. Another model called the conflict theory maintains that the function of education is to continue with the social inequality and maintain the power of the powerful in the society. Conflict theorists scrutinize the identical purposes of education as functionalists. However the functionalists view education inequality as a advantageous contribution to an ordered society and that helps maintains the social order while the conflict theorists perspective is that the educational system is a system that propagates the status quo by stultifying the lower classes into being submissive workers. They together concur that the educational system practices sor ting, but they disagree about how it enacts that sorting. Functionalist’s prerogative that schools categorize centered upon distinction; conflict theorists contend that schools classify along distinctive class and ethnic lines. Conflict theorists hold that, schools train those in the working classes to accept their position as a lower-class member of society. The conflicts identify several factors to defend their position: property taxes finance most schools this therefore means affluent districts have more money hence better funded schools. They can have enough money to pay greater wages, appealing to more professional teachers, and newer texts books and more technology. This therefore translates to better performance and development of more able students. Symbolic interactionists is yet another theoretical approach in explaining education inequality, symbolic interactionists say that society is conceivable since people have the capability to converse with one another by means of symbols. Further they add that people act toward others, objects, and events on the foundation of the connotations we convey to them. Subsequently, we experience and understand the world as a constructed- created reality. On educa tion they restrict their examination to what we directly observe happening in the schools. Additionally they lay a focus on how educators anticipations stimulates student performance, observations, and attitudes. Additionally researchers across the globe have come up with more theoretical methodologies to elucidate developments in educational inequality: the theory of industrialization, reproduction theories, MMI and EMI. theory of industrialization give its explanations on educational inequality that with increase with industrialization and modernization there would be decline in inequality in the education sector and as a result other sectors e.g. income distribution and resource allocation. As an outcome of economic, institutional, and cultural transformation, arising from improved technology and innovations, greater sections of the countries inhabitants will benefit, thereby reducing the factors that increase inequality. The theory asserts that access to education, and their educational achievement would be progressively rely on merit rather than cultural and economic background. Reproduction theories state that the inequality is a making of the education system; this can be simply inferr ed to mean that the systems are structured to reproduce the unequal social structure. Stratification in the society will continue even if the education enlarges because the powerful figures will continue to make strategies that maintain this benefit. Therefore there will forever be an intergenerational sinuousness of inequality. Maximally maintained inequality (MMI) cites the educational system expansion doesn’t specifically major on lower class but all the students, this theory was formulated in an attempt to answer why educational development and egalitarian transformations do not decrease educational disparity among socioeconomic divisions. Relative risk aversion (RRA) proposes larger disparity lessening is probable and is subject to altering costs and customs. Effectively maintained inequality (EMI) proposes that significant inequality decrease in equality is indescribable since qualitatively diverse categories of education preserve far-reaching inequality, even at collective conversions. When inundation is attained at a specific level and inequity in realization degenerates, quantifiable inequity may be swapped by qualitative. This means that upper classes will be better equipped. Concentrating on tracking, EMI openly deliberates the established administration of diverse educational systems, thus accentuating the importance of including the institutional facet. Theorists and researchers agree that the inequality in education is as a result of segregation and class differences more specifically brought about by income-economic factors. If the bridge in student achievement is to be crossed policies that emphasize inequality elimination and new initiatives have to be developed. The structure and the process of schooling should also be taken into consideration to achieve better performance. Reduction of race and sociocultural discrimination also will go a long way in improving the state of education in America. The state commitment to policies that ensure equal distribution of the resources and inception of programs that are aimed at improving the welfare of the people should be adopted.

Being Single Today Final

I strongly believe that being a single person is easier and carries fewer stigmas than it was 10 years ago. The Census Bureau reported last year that approximately 97 million Americans above 18 years were single with most of them having never married before. People have whole-heartedly embraced single hood way of life as normal. The initial tradition of women thinking marriage immediately after college has been abolished. Although most single people above 18 years look forward to marriage at a certain point in their lives, this does not hinder them from working hard to achieve in life.The effects of everyday wedding celebrations and the many dating sites have received neutral effects on most youth. (Sharon, pp 98) Happiness has proved to be acquired or created and traditional way of doing things and defining happiness has changed. I am single at 20 and happy. People have accepted the single way of life and the stigma attached to it is declining. There has emerged alternative ways of leading better single life. Perception about single hood way of life has changed to be more accommodative. Society is slowly recognizing the needs of the single people who were initially not excluded in work policies and tax codes.Books are published to enlighten the single on how they can be happy despite their single status. Such books include: Better Single than Sorry, A No Regret Guide to Loving Yourself and Never Settling. Such books encourage the single people (Sharon, pp 99) Single people can enjoy their life and maximize their happiness even when they are alone. In restaurant, parties and movies they can have fun by concentrating on themselves and the activities carried out at the respective places. Even in wedding parties one can socialize with people present and celebrate the day’s activity without thinking about relationship.(Jennifer, pp 110) Relationships are not working out nowadays, people are getting married today and divorcing tomorrow. This has made people s hy away from marriages or relationship. Some are worried about finding the right partner and have ended up staying single for longer. As more women are gaining education and staying and striving to achieve more in their career goals they are forfeiting traditional rules non relationships /marriage and motherhood (Jessica Yellin pg 108) I believe being single has more benefits or advantages than when in a relationships.Most of my friends share this conviction. People have different moodiness and emotional changes. If one is in a relationship one has to cope up with the other person’s feelings. The baggage of tolerating another person’s feelings is out of the question in the single hood way of life. http://www. aretax. furniture. com/article/article4. doc An old friend once collapsed and on rushing her to the hospital she had a feeding disorder. It was to our great astonishment that she had foregone meals for a couple of days in trying to cut weight as her spouse always complained she was growing fat.Such problems are hard to be encountered by the single people. One is able to appreciate one’s self and does not have to go overboard to simply please a partner. I believe single hood way of life will improve an individual’s personality. It can help one become a well-rounded person as one’s free time can be used in having fun as well as acquiring skills beneficial to the individual. It enhances independence a value that is envied by many. Instead of searching for friends to hand out with that time can be used in productive activities that will go a long way in ensuring their self-improvement.Recently, a woman took his husband to court over their finances. The lady was financially stable, a good job, house and care. Her family was also of a higher status socially. The husband was accused of misusing the wife’s finances. I just stopped and wondered where one’s independence goes on getting into relationships. One doesnâ €™t have control of his or her own finances. I think such problems would not arise if one chooses a single way of life, as they would have complete monitoring of what is their own. I went picking my cousin one day, as there was a movie to watch.Everyone was talking about it and it was a must watch. The disappointment on my face cannot be explained when she told me that the boyfriend was coming over and they were going to watch a football match. I pitied her since I knew very well she doesn’t like football. Is it this slavery? One doesn’t have for activities that they please with a single hood way of life one has the time to spend with their friends and don’t have to sacrifice what is meaningful to them (http://www. avetexfurniture. com/article/article4. doc)I wonder how I would deal with irritating habits of a partner. I agree nature has it that all people are different. Everyone is unique in his or her own ways. There are those who snore and those who do no t? Compatibility of divergent personalities could be difficult. For instance, I would not sleep peacefully when someone is snoring next to me. My single hood way of life eliminates such worries. I do not have to worry or deal with someone else’s personal habits that are unacceptable or irritating to me. I have seen couples break up due to very trivial issues.Trivial they may appear to me, but the involved parties handle them with a lot of intensity. A lady broke up with her boyfriend of six years simply because she bought a car without his consent. I wondered aloud don’t rights and independence exist anymore? Must I seek for another person’s point of view before responding to issues that affect me or must I seek another person’s consent before doing anything? Single people do not have to undergo such problems. They can spontaneously decide on the course of action to be taken in responding to any issue.Freedom of choice is best exercised when one is single than when one is in a relationship or is married. (http://www. avetexfurniture. com/article/article4. doc ) Relationship demand time and resources. People in relationships buy each other presents or gifts, which cost money. Treats also involve finances. To flourish parties involved must spend ample time together; this is not the case for the singles. The time they would have spent together is used more productive activities like mounding one’s career. Efforts are channeled towards career growth and development.Most single people develop their career to great heights and are able to raise their social status. Single people do not have to answerable to anyone. They are free to choose the direction of their life without prior consultations. They are masters of their own life and destiny. One doesn’t have to worry of why they interact with, as would be the case in relationships when a man may be offended if his lady interacted well with other gents or vice versa. One is i n a position of expressing their feelings in words without constraints. References: Jennifer Benjamin.How to love your time alone. Even the most social chicks occasionally find themselves flying solo pg. 109-111 http://www. aretexfurniture. com/article/article3. doc Jameson Oliver . 10 benefits of being single http://www. avetexfurniture. com/article/article4. doc Sharon Jayson. Free as a bird and loving it, more Americans are happy to marry later †¦ or not at all. Pg. 98- 99 http://www. avetexfurniture. com/article/article1. doc Jessica Yellin. Single Female and Desperate No More, 2006. pg. 106/108 http://www. avetexfurniture. com/article/article2. doc

History of Jazz Fusion. Social Changes and Jazz Fusion Essay

History of Jazz Fusion. Social Changes and Jazz Fusion - Essay Example When looking at the jazz fusions of the 1960s and 1970s, it can be seen that there is a direct relationship to both the expression of artistic advancement as well as the commerce which is associated with this. The combination of both intents by the various artists is one which has created several formulas for jazz fusion and has led to different sounds as well as new commercial opportunities for musicians. The formats and the interest which is surrounding this continues to remain as a main initiative with the idea of jazz and the promotion of specific formulas which can be used for higher interest among individuals who enjoy this particular expression of music. History of Jazz Fusion The propagation of jazz in the 1960s and the 1970s was associated with changes which were occurring in music during the time. Traditionally, jazz was known as an experimental style and was based on improvisation. However, the jazz form was constructed as the foundational movement with the ability to add in extra components to this. The construction of the jazz tradition was based first on the social roots, which was inclusive of innovation and experimentation as the basis of the art. The styles and periods that were before this time began with the blues, which emerged into swing, free jazz and jazz be-bop. Each of these related to finding a diverse way of expression, moving into improvisation that would be accepted and looking at more complex ways of examining style and expression. By looking at these components, there was the ability to create a different understanding and progression of jazz and the meanings which it held in contemporary society (DeVeaux, 1991: pg. 525). The historical aspects of jazz that led to the jazz – fusion of the 1960s was also inclusive of historical associations with popular culture of the time as well as the jazz culture that was well – known. The ideal of innovation, progression and the invention of new sounds was a part of the foundatio nal formula of jazz. However, the 1960s and 1970s began to move into these formulas not only as aspects of experimentation, but also moved into the ability to change the styles according to the sounds that were common during the time. This stayed in line with the jazz tradition and was able to tap into the cultural styles that were beginning to form in the contemporary society, such as rock and roll as well as pop. The concept of American jazz and the several branches which grew from this emerged during this time, specifically in light of the innovation and foundational ideologies of experimentation that were a part of jazz (Peretti, 1997: p. 35). Social Changes and Jazz Fusion Another aspect which was changing the way in which jazz was presented in society was from the cultural and social affiliations with music. During this time frame, jazz was known to be at a crossroads. There were traditions of jazz which were well – known to many; however, these were considered classics and often couldn’t be expressed in the same way. Repeating the same expressions in jazz through the traditional forms and the blues elements became one which didn’t work with the needs for jazz. At the same time, there was an emergence of cultural and social expressions that were based on diversity of thought as well as a changing ethnic identity within the culture. The traditions of music began to form within the culture as the main association of identity and were expanded on to reach specific groups who could best relate to these ideologies. The social movements were then a part of the jazz expressions and fusion that became a part of this time frame (Barkley, 2007: 6). The concept of creating a new sense of identity was one which jazz formed specifically because of social movements and the relationships which could be created. The Civil Rights Movement, aspects of free expression and the liberty to expand on various forms of ideals were the main concepts

Evidence on learning contract Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3500 words - 1

Evidence on learning contract - Essay Example Whether it had been a school project or a week of volunteer service at the hospital, I have always strived to improve my technical expertise rather than pay attention on the purpose for such things. This has resulted in a downside for me. I may have performed well in the start but over time I lost the zeal to be on the top. I did not perform as well as I had used to. For a person who used to graduate amongst the top ten in the class, I was suddenly facing falling grades. I could not understand my problem in the start. I used to ponder if it was the increasing difficulty of the course that I studied that was pulling me down. My falling grades discouraged me. I started to lose interest in studies. I did not have the same passion for improving my technical knowledge as I did so in the past. I also started to pay less attention to my studies. I would delay working on my assignments in contrast to the responsible behaviour I had shown in the past in submitting my assignments on time. Also , I became less attentive in my classes. This attitude continued for months and eventually years. It became an ingrained habit- one that I could not get rid of despite the negative impact that it had on me. It was not until I attended a class on self-motivation some time back that I came face-to-face with my demon. The class was an eye-opener for me. In the recent years, I had always struggled with deadlines and being punctual in my class work. Home assignments, for which we were given several days, and sometimes weeks, were done by me a day or so before their deadline. Whenever I set deadlines for the submission of my work, I defaulted them, mostly because I gave my social and family life priority over them. When I did not have a pressing deadline to meet, I used to slacken off and spend most of my time going to the cinema, hanging out with my friends, going out to eat and playing football. Studies were not my first

Relationship between education and health status Research Paper

Relationship between education and health status - Research Paper Example The study, of the relationship between education and the health status, is crucial since lifestyle related diseases are becoming increasingly rampant and can only be controlled if people are well educated on the same. When people speak of health status and education, it may not be obvious as to which form of education they are referring. It could be that they mean the formal education offered in schools, or the informal education offered concerning health and general wellbeing. This paper seeks to explain the relationship between education and health status of individuals. Fayissa et al (2011) explain that the relationship between health status and education is a two-way process. This, they explain, means that changes in the education quality and level of an individual affects the health status the same way the health status affects the level and quality of education. According to Fayissa et al (2011), poor health status has serious negative effects on the education of an individual. An appropriate illustration, they say, is the fact that an individual infected with such serious diseases as HIV and AIDS do not have the motivation to acquire education. This was established by a study carried out by Cutler and Lleras-Muney (2007). The study, carried out among college-age students, indicated that those with little or no education are less concerned about their health status. It was, however, concluded that in considering the effect of education on health status and vice versa, other aspect had to be taken into serious consideration. For example, such fac tors as the economic status of the family from which the individuals came from mattered a lot. An individual could be uneducated, but since they were financially stable and could afford to pay for insurance covers, they took more precaution and were so much concerned about their health. According to Cutler and Lleras-Muney (2007), the relationship between education and health

Nietzsche Moral Philosophy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Nietzsche Moral Philosophy - Essay Example Nietzsche aims at freeing human beings from their false consciousness about the issue of morality. He wants to free people from the idea that morality is good for them and not for the society (Richardson 20). Nietzsche forms an argument that free from the moral prejudices that he believes clouds the metaphysical pursuit and inquiries of science. Nietzsche concept of slave and master morality Master and slave morality is a key theme of the works of Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche presented that there are two types of morality. These include master and slave morality. Master morality majorly deals with the good or bad consequences of actions. Master morality values strength, pride and nobility. Master morality gets described by Nietzsche as the morality of the strong- willed. Slave morality deals with the good or bad intentions that people have. For Nietzsche slave morality values things like sympathy, kindness and humility. Nietzsche argued that we must not presume that anything that i s good is helpful, and all that is bad is harmful. He argued that this presumption got based on the grounds of habitualness. Value or non-value should not be derived from its consequences (Richardson 24). The strong-willed men in Nietzsche view look at something good as powerful and noble and what is bad as petty, weak, and cowardly. Nietzsche forwarded that morality deals with the individual. We must recognize that oneself is the measure of all things. Masters become creators of morality while the slaves simply respond to the masters with their slave morality. Slave morality originates in the weak while master morality originates in the strong. He argued that the strong people are few among the weak. The weak work hard to gain power by eroding the strong to believe in the causes of slavery which is evil. For example by stating that humility is good and voluntary, the slave morality lives in denial that humility got forced upon them by a master. Moral Skepticism Nietzsche was a mora l skeptic. He questions the authenticity of the explanations of morality which get purported to be factual. He maintains a doubting attitude towards the values and character of others which get considered moral. Nietzsche calls attention to the fact that the history of moral theories does not have a rational explanation for the foundational proposition about morality. Nietzsche supports the notion that there are no moral facts or truths. Nietzsche questions what brings about morality (Richardson 56). We do not know whether it is the criterion of the action or the reason for its performance that gets considered right. We must also consider the consequences that these actions bring about. Nietzsche also locates disagreement among the most sophisticated and moral philosophies which makes him a moral skeptic. Nietzsche was an aristocratic radicalism. This was a condemnation of hyper-aesthetic writing and fantasy in literature. It was a belief that literature should be based upon extensi ve thoughts of liberty and the progress of humanity. Moral Nihilist Moral nihilism is the view that nothing is intrinsically immoral or moral. Moral nihilists consider morality as something that gets constructed through a set of rules and recommendations. Nietzsche is not a moral nihilist. He states nihilism as absolute valuelessness, or that nothing has a meaning. He explained that this was extremely dangerous because it is through

Salata Baladi Movie Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Salata Baladi - Movie Review Example "It is this urgency and necessity to tell a personal, closer-to-life story that drives and motivates this family fresco." (Daele, Koen Van; "A Home Movie in the True Sense"; Mumbai Documentary Film Festival; 2008; www.wmm.com/filmcatalog/pages/ c746.shtml #top) Significant is the scene in which, while waiting in vain in Ramallah for the Israelis to reopen the Erez checkpoint which would enable them to visit their Palestinian brothers and sisters, Mary tries to communicate with her Palestinian friend in Gaza via webcam. On the computer they succeed in establishing visual contact but the sound is missing. "Through this technical problem, the director instantly represents the harrowing situation of the Palestinian refugees caught in the Gaza Strip. Collectively punished for decades, this is a people whose voice has been systematically taken away, and remains all too often unheard." (Daele, Koen Van; "A Home Movie in the True Sense"; Mumbai Documentary Film Festival; 2008; www.wmm.com/fi lmcatalog/pages/c 746.shtml #top). The film offers a perspective on how divided loyalties, as those of Mary between her pro-Palestinian convictions and love of relatives since migrated to Israel, make initially for indecisiveness, although blood eventually proves thicker than water. That perspective is unexceptionable as any other would have gone against human nature. Another is that rationalization comes naturally to those thus divided between loyalties. "Distant View of a Minaret" by Alifa Rifaat is a collection of 15 short stories that, the blurb claims, "give readers a glimpse of what it means to be a woman in an orthodox Muslim society in Egypt". (SPARKNOTES from Barnes & Noble). But while the setting may be Egyptian, the stories portraying different woes of women have universal appeal; for instance, a sexually dissatisfied woman, as in the title story, would be apt to remain stoic in the face of the death of her husband anywhere in the world, even in the US, not just in Egypt. In "Bahiyya's Eyes", Bahiyya, an elderly woman, tells her visiting daughter that she had recently visited a hospital where the doctor said she would soon go blind. The imminent blindness, according to her, is the result of copious tears that she had shed all her life for being born a girl. She learned about sex by watching animals; she had fancied a boy in her village, but her family had got her married to another man who died shortly after the wedding. Bahiyya describes the loneliness of being a woman without a man, and that her life and youth had been a waste. The message of this story too is universal because being born a girl is regarded as a curse in several countries, including Egypt, although that perception may still be alien to some advanced countries like the US. In "Degrees of Death", the narrator, who has begun to love the rabbits gifted her, realizes, on seeing nanny Zareefa kill one of them, that there are degrees of death for both human beings and animals as both get killed, either out of need or for sport; and that is a damning indictment of the human tendency to kill men and animals alike with a straight face in any country. "An Incident in the Ghobashi Household" shows to what lengths a woman can go to

The Company Yahoo Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Company Yahoo - Essay Example As the discussion stresses, the company was on the height of its success at the time of dot-com boom in 2000 when its stock price plunged to record high. Yahoo! also started its free mail service in response to the release of Google’s Gmail in 2004. In the following year, the company took over Flickr, a thriving photo sharing service. Yahoo! continued to expand by acquiring and purchasing innovative business in need of capital. The range of services offered by Yahoo! also rose in the year 2005 when the company stepped into Web 2.0 services. MSN Messenger and Yahoo! Messenger became interoperable in 2005 which was another great achievement for the company. Yahoo! also allowed its mail users unlimited free space in 2007 as it removed the barrier of 1GB storage. In 2008, in the time of recession, the company announced the layoff of 1000 employees. The company was facing difficulties in competing with the efficient Google. The main revenue model for the company was advertising ini tially. Afterwards, the company started making money from the augmented services that it offered. Efficient management of capital and reduction in expenditure helped the company to gain its profitability in the pure internet business. In 2008, the company was approached by Microsoft for the offer of a merger. However, Yahoo! rejected the offer of Microsoft as the share price being offered was very low. Recently, Yahoo! webpage is seen to be changed and a new version is launched called the Metro. This new look also has links to famous applications such as Facebook.com and Netflix. E-commerce website like Yahoo! needs to constantly innovate and develop new features on the website to attract more users and subscribers. The company right now faces lack of originality as it is engaged in merging and acquiring already established businesses like Flickr. The customer data which is private should not be used by the company to be sold to marketing agencies.

History Us Essay Example for Free

History Us Essay The Dawes Act, also known as the â€Å"General Allotment Act of 1887,† was – in theory – meant to protect the â€Å"property rights† of indigenous peoples during an anticipated â€Å"land rush† when â€Å"Unassigned Lands† in present-day Oklahoma were opened for settlement. Its sponsor, Senator Henry Dawes (R-Massachusetts), was a believer in the power of land ownership to â€Å"civilize† Native peoples, defining the term as the wearing of â€Å"civilized† (i. e. , manufactured and/or Euro-American type) clothing, the practice of agriculture, residing in homes made of wood and/or brick, the use of horse-drawn vehicles, formal schooling for children, consumption of alcohol and the ownership of property (Oates, 2000). While Dawes’ intentions may have been sincere, the nature of the Act and its results demonstrate that, unlike his detractor, Senator Henry Moore (R-Colorado) – who had actually lived in the West and had a better comprehension of Western land issues – Dawes had little understanding of indigenous culture and traditions. In fact, the U. S. government had spent the better part of a century in attempts to â€Å"register† native peoples and individuals. The Dawes Act was an attempt to â€Å"bribe† Indians with promises of land allotments prior to the land rush, partly in compensation for treatment of the previous 100 years. Not surprisingly, many Indians were not particularly trusting. Wars against, and subsequent relocation of the Nez Perce, Sioux, Yakama and other western tribes were not far in the past; even the painful forced relocation of the Cherokee and other Southeastern peoples a half-century before was within living memory of some. Fearing reprisals, many Indians who had refused to submit relocations in the past would not sign the Dawes Rolls. Either (Oates, 2000). Another provision of the Dawes Act required Indians to give up their given names and take on a more English-sounding name; therefore, someone whose name might translate as â€Å"Running Bear† would wind up having to register as â€Å"Richard Bill,† for example. This made it all too easy for government agents to slip in the names of friends and family members, resulting in the transfer of Indian lands to political cronies (Oates, 2000). The Dawes Act appears to contain an interesting conflict; whereas Section Six refers to Land Patents – which according to the law, grants the landholder unconditional rights to said property in perpetuity, Section Ten asserts Congress’ right of â€Å"Eminent Domain,† allowing the government to confiscate the land for any public use â€Å"upon making just compensation† (USC, 1887), creating a large loophole that was taken advantage of often in the ensuing four decades. The record is clear; nearly half of the treaty land passed into the possession of non-native settlers, and the Meriam Report of 1928 clearly showed how government agents had used provisions of the Dawes Act illegally to deprive indigenous peoples of their property – people who had very little concept of land ownership in the Euro-American sense on the first place. Most Native societies were built on communal living within the context of an extended clan-kinship grouping, which more often was matrilineal. This is significant, because of gender roles; traditionally, males were the hunters, while females gathered or – among the few Native peoples that practiced agriculture at all – engaged in the cultivation of food plants. The imposition of Industrial-Age and hyper-patriarchal Victorian values in which the man was the head of a small nuclear family dependent upon a capitalist system led to the disintegration and ultimate destruction of their traditional kinship support system (Norton, 2003). Ultimately, this was yet another â€Å"divide and conquer† strategy that allowed more Indian lands to pass into the control of Euro-American settlers. II. Reconstruction was an attempt on the part of the U. S. federal government to gradually bring the states of the former Confederacy back into the union and resolve social issues of the conflict. The initial phase of Reconstruction began in 1863 under Abraham Lincoln and his successor, Andrew Johnson. Lincoln’s intentions were to restore the Southern states as quickly and with as little rancor as possible; his moderate program mandated that as soon as 10% of a former Confederate state’s electorate signed a loyalty oath, that state could then form a government body and send representatives to Washington D. C. During the mid-term elections of 1866 however, Congress fell under the control of hard-liners of Johnson’s own party. These â€Å"Radical Republicans† – most likely out of vindictiveness toward ex-Confederates rather than any genuine concern for African-Americans – attempted to enforce â€Å"instant equality† onto Southern society. This â€Å"Radical† phase of Reconstruction lasted from 1866 to 1873, and emphasized civil rights and universal suffrage for freed blacks, many of whom were appointed to offices for which many were not necessarily qualified. Numerous well-meaning Northerners moved to the South as well with the intentions of educating blacks and providing relief for blacks and whites displaced by the war; however, they were accompanied by a large number of fortune seekers, who became known as â€Å"Carpetbaggers. † Along with free blacks and native white southern Republicans known as â€Å"Scalawags,† the Carpetbaggers formed a Republican coalition that managed to gain control of every southern state except for Virginia (Norton, 2003). The third phase of Reconstruction started when conservative Democratic coalitions of white supremacists – known as â€Å"Redeemers† – began taking back state legislatures, a process that was complete by 1877. (The former Confederacy would not elect another Republican president for 103 years). It would appear – at least from the perspective of a Southern landowner or former landowner – that such a backlash was inevitable. Many southern slaveholders operated under a sincere belief (misguided as it was) that their Negroes were better off under the â€Å"care† of their masters. When slaves went â€Å"on strike,† and even deserted plantations, surrendering themselves to oncoming Union troops, there were genuine feelings of betrayal. Meanwhile, Northerners often had little love for blacks; for example, an 1863 law that allowed rich whites to buy their way out of the draft led to perceptions among working-class whites that they were being expected to die for the benefit of blacks; this resulted in major riots in New York and Detroit in which many blacks were attacked and killed (Zinn, 2003). Once the white supremacists were back in control, they wasted little time in excluding Afro-Americans from mainstream society, banning them from restaurants, schools, and other establishments as well as suppressing the vote in a number of ways. When challenged in 1883 under the Fourteenth Amendment, the Supreme Court interpreted it in a way that made it useless as a guarantor of civil rights, essentially nullifying the Civil Rights Act of 1875. The majority ruled that the Fourteenth Amendment applied to states only, and not private citizens; therefore, discrimination by private individuals was completely within the law. In a dissenting opinion, Justice John Harlan – himself a former slave owner – wrote that discrimination was a â€Å"badge of slavery,† and therefore illegal under the Thirteenth Amendment banning the â€Å"peculiar institution,† as well as Article 4, Section 2 of the Fourteenth: â€Å"†¦the citizens [one born in the U. S. ] of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States† (Zinn, 2003). Nonetheless, the court then – as now – was swinging toward interpretations that favored Big Business and corporate capitalism, which has never had any use for equality of any kind. This eventually paved the way for Plessy v. Fergusson and the subsequent decades of â€Å"Jim Crow† apartheid in the south. III. On the eve of the First World War, class struggle between the workers and corporate capitalism was intensifying. On one side were socialist movements whose members clearly saw what the war was about: the struggle between capitalist power-brokers, through their bought-and-paid-for national governments, over land, colonies, resources, power and wealth – none of which in the working class, who nonetheless wound up fighting an dying in the trenches for these concepts, had any stake whatsoever. On the other side – then as now – were the corporate capitalists, who had a great deal at stake over the outcome of the war. American corporations had substantial investments in British companies and vice-versa; meanwhile, Britain was draining its treasury as well as its people for a war that historians today has never been shown to bring â€Å"any gain for humanity that would be worth one human life† (Zinn, 2003). The German announcement in April of 1917 that they would sink any ship carrying supplies to their enemies (i. e. , Britain) has long been cited as a reason that Wilson eventually sought a declaration of war from Congress. However, German-Americans had for some time been sending aid to the ancestral homeland, while the British had been interfering with the rights of U. S. citizens on the high seas during the same period. Because of economic reality however, Wilson had to find other reasons to enter the war on the side of the Allies (Zinn, 2003). According to historian Richard Hofstader, there were a number of economic reasons that shaped Wilson’s policy on the war; a recession that had begun in 1914 had begun to ease starting the following year because of orders by the Allies that totaled over $2 billion by 1917. By the time the war had begun, foreign investment in the U. S. totaled $3 ? billion. Foreign markets were considered vital to the U. S. economy. Since the outbreak of hostilities, Britain was buying not only durable goods and war materiel from U. S. companies, but since the lift on a ban on private bank loans to the Allies, were taking out many interest-bearing loans as well. The result is that the U. S. economy became closely tied to British victory. African-American author and activist W. E. B. DuBois clearly saw that the wealth of the U. S. and Europe was built on the backs of people in the lands which they had colonized – chiefly Africa and Asia, control over which were at the heart of the conflict. War, he said was a â€Å"safety valve† for the tensions of class conflict. Warfare created an â€Å"artificial community of interest† between the corporatist/investor class and that of the workers (Zinn, 2003). This was not lost on the workers of the nation. Only 73,000 men volunteered in during the first six weeks following the declaration, and there was little indication of public support. Socialist anti-war rallies throughout the country were attended by thousands of working people protesting the war and corporate profiteering. A conservative newspaper in Akron, Ohio admitted that the nation â€Å"had never embarked upon a more unpopular war† (Zinn, 2003). The federal government – at the behest of the corporate interests who then (as now) had the legislature in its back pocket – had little choice but institute legal and punitive measures which included both military conscription and the Espionage Act – a law of dubious constitutionality passed for the purpose of silencing dissent (Oates, 2000). While ostensibly the law was to protect the nation from spies, a clause provided for a penalty of up to twenty years imprisonment for anyone found guilty of causing â€Å"insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny or refusal of duty,† although another clause stated that â€Å"nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or restrict†¦any discussion, comment, or criticism of the acts or policies of the Government. † Nonetheless, Socialist leader Charles Schenk was arrested in September 1917 for the distribution of leaflets arguing that conscription was a violation of the Thirteenth Amendment. Another Socialist, Eugene V. Debs, was arrested the following June for making a public speech against the war. Eventually, nine hundred people were incarcerated under the Espionage Act and dissenters buried under an intense propaganda campaign by the government and their corporate lapdogs in the media. IV. â€Å"Prohibition† – the perhaps well-intentioned, but misguided attempt to outlaw the consumption of alcohol and spirituous liquors – dates back to the beginning of the republic. During colonial times, moderate alcohol consumption was tolerated, but over-indulgence was not. Alcohol was a â€Å"gift of God,† while drunkenness was seen as an abuse of that gift, but alcohol itself was not seen as a problem – only the behaviors associated with its excessive consumption. By the time of the revolution however, this had changed significantly. The shift from an agrarian to an urban society brought with it the usual consequences of poverty and unemployment, which in turn resulted in crime. With a strongly Puritan-influenced mindset, most devout Americans were unable to make the connection between poverty and crime, so alcohol became the scapegoat. The complete prohibition of alcoholic beverages was promulgated by religious Protestant groups on the grounds that it was the cause of crime and domestic violence. Prohibition movements met with limited success in the years running up to the Civil War. After a twenty-year hiatus, the concept was revived by the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union and the Prohibition Party, which gained significant political power in the forty-year period on either side of 1900. Prohibition laws were enacted locally throughout the nation, even to the point of becoming state law in Kansas. A number of southern states as well as individual counties within those states, with their streak of religious conservatism and intolerance, followed suit (Norton, 2003). (This patchwork of laws had some rather odd results that persist to the present day; for example, Jack Daniels Whiskey is still manufactured in Lynchburg, Tennessee, but local ordinance makes it illegal to sell or purchase it there. )

Bram Stoker Essay Example for Free

Bram Stoker Essay Within Dracula, Stoker clearly presents the male characters in the book as heroes, without over emphasising this by giving them extraordinarily strong powers. They are portrayed as normal human beings with faults and weaknesses. This can be seen when Van Helsing suffers from hysteria, but despite this still plays an important role in the chase for Dracula, and brings confidence to their quest at desperate times. He describes the Band of Brothers as those , who are willing to peril even our own souls for the safety of one we love-for the good of mankind, and for the honour and glory of God. A similar comparison could be made to fictional characters/super heroes in comics such as Superman. They save the weak and bring down the villain while also leading normal lives. But despite doing this, these super heroes still posses certain vulnerabilities, in the instance of superman, he possesses a weakness to kryptonite. In the same sense, members of the brotherhood have their own weaknesses. Therefore, it is fair to say that there is some presence of a comic book nature in Stokers writings, and the characters in the book represent this. Stoker does well not to make the characteristics of his male heroes all man and butch, like our version of the male hero today. I believe Stokers view of the perfect hero, is one that is physically strong but in touch with his feminine side. I believe such a character to be Van Helsing. At the opening of Jonathan Harkers journal it says, God preserve my sanity, and later Dr. Seward says, What does this all mean? I am beginning to wonder if my long habit of life amongst the insane is beginning to tell upon my own brain. Clearly within the novel, the male characters show signs of tenderness and sensitivity, which would be an imperative trait for a women of the time. Despite this, within the Band of Brothers each individual member have their own personal weakness, and this again parallels to that of a super hero in a comic book, (an ideal present day hero), how everyone has their own weaknesses, and often all have a universal weakness, eg. Breathing, in a comic world. In this case, the universal weakness of the Band of the Brothers is the shared love and protective nature over their women/partners. I believe that the men in the novel feel threatened by Dracula, who is a perfectly attractive, who is physically powerful, and more importantly targeting their women. The men may have felt that this new species may lure their women away from them, since it can be seen that his prey needs some sort of willingness or co-operation for him to act. It is not clear in the novel if Jonathan and Mina have consummated their marriage, since Jonathan was in such a bad state at the time of the wedding, yet later in the play he again shows inadequacies in the bedroom department, and can only watch Mina sucking at the chest of Dracula having been paralysed by the more dominant figure, Dracula. In the novel, personal and universal strengths and weaknesses are present in the Band of Brothers. Since all the characters concerned are human, there is no distinct line between the two, perhaps rather they represent individuality of characters. Due to the groups enthusiasm, and their keenness to save their beloved from Dracula, they play directly into the hands of Dracula, and this can be seen in London. This shows that the eager and hunger of the man exploits their weakness of not thinking correctly, rushing into things and a little gullibility. Mina is left alone at the house a sitting duck for Dracula to attack, a thoughtless action showing human weakness. However the group show great dedication and understanding to the task in hand as Van Helsing says, Our toil must be in silence, and our efforts in secret; for in this enlightened age

Relationship between Assets and Liabilities on Balance Sheet

Relationship between Assets and Liabilities on Balance Sheet Cement industry indeed a very important part of industrial sector that plays a essential role in the economic development. Though the cement industry in Pakistan observed its lows and highs in recent past it improved during the last couple of years and floated once again. A basic economic decision deal with a financial intermediary is the mixture of assets to buy and liabilities to sell, a decision that reflects a complex set of economic and institutional considerations. When viewed as a decision under uncertainty, the outcomes from this decision involve interactions among the assets, among the obligations and among assets and obligations. The asset and obligation structures of cement sector of Pakistan necessarily reflect these interactions as well as many regulatory and institutional constraints unique to the cement industry. Multivariate statistical procedures such as canonical correlation analysis are being used more frequently and the methods used in thesis can be applied to other studies. The mixture of assets and liabilities chosen can be viewed as a basic portfolio theory decision. In thesis canonical correlation analysis was applied to examine the relationship between assets and liabilities made by a cross-section of 18 large cement companies of Pakistan listed in stock exchange. Canonical correlation is a multivariate statistical technique that was used to assess the nature and strength of relationship between assets and liabilities. The correlation between each set of assets and each set of liabilities indicates the relationship between assets and liabilities but all of these correlations assess the same hypothesis that assets influence liabilities. The thesis focused on firms of the Pakistans cement industry and the purposes of the thesis was to identify relationships between assets and liabilities exhibited by these corporations and to explain the nature of these relationships. The teaching of corporate finance as reflected in the major textbooks compartmental izes the decision areas of finance and within each compartment management is assumed to attempt to maximize the firms wealth, holding the other areas of the firm constant. For example, capital budgeting decisions are made given a cost of capital or required rate of return (a capital project is evaluated independent of how it is financed), or the capital structure is chosen given the character of the firms assets. Cash, receivables, and inventory balances tend to be optimized independently. There is a tradeoff between the rigor afforded by global models of the firm (such as the CAPM) versus the realism afforded by the various approaches used in the compartmented models (e.g., cash management models, equipment replacement models, leasing, etc.). Business practice has the same dilemma; complex organizations must decompose the overall wealth maximization problem into sub problems which, when solved, allow the firm to make satisfactory decisions. Business executives may be uncomfortable with an assumption of independence between investing and financing decisions for two reasons. First, even if the decisions were independent, the decisions may occur simultaneously because of the necessity of raising the funds to invest. Second and more importantly, the assumptions necessary to obtain independence may not be obtained. Several interdependencies might be anticipated between assets and liabilities: Hedging is commonplace, where firms go with maturity structure of their assets and obligations (i.e., short-term assets tend to be financed with short- term obligations and long-term assets tend to be financed with long-term obligations). Some assets are used as collateral for loans. For example, accounts receivable can be used as collateral for short-term bank loans or factor loans and real estate as collateral for mortgages. Commodity-producing firms will maintain inventories which may be financed with credit from suppliers (accounts payable) while service-providing firms may have little of either inventories or accounts payable. High risk businesses may try to manage risk by using less leverage on right hand side of balance sheet (high equity) and by maintaining larger liquidity balances on the left-hand side. This process may enable management to reduce the probability of insolvency It was the objective of the thesis to determine relationships between assets and liabilities on balance sheet exhibited by a sample cement firms of Pakistan. Canonical correlation analysis was used to identify and study the nature of relationship between the structure of the left and right hand sides of the balance sheet. Though canonical correlation analysis is very similar to discriminant and factor analysis, it has not been widely employed in finance. The variables used in this study are, Cash, Account Receivable, Inventories, Long-term Assets, Account Payable, Short-term Debt, long-term Debt and Share Holder Equity. CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW Stowe,John D,Watson,Collin J Robertson ,Terry D (1980) observed the relationship between assets and liabilities with the help of canonical correlation analysis. The purpose of research was to identify relations between the two sides of balance sheet (Assets and liabilities) revealed by the corporations and to explain the nature of these relationships. Data from balance sheet for a cross-section of firms was used in the study. For each firm / corporation, a general size (or percentage breakdown) balance sheet was constructed with 4 asset and 4 liability accounts. A big diversity of balance sheet structures was present between 510 firms. A number of remarkable relationships were found in the study i.e. inventories were positively correlated with accounts payable and long-term assets were correlated with long-term debt. On the other hand, stockholders equity was not highly correlated with any of the asset proportions. An independence of asset and liability composition of the firm is tilted in much modern financial theory, the independence of investing and financing decision is a prominent part of Modigliani and Millers classic capital structure research. Though the distribution of financing and investment decision is an invaluable assumption which greatly makes simpler many business financial decisions, real balance sheets of modern corporations do not exhibit independence between assets and obligations on balance sheet. The aim of the study was (1) to recognize relationships between t assets, obligations and equity on a balance sheet reveal by these firms and (2) to clarify the nature of these relationships. Independence of liability and asset composition is explicit in Modigliani and Millers capital structure proposition. In their article, they exhibited that, given a flow of risky earnings; the firms total market value and cost of capital are independent of capital structure. The education of corporate finance, as imitated in the major textbooks, compartmentalizes the decision spots of finance and, within each box, management is assumed to effort to maximize the firms wealth, holding the other spots of the firm stable. For example, capital budgeting decisions are made given a cost of capital or required rate of return (a capital project is evaluated independent of how it is financed), or the capital structure is chosen given the character of the firms assets. Cash, receivables, and inventory balances tend to be optimized independently. There is a tradeoff between the rigors afforded by global models of the firm (such as the CAPM) versus the realism afforded by the various approaches used in the compartmented models (e.g., cash management models, equipment replacement models, leasing, etc.). Business practice has the same dilemma; complex organizations must decompose the overall wealth maximization problem into sub problems which, when solved, allow the fi rm to make satisfactory decisions. Business executives may be uncomfortable with an assumption of independence between investing and financing decisions for two reasons. First, even if the decisions were independent, the decisions may occur simultaneously because of the necessity of raising the funds to invest. Second and more importantly, the assumptions necessary to obtain independence may not be obtained. Several interdependencies might be anticipated between the assets and liabilities, those are, (1) Hedging is commonplace, where firms go with maturity structure of their assets and obligations (i.e., short term assets tend to be financed with short term obligations and long-term assets tend to be financed with long-term obligations), (2) some assets are used as collateral for loans. For example, accounts receivable can be used as collateral for short-term bank loans or factor loans and real estate as collateral for mortgages, (3) commodity-producing firms will maintain inventories which may be financed with credit from suppliers (accounts payable) while service providing firms may have little of either inventories or accounts payable and (4) high risk businesses may try to manage risk by using less leverage on right hand side of balance sheet (high equity) and by maintaining larger liquidity balances on the left hand side. This process may enable management to reduce the probability of insolvency. It was the intent of the study to determine relationship between assets and lia bilities on balance sheet are exhibited by a sample of large corporations. Canonical correlation analysis was used to identify and examine the nature of relationships between the structures of the left- and right-hand sides of the balance sheet. While canonical correlation analysis is very similar to discriminate and factor analysis, it has not been widely employed in finance. There were two general conclusions of study. The first basic purpose of study was satisfied that there are basic relationships between assets and obligations on a balance sheet which were identified with canonical correlation analysis. The assumptions behind much of modern financial theory allow us to separate investing and financing decisions. Relaxation of these assumptions can admit interdependencies between assets and obligations and several interdependencies were found in our empirical study. These relationships across the balance sheet include (1) hedging, (2) the use of collateral for loans, (3) invento ries associated with accounts payable, and (4) manage risk with instantaneous use of inferior leverage and larger liquidity balances. The capital structure research since M and Ms original irrelevance argument has attempted to utilize the effect of the current value of interest tax shelter due to debt financing and the effect of expected bankruptcy costs on the firms optimal capital structure. The interdependencies between assets and liabilities found in this empirical study could be incorporated into models of capital structure. The second general conclusion was to recommend canonical correlation analysis of financial statement data for other research topics. Much of the published empirical research concerning financial statements is on topics with a single, well defined dependent variable; these topics would include predicting bankruptcy, bond ratings, or loan defaults and explaining market risk measures. Canonical analysis, where there is a set of dependent variables, would allow empirical analysis to proceed where no unique variable can be chosen as the dependent variable. Furthermore, variables which are linear combinations of financial statement proportions might be employed instead of the usual financial ratios.7 Canonical variate scores for a firm could be associated with its bond ratings, probability of default, or systematic risk. These topics usually have been investigated using financial ratios as predictor variables Stowe,John D Watson,Collin J(1985) did the multivariate analysis on balance sheet composition of life insurer. The purpose of that analysis was to study the empirical relationships between the assets and obligations structure of the life insurer. The assets and liabilities mixture that chosen by life insurer can be viewed in terms of basic portfolio theory decisions. Canonical correlation analysis was used by the researcher to study or examine the internal structure of these portfolio decisions that was made by a cross section of large life insurers. The financial intermediaries study, such as life insurers, is distinguished from that of nonfinancial businesses for several causes. First, the financial intermediaries assets consists just about entirely of financial assets as opposed to the real assets that bulk large on the balance sheets of nonfinancial businesses. As suggested by Moore B. J (1968) in his article an introduction to the theory of finance that the financial assets dif fer from tangible assets; the financial assets are intangible and they are held for the income they generate as opposed to the direct physical services they yield; financial assets are more liquid and finally financial assets can be more freely converted from one form to another while real assets are indurate. A second difference between intermediaries and nonfinancial businesses involves the nature of their obligations. Financial intermediaries accumulate loan able funds through issuing a variety of claims. For example, the commercial banks and life insurers claims are quite different from the obligations issued by nonfinancial corporations. A final significant difference between financial intermediaries and other businesses is that the intermediaries normally are more seriously regulated and sometimes are subject to separate taxation from other firms and individuals. Like other intermediaries life insurers have been the subjects of a range of empirical research projects. J. D (197 3) Cummins in his article An econometric model of the life insurance sector of the U.S economy and J. E Pesando, in his article The interest sensitivity of the Flow of funds through life insurance companies presented an econometric analysis for the comprehensive flow of funds through the life insurance sector. J.D Stowe (1978) in his article examines the investments of individual life insurers in a cross-sectional, time-series study. The basic operational hypothesis for the study on balance sheet composition of life insurer was that a number of categories of assets on the left hand side of life insurer balance sheets had more than one pattern of correlations when they are associated with several liability and surplus classes from right hand side of balance sheet. In addition to testing this hypothesis, the natures of the relationships between assets and obligations were examined and the strength of the multivariate relationship was anticipated. The structure of life insurer assets w as explained as a function of the structure of the other side of the balance sheet and of some additional firm specific variables. In this study it was necessary to predict several criterion variables simultaneously by means of a second set of predictor variables. Under these circumstances, no single regression equation can presented a fully adequate solution. Any linear combination of the criteria may be used as the dependent variable in a regression equation, and in general not one but a number of regression equations must be used to give an appropriate picture. The problem of finding linear combinations of the criterion variables that can be most accurately predicted from the predictor variables was solved by H. Hotelling in his article The most predictable criterion commonly known as canonical correlation analysis. G. Donald Simonson, D. J Stow, and J. Collin Watson (1983) analyzed a canonical correlation analysis between assets and liabilities structure of commercial banks in. They analyze the balance sheets of all 435 domestic U.S banks with assets in excess of $300 million at year end 1979. Data was taken from the December 31, 1979 Foreign and domestic Report of Condition files prepared on magnetic tape by the three federal bank supervisory agencies. They limited the analysis to large banks for two reasons. First, smaller banks do not have the talent or market position to aggressively practice liabilities management and therefore their balance sheets are not as likely to reflect differentiated policies relative to bearing interest rate risk. Second, the three federal agencies require only banks with assets over $300 million to report maturities of both de posits and selected loans, as well as a breakdown of loans in to those with predetermined versus floating interest rates. These large bank data permit us to construct several key balance sheet accounts on the basis of interest sensitivity. Six asset and six liability/capital categories were expressed a s a proportion of total assets for each of the 435 banks in the study. The purpose of a study was to identify and describe the relationship including heading behavior of a single dependent variable as a function of a set of independent variables, canonical correlation analysis relates two sets of variables. In the present case one set of variables is the composition of the left hand side of the balance sheet and the other set is the right hand side. The variables used in this study are asset and liability/ capital categories expressed as proportion of total bank assets. These portions were used in lieu of the more usual financial ratios and no information exogenous to the bank was employed. During the past two years bankers and bank analysts have been concerned about how interest rate risk is derived from cross balance sheet relationships. The mismatching of maturities or interest sensitivities whether interest sensitive assets financed with long term liabilities or long term assets financed with interest sensitive liabilities creates interest rate risk. For example high interest rates and a downward sloping yield curve, one whose short term rates exceed long term rates for borrowers of similar creditworthiness, especially expose institutions which pursue the traditional financial intermediation formula of borrow short lend long. In commercial banking, the exposure is greatest for banks which finance fixed rate term loans and long term fixed income securities with short term funds at money market rates. Banks can defend themselves against this exposure by practicing asset/liability management; by coordinating their procurement of funds and acquisition of assets. There was early theoretical appreciation of the necessity for management of the maturities of asset and liability portfolios. In a simple three variable model D.H Pyle (1971) in his article theory of financial intermediation shows that assuming banks maximize the expected utility of terminal wealth, ba nks choices of assets (liability) portfolio will be conditioned upon the parameters, including maturity, of their liability (assets) portfolios (given nonzero covariance of liability and assets yields). According to the applied asset/liability management dictum, banks with volatile short term interest sensitive source of funds should attempt to structure their asset portfolios to emphasize short term and floating rate movements and in general maturities of asset and liability portfolios should be matched. Such banks can be said to adopt defensive loan portfolios. Other banks by their nature are less dependent on short term market rate funds and are in a better position to offer fixed rate loan terms to borrowers their customers provide a relatively large core of stable savings and time deposits with average interest costs well below current market rates. As result these banks have to be free to acquire long term assets at predetermined interest rates that are they can adopt aggressi ve loan portfolios. HO, T.S.Y in his article (1980) The determinants of bank interest margin showed that balance sheet hedging is a rational response to interest margin uncertainty which results from the interplay between volatile interest rates and asset and liability structural interrelationships. Their research attempts to find evidence of such asset/ liability hedging practices among U.S banks during a period of high and volatile interest rates and a downward sloping yield curve. If banks in aggregate tend to hedge interest sensitive funds with core funds, the banking industry would appear to be coping appropriately with interest rate risk. On the other hand, if there is a systematic tendency for many banks to combine fixed rate long term assets with volatile short term funds, the industry might be excessively exposed to interest rate risk. The issue of capital adequacy also concerned with the comparative maturity structure and duration of the two sides of the balance sheet. S.T. Maisel and R. Jacobson in his article Interest rate changes and commercial banks revenues and costs they showed that over the period 1962 to 1975 for the average bank, the threat of insolvency due to the instability of economic returns stemmed primarily from the mismatch of asset and liability durations. They concluded that unheeded interest rate risk might require additional equity capital. Other sources of risk, such as default risk, would dictate a positive relationship between the amount invested in riskier loans and securities and the amount of equity capital. Research was limited because data on the market values of asset and liability items are not available. Presumably, potential changes in cross balance sheet market values are transmitted to changes in the market value of the firm. There was a considerable literature addressing asset-l iability management in banks. One of the key motivators of asset-liability management worldwide was the Basel group. The Basel group Banking Supervision (2001) formulated broad supervisory standards and guidelines and recommended statements of best practice in banking supervision. The purpose of the committee was to encourage global convergence toward common approaches and standards. In particular, the Basel II norms (2004) were proposed as an international standard for the amount of capital that banks require setting to the side to protect against the types financial and operational risks they face. Basel II proposed setting up accurate risk and capital management necessities designed to make sure that a bank holds capital reserves suitable to the risk banks picture their self to throughout its lending and investment practice. In general, these regulations mean that the larger risk to which the bank is showing, the larger the amount of capital the bank requires to hold to defend it s solvency and whole economic strength. This would ultimately help to defend the international monetary system from the kind of problems that may take place should a major bank or a sequence of banks collapse. Gardner and Mills (1991) discussed the principles of asset-liability management as a part of banks strategic planning and as a response to the changing environment in prudential direction, e-commerce and new taxation treaties. Their text provided the foundation of subsequent discussion on asset-liability management. Haslem (1999) used canonical analysis and the interpretive structure of asset/liability management to identify and interpret the foreign and domestic balance sheet approach of large U.S. banks. Their study found that the least money-making very large banks have the biggest size of foreign loans, yet they give emphasis to domestic balance sheet (asset/liability) matching strategies. on the other hand, the most money-making very large banks have the smallest size of foreign loans, but, however, they emphasize foreign balance sheet matching strategies. Vaidyanathan (1999) discussed issues in asset-liability management and elaborates on various categories of risk that require to be managed in the Indian context. In the past Indian banks were primarily concerned about adhering to statutory liquidity ratio norms but in the changed situation, namely moving away from administered interest rate structure to market determined rates, it became important for banks to equip themselves with some of these techniques, in order to immunize them selves against interest rate risk. Vaidyanathan argued that the problem gets accentuated in the context of change in the main liability structure of the banks, namely the maturity period for term deposits. For instance, in 1986, nearly 50% of term deposits had a maturity period of more than five years and only 20%, less than two years for all commercial banks, while in 1992, only 17% of term deposits were more than five years whereas 38% were less than two years Vaidyanath. It was found that several banks had inadequate and inefficient management systems. Also argued that Indian banks were more exposed to international markets, especially with respect to forex transactions, so that asset liability management was essential, as it would enable the bank to maintain its exposure to foreign currency fluctuations given the level of risk it can handle. It was also found that an increasing proportion of investments by banks were being recorded on a market to market basis, thus being exposed to market risks. Is was also suggested that, as bank profitability focus has increased over the years, there is an increasing possibility that the risk arising out of exposure to interest rate volatility would be built into the capital adequacy norms specified by the regulatory authorities, thus in turn requiring efficient asset-liability management practices. Vaidya and Shahi (2001) studied asset-liability management in Indian banks. They suggested in particular that interest rate risk and liquidity ris k are two key inputs in business planning process of banks. Using firm-level data, an extensive accounting literature focuses on the contemporaneous correlation of stock returns and earnings. Despite the statistically reliable positive association between stock returns and earnings, Ball and Brown (1968), Beaver, Clarke, and Wright (1979), Beaver, Lambert, and Morse (1980), Easton and Harris (1991), Collins, Kothari, Shanken, and Sloan (1994), and others find that the explained fraction of stock return variation was significantly less than one (typically under 10 percent). Lev (1989) and others suggest that the relatively low explanatory power stems from earnings lack of timeliness and/or value-irrelevant noise in earnings. The idea that correlation between a cash-flow proxy and stock return may be due to any of the three components was not novel. Fama (1990), Schwert (1990), Kothari and Shanken (1992), Campbell and Ammer (1993), and others recognize that when stock returns are regressed on cash flow proxies, any of the three effects may be d riving the regression coefficients. They do not, however, clearly quantify the relative importance of these three effects. Thus, in the end, it is still unclear why cash-flow proxies are or are not related to stock returns. The fundamental subject of working capital is to provide optimal balance between each element forming working capital. Most of the efforts of finance directors in a firm are the efforts they make to carry the balance between current assets not at optimal level and responsibilities to an optimal level Lamberson (1995). One reason for this was the decisive influence of current assets on others, another reasons was liabilities of completion of present responsibilities. The combination of the elements forming working capital are change over time. Need for working capital manipulate liquidity stage and profitability of a company. As a result, it affects investment and financing decisions, too. Amount of current assets to be calculated at a level where total cost is of a least degree means an optimal working capital level. The optimal working capital point is case wherein balance between risk and effectiveness is provided.. The entire current assets hold by a firm known as working capital. Net working capital is calculated when short term obligations are took out from current assets. Return of total assets of a firm as a result of an activity is closely related to level and distribution of assets of the firm and efficiency in application of these assets. In lots of firms current assets called working capital make up of a remarkable part of community assets. (Note 1) But it is clear that working capital is ignored in finance journalism compare to long term financing decision. Corporate finance studies usually concentrate on core decisions like, dividend, capital structure and capital budgeting. Though, the sum of assets group is a important part of entire asset and called working capital (inventories, quasi money and money. short term liabilities and trade receivables) is a focus matter in all main books relating to corporate finance where efficiency level of distribution and application of assets influe nce profitability and risk level of the company. The major purpose of a company is to increase the market worth. Working capital management influence profitability of the company, its risk and thus its value Smith, (1980). Further, effective management of working capital is a key component of the broad strategy aim to increase the market rate (Westhead and Howorth (2003). Since the flexibility of this group of assets is very high in terms of adapting to changing conditions and due to these uniqueness they can frequently be applied to understand the major aim of financial management through policy changes. Success of a firm mainly depends on efficient management capability of finance director to manage receivables, inventories and liabilities (Filbeck and Krueger, 2005). Firms can strengthen their funding capabilities or decrease the source cost reducing source amount they allocate to current assets. In finance literature there is a common opinion about the importance of working capi tal management. Explanations about why effective capital management is important for a company usually concentrate on the association between effectiveness in working capital management and company profitability. Effective working capital management includes controlling and planning of present assets and liabilities in such a way it avoid extreme investments in current assets and prevents from working with few currents assets insufficient to fulfill the responsibilities. In relevant studies the measure taken as an indicator of efficiency in working capital management is generally cash conversion cycle. For firm cash conversion cycle is the period during which it is transited from money to good and again to money. In the studies conducted by Shin and Soenen (1998), Deloof (2003), Raheman and Nasr (2007) and Teruel and Solano (2007) it was concluded that there is a negative relationship between profitability of a firm and cash conversion cycle. Thus, it is possible to increase firm profitability through more effective working capital management. It is necessary to realize that major basics of cash conversion cycle (short term account receivables, short term trade liabilities and inventories) should be managed in a way they maximize firm profitability. An efficient working capital management will increase free cash flows to the firm and growth opportunities and returns of stockholders. Working capital level of a firm indicates that it wants to take a risk. The more working capital amounts, the liquidity risk and profitability become lower. The working capital strategies of firms differ according to the segments and within each segment it varies over time Filbeck and Krueger (2005). Ganesan (2007), put forward that the firms in less competitive sectors focus on cash conversion minimizing receivables, while the firms in more competitive sectors have a relatively higher level of receivables. Lazaridis and Tryfonidis (2005) stated that small firms focus on inventory management, the firms with low profitability on credit management. Statements in literature of finance about the significance of working capital for companies are being once further emphasized in these unstable days of international economy. While firms make efforts to increase return on assets in a way they pay their due obligations as late as possible and keep the cash, decreases in activ

Freezing Of Gametes And Embryos :: essays research papers

A Heated Issue Frozen in Time: The Controversaries within the Freezing of Gametes and Embryos   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Could you imagine freezing your eggs or sperm and a century after your death you are still mothering or fathering children? How about creating embryos and then freezing them until you are ready to have children? In today’s society, the freezing of gametes and embryos brings up several ethical and personal issue that are very controversial to people.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ever since the day scientists and doctors discovered infertility existed they have been trying to find cures, or new methods, to work around this disability. The freezing of gametes and embryos just happens to be the new cure people are turning to. Sometimes couples’ egg and sperm won’t mesh together. The couple then turns to in-vitro fertilization and creates about 10 embryos. 3 out of the 10 embryos are inserted back into the woman’s uterus hoping that at least one would take. Now the question is what happens to the 7 embryos that are left? This is when couples usually turn to the freezing method. Before the freezing method existed the doctors would just create about 5 embryos and insert all of them into the uterus, which usually resulted in multiple births. If none of the embryos took the couple would spend around another $10,000 to do the process all over again. Once the freezing method came into play couples then froze the extra embryos f or later use instead of doing the process of making the embryos again.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The freezing of eggs, sperm, and embryos tends to bring up a huge controversy among people. There are two different sides to this issue. There are the people who think that freezing gametes or embryos is unnatural and unethical while the other side begs to differ. The other side views the freezing method as a huge milestone in reproductive technology and should be taken advantage of generously.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  As of right now, the freezing process is open to anyone that can afford it. The people who are against the freezing of gametes and embryos not only want limitations set on reproductive technology in general but they wish to get rid of the whole idea of the freezing method. They feel as though the freezing method is mostly used for a delaying purpose instead of its main intention, which was to help the infertile at a lower cost. An example of the delay situation that they are talking about is a woman who is 30, successful in her career, but hasn’t found Mr.

Book Report On the Lost World :: essays research papers

Book Report on "The Lost World" Characters: The main character in the book is Ian Malcolm, a middle aged mathematician and a little bit of an explorer. The man who set up the exploration, Richard Levine, is a rich and reckless yet well known adventurer who spends a lot of his time and money exploring different places around the world and helps at a middle school to give students of ideas of careers in science. Sarah Harding is a zoologist who was hired to possibly deal with some of the animals. Jack Thorne is the man who made all of the special equipment the group is taking with them and he went along to help and show everyone how to and operate most of the vehicles. Synopsis: My book is about how Richard Levine tries to and does find the InGen corporation's second dinosaur island which he had been searching for and trying to locate for years. The second island is only a few hundred miles away from the original , and they both were abandoned when a freak and tragic incident left nearly everyone on both islands dead. Not many people who knew about the second island survived so it took him a long time to find one of the old employees of InGen and get him to tell him about and the location of the island. With his information Levine made a team of five people to take to the island himself, Ian Malcolm Sarah Harding, Jack Thorne, and Eddie Carr, the top employee of Thorne. They were going to leave in two weeks when Thorne finds out that Levine has left for the island early wanting to be the first one to â€Å" officially† find it. He and the small crew of people he took with him were attacked and all but Levine were killed. He would be found later. The team left for the island soon after to try and find him. Unknown to anyone, two of Levine's students at the middle school where he helps, sneaked into the cargo of the plane and went to the island with them. His two star pupils, Kelly and Arby really wanted to go when he told them that he was going on an exploration in the Caribbean to an unknown island. Almost as soon as they got to the island Kelly and Arby were found and everyone realized that they shouldn't but were going to have to stay the whole expedition. At the time they didn't mind. They later set up base and took the Explorer they brought to look around.