Case Study Comparisons Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Case Study Comparisons - Essay Example paper also analyzes the importance of CDHPs and how they help the insured understand and use information regarding costs as presented by the Institute of Medicine et al (2010) et al. Additionally, it provides in depth analysis of why CDHPs are comparatively cheaper compared to HMO and PPO plans (The Balser Group, 2013). To this end, the paper presents a comparative analysis of the available health insurance plans with an objective of determining the most feasible plan for an individual with no access to any form of federal assistance. Following the above analysis of PPO, HMO and CDHP plans, the benefits of CDHP plan far much outweigh its disadvantages, and offers comparatively better benefits compared to the other plans explored. For instance, the program offers additional and/or supplemental medical benefits to the insured. Further, research show that the program is popular among employees because it offers more design flexibility, and is favored by employers due to its package that allows employers to promote consumerisms and a framework for educating and motivating employees to be active participants concerning their individual health management. However, it is worth noting that enrolment of CDHP plans still lags behind PPO plan, this is attributed to the fact that PPO plans have high deductibles, thereby yielding immediate lower costs compared to CDHP. However, a point to note is that such an argument is skewed since employee objective is never concerned solely with immediate lower premium costs hence we expe ct the trend to change in the near future. Institute of Medicine (U.S.), Yong, P. L., Olsen, L. A., McGinnis, J. M., & National Academies Press (U.S.). (2010).  Value in health care: Accounting for cost, quality, safety, outcomes, and innovation : workshop summary. Washington, D.C: National Academies

International political economy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

International political economy - Essay Example Entrepreneurs, leading corporations, and even social activists are taking the step to show how this phenomenon is changing the lives of people across the world. This book forms the basis for this review as it tries to identify the realism of this phenomenon, and if the corporate world is entirely ready for it. The definition of social business in this book is that it is a sustainable business that guarantees return on start-up capital, but does not offer investors any return. It is the author’s belief that the current practices, for example; social enterprises and non-profit are what may lead to more poverty among countless individuals. Social business offers an owner a return on their start-up capital, regardless of the time it takes to get this capital back. According to the author, this phenomenon (social business) has stopped being just a theory that is discussed in corporate boardrooms, and is being introduced in some areas in Asia, the U.S., and even Europe. By introduci ng, embracing, and trying the social business theory, the author develops an idea about a new form of capitalism that is opposed to some current methods and practices present in most organizations (Yunus 2011, p. 103). Products offered by social businesses may rake in profit, but do not offer dividends (Yunus 2011, p. 229). They are also capable of satisfying the needs of the less wealthy individuals in society. All profits gained have to go back to the society in which the business is located. According to the author, the case studies are a way of showing individuals that it is possible to incorporate this in the economic world and find a way to provide everyone with their needs. This is while reducing the pressure of money among the less privileged. Something worth noting about the author is that he is the founder of the micro-credit agency, Grameen Bank. It offers services (financial) at an affordable rate of interest. The author’s economic stand is brought out in the book as it struggles to change the perception that establishments can only belong to one of two economic camps, which are; non-profit and for-profit. However, the book might fail to address some crucial elements that surround the progress of the theory of social business. Some of the issues brought out in the book offer advice on what might be the best possible way for people to start their own businesses (Bari 2011, p. 78). This is not geared toward encouraging the growth of the phenomenon in most corporate structures in the business world. A great idea might lie behind the author’s intention of getting people to know what needs to be done to start and run a successful business. Sadly, it does not delve into advising would-be business owners on what needs to be done to exactly capture all the latest trends in the economic world. The ends of the first chapters in the book talk more of the steps in the development of the Grameen. This, according to me, makes the chapters seem lack lustre in their presentation. The didactic aspect of the book leaves no room for the profit and social business aspects that most readers may want to attain at the end of the book. It is next to impossible to attain a clear perspective on the part profit aspect of a

Failure of Financial Regulation in the UK Essay

Failure of Financial Regulation in the UK - Essay Example This essay evaluates the failures of financial policies in United Kingdom and the move made by policy makers to cushion the country from falling into financial crisis. Financial crisis witnessed towards end of this decade had similar effects to crisis witnessed in 1970s. Many people grappled in unemployment, devaluation of wealth and other related issues that come when economic depression occurs1. G 20 meeting realized that policy tools made to cushion the world from economic slump had failed to discharge their role. It was also apparent from that meeting that the banking policies of United Kingdom and related market players had stains to the crisis. Growth in a country or in the world depends on sound policies, which balances the financial market and enhances economic stability. Economists and analysts in the economic sector believe that fiscal tools, which guide the economic growth of the country, must meet a certain threshold if the country is to remain stable. Deliberation of the meeting indicated that credit securitization is a factor that policy makers in the financial sector ignored2. Many banks offered credit loans to investors without collaterals that could support financial stability. The banks could not raise the minimum threshold required to make them remain in businesses after the investors had defaulted. The result was as worst as the financial depression of 1970s. Critics have contributed to this situation by making different argument about the country should do to avoid similar misfortune. The argument has rested on the effects of policy, which influence banking system. Some critics noted that policies instituted to correct the dangers of economic depression failed because of poor implementation strategy, which aimed at making the country more economically sound. Many economists believe that policy tools adopted in the banking sector created a window, which led to the economic meltdown. Evidently, a weakness of a policy can create instability as observed during the financial crisis. The major question that the society is trying to answer is not what caused the depression but how it can avoid the depression in future. Analysts have settled on the fact that failure of UK financial system is the contributor of the economic crisis. Economists have stated three reasons, which support the argument that policy failure led to financial meltdown. First, the role of financial market is to regulate market economy3. This regulation occurs through relationship that exists between the financial system and the market players. Economists believe that financial relationships influence market structures by creating stability and instability in the market. This means that financial system is the key driver to propel market structures towards making balance payment in the market. A failure of the system spells doom to the society since it creates imperfect operation in the market. Evidently, a slight mess bin the market would contribute to a collapse of other systems in the financial sector. Financial analysts have sited burst and boom factors as factors that directly influence market stability. Financial system usually look at credit supply and credit pricing as factors that control speculation in the burst and boom factors. Studies indicate that internet burst and boom witnessed in 1998-2001 increased the liquidity index in the country4.

Writing comments Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Writing comments - Coursework Example It is important that the values of communicating with people of other nations that people working internationally together in the business world recognize the privacy, cultural sensitivity, teamwork, legality and privacy (Voss and Flammia, 73) and American interpretations of those are respectful of other countries in order work together in a global economy. As Americans, it must be acknowledged that there are these differences and that being ethnocentric and believing that doing business such as it is done in the United States is not the only way that it is always done. There is no doubt that business is not conducted in just one country anymore as not everything wears the ‘Made in America’ stamp. One major aspect in global business that can be a huge hurdle that is only the beginning is the fact that not everyone speaks English. In a study acknowledged by Barry L. Thatcher, he pointed out that in a study of over 200 countries, over 50 languages were spoken (178). However, working together globally, this is an important concept to understand. Not everyone in other places work the same way that those businesspeople in America do. Business theory is not universal but instead cross-cultural and when conducting it, it is important to take note of these differences and instead to adapt to how all can work together to achieve a smoothly functioning working global

Ecoproject3 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Ecoproject3 - Essay Example Gross domestic is one of the leading predictor of the economic size of the country and his significantly influence the financial market and economic cycles which would be useful in formulating business plan and target projections (Madura,2008,99). Good GDP figures indicate positive performance of the overall economy and vice versa. Inflation rate is a factor in price and cost of input factors and therefore significantly influences investment decision. It would therefore be imperative for the trader from Japan to analyze this factor in the context of US economy. Unemployment rate reflects the consumption level and living standard in general. In the event that unemployment in US is relatively high then this would send wrong signals for a better business future in the country. Considering the trend of the above mentioned factors in the past 12 months in the US, it would be easier to make informed decision in respect of viable engagement. ... Positive GDP predicts better market response for any potential investor and it would therefore important for the Japanese investor to consider starting the venture. Nonfarm payroll employment over-the-month change, seasonally adjusted, April 2012–April 2013Month Data retrieved on May 10, 2013 from: http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2013/ted_20130506.htm Month Employment change Apr 2012 112,000 May 2012 125,000 Jun 2012 87,000 Jul 2012 153,000 Aug 2012 165,000 Sep 2012 138,000 Oct 2012 160,000 Nov 2012 247,000 Dec 2012 219,000 Jan 2013 148,000 Feb 2013 332,000 Mar 2013 138,000(p) Apr 2013 165,000(p) From the change of employment rate that can be observed above, it is important to note that the trend in unemployment has been steady and changes very insignificantly. However, the latest period running through March and April 2013 there is slight fall in this change and this means that level of income is still in the right track. It would therefore be viable for the Japanese lady to kick -start the business as the US future is bright except for small disturbances that are likely to arise from economic cycles. Unemployment is one of the most important indicators of the overall economic progress and this is clear from the socio-economic and political concepts that surround employment in the society (Madura, 2008, 99). When the rate of unemployment is fairly down, there is better business prospects in the country and this can be predicted to be working out for US from the data provided by the Federal bureau of statistics. Inflation data for Jan 2012 to March 2013 Retrieved on May 10, 2013: http://inflationdata.com/Inflation/Inflation_Rate/CurrentInflation.asp Year Jan Feb Mar

Module 4 Written Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Module 4 Written - Essay Example Latin American countries characteristically have high inflation rate, with some countries having as much as three digit percentage. In fact in a 70 year history of Argentina, the country averaged in excess of 200 percent inflation rate, Brazil on the other hand averaged 390 percent from 1980, and attaining a high of 6821 in the first quarter of this year. Venezuela rates are very high, a rate of 63.4 percent. The concept of Purchasing power parity (PPP) would imply that the currencies of these countries shall depreciate compared to the United States dollar so as to consolidate the purchasing power across the countries. According to Keown, Martin & Petty (2008), PPP reflects the relative value of purchasing a product in one county versus another. A high inflation rate has the effect of making their exports cheap while making imports expensive, thereby discouraging demand for Latin American imports and forces a downward pressure in their Latin American currencies. Depreciation of the c urrencies compensates the rising prices on Latin American exports when viewed by imports from the US and other countries. Interest rate parity exacts pressure on the forward rates to contain a large discount as a result of the high interest rate prevailing in Latin America, which shows a snag of hedging Latin American currencies. Hence, the option to hedge bears more sensibility if the expected rate of depreciation exceeds more than the forward rate. It is also important to factor in that certain remittance cannot be hedged anyway as a result the value of uncertainty in future remittances The forward rate of a Latin American currency would have a big discount; as a result the Latin American interest rate would be higher than that of the US. The discount operates as the prediction of the rate of change in the value of the Latin American currency given a lengthy period of time, which I represented by the forward

Modern public life Essay Example for Free

Modern public life Essay Modern Public life could not exist or function properly without the Media In this essay I will be discussing the above statement and arguing that without Media, modern public life could not exist. I will first explain some key terms to help in the argument including explaining the meaning of the term Public Life. According to the Collins Dictionary The Public is people in general or the people of a particular place. Public is used to talk about the feelings and behaviours of people in general. If someone is a public figure or is in public life, they are well known. Public is used to talk about things being said or done so that everyone can hear them or see them. What is meant by the term Public Life is a space where a body of people can come together to discuss issues relating to their group. These groups can be very small like a book club or large like the United Nations and they can discuss anything from the latest Bryce Courtney novel to world peace. Geoffrey Craig in his book The Media Politics and Public Life explains the concept of public life as: .. A body of people within a society and a domain within which debate about that society occurs The public is also a subject, and people come together as a public in modern times when they engage in readings of the events, the stories and the debates that circulate in the society. (2002. P49) Public life occurs where private issues are brought to the attention of the general public through the use of the media. Without out the media it would be private life, not public life. Media, as defined by the Collins dictionary is the plural of medium which is a means of communicating or teaching something. When we talk about the media we do not just use traditional forms of media like newspapers, television and radio but we also use other forms of media like movies, the internet, transnationals companies and communication technologies. All of these forms of media are sites where the meanings of public life are played out, debated and evaluated. Our everyday lives could not function properly without the media. Media is a drug that we cannot live in a democratic society without. We listen to the radio on the way to work to hear the traffic reports and to know where the multi-novas are hidden. When election time comes, we cant invite John Howard round for dinner to discuss his policies so we rely on the media to show us them through television radio and newspapers. When a cyclone is coming our way, how do we know to lock up the house or leave town? The media inform us. Even the very early smoke signals were a form of media, a form of communication. It is important to stress here that there is no way that public life could function without the use of the media as the understandings of our society, the norms and values of the world in which we live are the products of living in a mediated world. We as a public only ever see the representations of a breaking story through the television or in the paper. We rely on the media to tell us breaking stories that are happening around the world because of our geographical locations. John Hartley (1992 P1) has noted: while [the public domain and the public] dont exist as spaces and assemblies, the public realm and the public are still to be found, large as life in the media. Television, popular newspapers, magazines and photography, the popular media of the modern period, are the public domain, the place where and the means by which the public is crated and has its being. In talking about public life we must clarify the notion of having a public sphere. By public sphere we mean any activities that occur in the public eye or that is brought to the attention of the public through the media. Habermas argues that the original public spheres originated with the early Bourgeois movement in the tea houses, libraries and reading societies in England. It was here where people gathered to discuss issues concerning their lives and the society in which they lived. What made this a public sphere was that the people were all gathered in one place discussing issues that were relevant to them. Although this was regarded as one of the original democracies that were a voice for the people, Habermas also understood that the early tea house publics were not totally representative of the communities for which they were fighting for. In the early days women were not included in the tea house discussions, also, only a certain class of people were allowed to enter the tea houses and those that could not read would not need to go to reading houses or libraries. Of course those that could not travel to these public events had no said either. This limited the voice of the people to only those that were upper-class, well educated men that could travel. This was not representative of the wider communities. The next stage in the evolution of public life was when the printing presses made literature available to the mass public. This literature was free from state control and was the newest site for public life to be played out on. Of course if you were illiterate the medium was useless but for those that could read and had access to the literature a new public was formed. The reading public was not tied by geographical restrictions. The development of film was again a new medium that with it brought a new public. By now we have to understand that there are a huge amount of publics that all have their own issues to debate. A person can be part of a number of publics at one time. She may be a single mother, working at the supermarket, she is part of the conservative party, is a part of a sci-fi reading club, she buys Thai cooking books, buys red wine and goers to wineries, is part of a mothers group at day care, has a network of other single friends on the internet and is part of a union at work. All of these publics want very specific things and all lobby for different things, the private issues become public when they are played out through the different types of media. Without the media the issues would not be brought into the public spotlight and would likely not be resolved. It is essential to point out that modern public life is played out through our media consumption and not through our everyday experiences. We collectively watched the September 11 attacks through our televisions, listened to the disaster unfold on our radios and read about and saw the pictures of the devastation in newspapers. Without these sites we would not have experienced it at all. This highlights the fact that we rely on the media to get information that would not readily be available to us. Peter Dahlgren argues that the public sphere is not just a marketplace for ideas or an information exchange depot but also a major societal mechanism for the production and circulation of culture. This idea of the media framing culture is very important because it gives the media great power to give meaning to our identities. Culture, which consist of ideas, customs, norms, values and attitudes are shared by the people of a particular country. Campaigns that promote a type of culture are often produced by government and portrayed through various media outlets. Popular campaigns that frame our culture are the domestic violence ad Australia says NO to domestic violence and the drink driving campaign, that enforce that fact that those things are going against our culture and that that type of behaviours is not accepted. These campaigns are dependant on the media getting the message out there. The main media technologies that are responsible for the communication of public news are television, radio and print and these all function as journalism. These are seen as the most trustworthy sources of information as they are governed by laws that protect privacy, defamation and the use of misleading information. Journalisms main role is to seek the truth and tell the masses. Although these forms of media are self regulated (to be free of outside influence) their guidelines that journalists have to abide by are strict to keep the freedom to self regulate. Television is the most powerful mass medium and is an absolute must in every household. In my house alone there are four televisions and there are only 2 people living there. A productivity commission report found that Australias spend over 20 hours per week or 36% of their leisure time watching television(Productivity Commission 200, P62). The ability to actually see an event or person and hear them speak makes television the most trustworthy of the media outlets. Politicians often measure the success of a campaign on the presentation of their image/policy/media events. Although television has taken over from the print media as the most popular type of news media, many argue that the print media are the most influential mass medium for political debate. Agenda setting for the day is mostly done by the quality morning newspapers. Newspapers are often more detailed in their dissemination of public life because they are not restricted by the time factor that is TV. Radio is the secret weapon in the fight for a public life. The radio doesnt have the ability to show the audience an event or doesnt even give them a chance to read about an issue but it is the most pervasive forms of media as it can be listened to whilst driving or doing the housework. Politicians often use talkback radio as a direct link to the public. It is often the closet the general public will get to speaking with high profile players. Because the media is the chief agency to communicate public life and the world that we know is based on the representations of the media, there is much scrutiny placed on the authenticity of the stories that are shown to us. In Australia there are laws that ensure that one source does not have monopoly over the content of our media, Australias former prime minister Paul Keating put it best when he said that the cross ownership laws meant you could be a prince of print or a queen of screen but not both. This means that one person will not be in control of all of the media of our country and so a true representation of societys issues would be presented by the media. Again without the media, Australia would not be able to be a democratic society and have a public life. Through many different sites issues and events are played out and become open to the scrutiny of the general public. These different issues and events create discussion between the people that read or hear about them and this is what is meant by a public life. People that are hundreds of miles away from each other can be discussing the same issues without even having to talk to one another. These systems of communication enable us to live in a democratic society, a society where we can chose who leads us in government and we can discuss issues relating to our society. This would not happen if wasnt for the role of the media. Without the media to portray issues and events we would never hear about a sale on in the city or about governmental policy that is set to affect us all. Public life as we know it would not be able to function properly without the media. References Craig, Geoffrey. Chapter 1, 2 and 3. The Media, Politics and Public Life. Victoria: Allen and Unwin, 2004. Cunningham, Stuart and Graeme Turner. The Media and Communications in Australia. St Leonards, Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 2002. Dahlgren, Peter. Television and the Public Sphere: Citizenship, Democracy and the Media. London: Sage, 1995 Grossberg, Lawrence, Ellen Wartella and D. Charles Whitney. The Media and the Public. Media Making: Mass Media in a Popular Culture. Thousand Oaks, CA:Sage, 1998. 357-374 Habermas, Jurgen. The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into the Category of Bourgeois Society. Trans, T. Burger. Cambridge: Polity, 1992. Scannell, Paddy. Public service broadcasting and modern public life Media, Culture and Society. 11(1989):135-166. Thompson, John. The Media and the Development of the Modern Societies The Media and Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995. 44-69 Wark, McKenzie. Celebrities, culture and cyberspace: the light on the hill in a post-modern world. Sydney: Pluto Press, 1999. 128-136 http://malagigi. cddc. vt. edu/pipermail/icernet/2004-January/002743. html http://www. zip. com. au/~athornto/thesis2. htm http://www. gseis. ucla. edu/faculty/kellner/kellner. html.