soc paper :: essays research papers

WORK, WELFARE, AND SINGLE MOTHERS If you want to know a big problem in our country today it is single mothers and welfare. If you look at all the money that we throw away each and every year, you wouldn=t think this would be a problem. With all the rich giving to the poor, some should go to single parents trying their best to take care of their children. This could be easy, if they would just go and get a job they would be off welfare very quickly. But it isn=t that easy, study=s show that most welfare mothers have bad or no schooling at all, they are the woman that has been lay off of work, and the one=s that are young and don=t have enough to pay for their child=s living conditions. A lot of things changed in 1996 as federal lawmakers dramatically changed the rules poor people live by and made states responsible for implementing these rules. Twenty-five percent of the mothers on each state=s welfare caseload must be working by the end of 1997. By 2002, fifty percent must be working. Studies show that mothers that leave the welfare to quickly are the one=s that will not make it far in life, not far in life but the one=s that will be the least likely to succeed in getting off welfare and taking care of their families. Their main problem is making the transaction from welfare to work. They have problems making ends meat. They sometimes receive extra money from community groups, local charities, working extra jobs, obtaining cash from network members. They have to hid most of their income from their caseworkers so they could keep their welfare benefits. It was also hard for working mothers as they faced larger budget deficits than welfare mothers because they often didn=t Medicaid and had considerable work-related expenses. Working mothers had less time to work a side job or even get extra money from community groups and charities. It is a known fact that is harder to make ends meet when working than collecting welfare. All the studies are from four main cities which are Boston, Chicago, Charleston, and San Antonio. These were the cities picked to represent the study. The cost of living was different in all these places. They took into consideration different races, age, education, work experiences, and the background they came from. All these differed in all areas due to these things.

International Financial Reporting Standards Essay

Organizations around the world are continuously recording data and reporting financial information to the used for many purposes by the respective users. A tremendous amount of financial transactions continuously stir in the organizations, some transactions occur each second or minute whereas some transactions are very unique and take place occasionally as a result of a specific event. That is why to bring things in conformity and consistency, it is important that organizations establish standards and procedures for recording their data. In doing so present results will be in a position to be compared with historical data and with entities in similar industry. Listed companies have to particularly follow standard formats and disclose their financial information in such a way that it is easily understood by the users of the financial statements. This is because consistency flows through not just one organization but the entire industry making outcomes easier to contrast. These objectives are being addressed by standard setting boards such as IAASB by setting International Accounting Standards (IAS) and International Financial Reporting standards (IFRS). Both IFRS and IAS are equal in terms of their value and standing. (Tatum Malcum) All transactions need to be recorded as suggested above. One of the aspects that are a part of recording is financial instruments; created by a legal document and having different monetary values. They can be classified as cash or derivative instruments. Cash type of financial instruments is widely used and can be most easily understood. Currency in itself is a cash instrument or a bank cheque is a good example which can be used to transfer money from one bank account to another. However derivative instruments include those tools such as futures; an instrument saying that the seller will sell the asset or buyer will buy it at a future date. Price of such transactions is determined at the time of entering into a future contract. There are other instruments as well such as options and swaps whereas sometimes stocks, bonds and currency forwards are also termed as financial instruments. (Tatum Malcum) Due to the wide range of financial instruments being used, IAS 39 was introduced by International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) in 2001 to regulate the process of recognition and measurement of such transactions. The organizations dealing with them were facing problems with respect to treatment as different approaches were being applied by entities. This led to inconsistency of disclosing and recording of appropriate amounts within the industry as they were no standard process for recording the financial instruments. This directed the results of entities within the same industry to be incomparable with one another. Many of transactions involving financial instruments remained unrecognized as no proper recognition and measurement processes were known to the accountants. Hence CFO and CEO were in a position to distort the actual results and lead shareholders astray. (Miolo Alessandro, Andersen Arthur) In response to that IAS 39 introduced a concept of fair value accounting. The standard increased the importance of the fair value accounting for the financial instruments and therefore required entities to record assets and liabilities on the face of the balance sheet and discloses the nature of derivatives in the financial statements. In case of hybrids, the structure had to be broken down into two components (Miolo Alessandro, Andersen Arthur). This is because hybrid instruments have a mixture of characteristics of both debt and equity thereby market price of the hybrid instrument is sensitive to both the interest rates and quoted price for the stock (Riskglossory. com). The two components of the hybrid contract are real contracts however derivative is separated from the contract to be measured at fair value. (Miolo Alessandro, Andersen Arthur) IAS 39 also introduced hedge accounting for all derivatives in order to minimize the volatile affects on the income statement. Further segregation in the standard came into place as the â€Å"intention† of hedging was used to establish which accounting rules will be applied. As a result a fair value hedge, net investment hedge in foreign currency and cash flow hedge accounting rules was launched. In fair value hedging the risks are connected to the fluctuation of fair value of an underlying asset or liability. Whereas cash flow hedges are those in which the exposure is connected to the future cash flows of assets or liabilities recognized or any future commitment or forecasted cash flow of the organization. Moreover, the net investment hedge in foreign currency is hedging the risks of an entity’s net asset which is not an associate, joint venture or a subsidiary. (Miolo Alessandro, Andersen Arthur) Implication of this IAS affected all the users of financial statements and also the people who were trying to comply with the standard. The development of this standard and its implementation had significant impact on the strategies in dealing with financial risks. As the financial instruments have volatile affects on the equity portfolio and income statements these affects were then being countered by engaging in hedging strategies and transparent accounting policies. (Miolo Alessandro, Andersen Arthur) IAS 39 also provides organizations with the recognition criteria on how to record hedging instruments when entering into a transaction. After that at each period end gain and loss is recognized on an ongoing basis. So it has a forward looking stance at initiation but a backward bearing when re-assessment of investment’s effectiveness is carried out. The organizations needed to asses which process of reassessment would be right for their investment portfolio. A proper system was therefore required to record and reassess not only cash flows and fair values but also take into account the premiums and discounts involved. Moreover, IAS required the disclosure of all the investments and subsequent gains or loss arising due to it. (Miolo Alessandro, Andersen Arthur) The first revision of the IAS 39 took place in 2004 which incorporated Macro hedging, involving interest rates risks hedge. This amendment was made due to the increase use of these instruments and such investments were not addressed by IAS 39. Macro hedge is an investment technique to reduce or minimize the risks associated with the whole portfolio of investments (Peter Williams). This investments technique was widely spread because of the ease of information available about the interest rate and currency fluctuations between different countries. The macro managers earned by hedging the risks in different market by buying long and short in different markets of the globe. That increasing trend required the correct measurement and recognition of such investment which could only be linked with financial instruments dealt in IAS 39. (Hubpages, Inc. ) Further amendment took place on the issue of initial recognition of financial asset or liabilities and the subsequent charging of gain or loss. Initially all of such instruments were allowed to be measured on fair value if measured reliably. In 2005 the option to value instruments at fair value had been restricted to only those investments which had significantly reduced due to accounting mismatch along with those financial instruments whose fair values were regularly managed evaluated for its correctness. In addition IAS 39 stated before October 2008 that once an instrument is classified on the basis of fair value i. e through profit and loss category, it cannot be reclassified. Amendment in 2008 allowed some of the instruments to be reclassified from fair value and available for sale category under certain conditions and a disclosure is required in case of such a reclassification. Moreover it was stated that all the derivatives need to be reassessed in case of any reclassification; an issue that was developed due to the global credit crunch, significantly affecting the financial market. (Delloitte Touche Tohmatsu) With all the problems and issues dealing with financial instruments IASB and FASB started working together on IFRS 9 to replace IAS 39. Its purpose is to reduce difficulty in accounting for financial instruments and hedging activities. This development took place in phases. Phase one tends to improve and simplify the measurement and classification of the financial instruments. Though this phase has been completed but the exposure draft has been under plan to be issued and the implementation is to be completed in the current year. (International Accounting standard board) This new standard has raising concerns in the world in corporate sectors on how this will be implemented and how it will affect their operations. Many are happy for the change to take place as the IAS 39 is thought to be a difficult standard to implement. The replacement is a result of the world’s economic crises after which all the investors and the regulators of financial institutions were demanding for an accounting system which showed the types of assets and liabilities held at a given time, the risks that they are exposed to and gain and losses expect to be realized. (IFRS 9 – Deconstructing IAS 39) In 2008 when Lehman Brothers share price collapsed, the investors in turn rushed to purchase the share prices in anticipation of prices bouncing back. However they couldn’t see the situation of the bank’s exposure in financial instruments related to subprime loans as less information was disclosed for their understanding. Hence it was later suggested that accounting needs to be clearer which became evident upon the fall of many banks. IFRS 9 strived to cater and answer all these major issues in hand while giving organizations an option to adopt this standard before it becomes mandatory in 2013. Only the first phase of the standard is completed and all the stakeholders are waiting to implement it upon finalization of IFRS 9 completion. IFRS 9 – Deconstructing IAS 39) IFRS 9 looks to tackle all the current problems and questions probed by various investors but it cannot give a guarantee to prevent any crises in future. It is important that accountants, regulator and the investors remain vigilant because no matter how much IFRS 9 helps to simplify the accounting of financial reporting, when this economy starts its recovery phase no one can stop the development of new financial instruments eluding the situation like before. European Union refused to adopt IFRS 9 last year posing some questions relating to fair value of investments coverage. On the other hand Japan signed it for an early adoption in March 2010 which is a significant step toward promoting transparency in policies and implementation (IFRS 9 – Deconstructing IAS 39). Hence it can be clearly seen that IASB and FASB have been working for the betterment of the society by incorporating the external changes in the market which can be reflected upon the replacement of IAS 39 with IFRS 9.

Reflection Paper of a Walk to Remember Essay

Summary: â€Å"A Walk to Remember† is a heart touching story which is being narrated by a 57 year-old Landon Carter, who describes how he fell in love with the Baptist’s daughter, Jamie. It’s starting from two young people who first are strangers and then find themselves unexpectedly fall in love with each other. In 1958, Beaufort, North Carolina, seventeen-year-olds Landon Carter who is a popular and rich kid in the community planned to study at University of Carolinas after he graduated. His first girlfriend is Angela, but unfortunately they are not last. Therefore, Landon and Jamie live in two completely different worlds. Jamie Sullivan is a quiet and kind and bookish girl whom he has known many years but rarely ever spoken with. This changes when Landon needs a date for the homecoming dance. All the girls he knows already have dates and finally he has no other possibility than asking Jamie. Surprisingly, she agrees, although her father doesn’t like Landon at all. The party day is coming and they have fun together lots. After the dance, Jamie asks Landon to play one of the main roles in a Christmas play that her father has written. Landon doesn’t want to but he agrees nevertheless. When the rehearsals start, Landon and Jamie spend a lot of time together, and the more Landon knows about Jamie, the more he understands and even likes her. He even walks Jamie home every night. On the evening when the play is performed, he seen Jamie as a very beautiful lady and he realized he falls in love with her. After Landon confessed, they start dating and having a very sweet couple life. They’re in a relationship together until Jamie tells him she has leukemia, and that she had stopped responding to treatments. This causes a struggle in their relationship. Jamie condition getting worse day by day and London feel really sad that he can’t help her anything. In the end they get married because Landon wants to fulfill her wish. Forty year later, Landon still loves her and never removed the ring. He said â€Å"I now believe, by the way, that miracles can happen†. Characters Analysis: Jamie Sullivan is the seventeen-year-old daughter of Hegbert Sullivan. She is a very religious girl, carrying her Bible around with her everywhere. She is happy and cheerful and sees the best in everyone and in every situation, always ready to help those in distress. I really like her character the most because of her kind and innocent attitudes and very loyal to love. Landon Carter is the 57 year-old man who through flashback narrates the story of his seventeenth year, the year that changed his life. I really like him after finishing the whole reading because it show that he is very loyal to his wife by never removing the wedding ring and still in love with her. However, after I take looks at the acknowledgement part of the novel shows that he re-married with other women and has 2 sons. I really dislike the fact that he re-married showing that he is not loyal to Jamie at all. Recommendation: I would recommend this story for those who enjoy novels that touch your heart and make you think about real life. It’s a story of how strong teen love can truly be and the love conquers all. Even it’s a bit complicated and boring at first, if you keep on reading you will find it addicted, because the best part of the story is in the last chapter. Conclusion: This novel is a very heart touching story and I like it. I love how the author draws the reader in with emotions, descriptions, love, and death. Therefore, I think it’s a great book that show the real love between man and woman and it’s even touching of how it show that the main characters struggle together through their love obstacles and how the power of love can change a person.

Perfect Pizzeria Essay

Perfect Pizzeria Restaurants is a chain of 125 pizza establishments around the country with headquarters in Madison, Wisconsin. There are three locations in Bloomington, Indiana however they have financial and employee problems particularly at the location near the Indiana University campus. Each location has one manager and two shift leaders. The employees are mostly college students, with a few high school students performing the less challenging jobs. Nearly all of the employees, with the exception of some managers, are employed part-time and most earned only the minimum wage or slightly above. To address the financial problems, the Perfect Pizzeria manager’s compensation plan was changed to now being based on food and beverage costs and profit targets. If the percentage of food unsold or damaged is very low, the manager gets a bonus. If the percentage is high, the manager does not receive a bonus; rather he or she receives only his or her normal salary. Their compensation is also reflected in the restaurant’s profit figures which also must reach a certain level for the manager to receive a bonus. Thus the managers knew the criteria being used for their evaluation and therefore where to focus their efforts. These profit and loss figures often fluctuate. Knowing the manager cannot be in the store 24 hours a day, some employees make up for their low paychecks by helping themselves to the food. When a friend comes in to order a pizza, extra ingredients are put on the friend’s pizza. An occasional slice or two of pizza by the 18 to 20 employees throughout the day/evening at the break table also raises the percentage figure. An occasional bucket of sauce may be spilled or a pizza accidentally burned. Sometimes the wrong size of pizza may be made. In the event of an employee mistake or a burned pizza by the oven person, the expense is supposed to come from the individual employee. Because of peer pressure, the night manager seldom writes up a bill for the erring employee. Instead the establishment takes the loss and the error goes unnoticed until the end of the month when the inventory is taken. That’s when the manager finds out if the food loss percentage is high and if there will be a bonus. (Next page) Over time these loss figures increased. To address these problems at the Bloomington location, the manager took retaliatory measures. Previously, each employee was entitled to a free pizza slice, salad, and all the soft drinks he or she could drink for every 4 hours of work. Management decided to raise this figure to 6 hours of work before any free food. Since the employees had received this â€Å"free food after 4-hours† benefit for a long time they frequently ignored the rule and took advantage of the situation whenever the manager was not in the building. Therefore, the Perfect Pizzeria manager decided to create an assistant manager position which could more closely supervise the shift leaders. Each shift leader was now responsible for a team of 3 – 4 employees who were given specific responsibilities for a particular job such as counter, delivery, food preparation, etc. Employee apathy grew within the pizzeria. There seemed to be a further separation between the store manager and his workers, who were once a closely knit group. The manager made no attempt to alleviate the problem, because he felt it would iron itself out. The employees who were dissatisfied would quit or they would be content to put up with the new regulations. As it turned out, there were many employee resignations. The manager had no problem in filling the vacancies with new workers, but the loss of experienced personnel was costly to the business. It didn’t take long for the new employees to become influenced by the more experienced employees and the unsold/damaged food percentage remained high. Then the manager took a bolder step. He eliminated all the benefits that the employees had – no free pizzas, salads, or drinks. The manager tried still another approach to alleviate the rising unsold/damaged food percentage problem and maintain his bonus. He placed a notice on the bulletin board, stating that: if the percentage remained at a high level, a lie detector test would be given to all employees. All those found guilty of taking or intentionally wasting food or drinks would be immediately terminated. This did not have the desired effect on the employees, because they knew if they were all subjected to the test, all would be found guilty and the manager would have to dismiss all of them. This would leave him in a worse situation than ever. As the manager sat in his office listening to his beloved Cub’s baseball game, he analyzed the month’s profit/loss statements and knew things were not going to be good. What he did not expect was that the percentage was actually increasing from previous months. Another problem developed at the Bloomington campus location when Jennifer, a recently hired night shift counter clerk filed a complaint with the regional manager. She stated in her complaint that she was always required to work the late shift and Bill the night manager was becoming a bit â€Å"too friendly†. In fact her complaint stated, the only way she could get off from work earlier than other employees was if she would agree to meet Bill on their nights off at Hoosier’s, a popular college student club down the street from Perfect Pizzeria. Additionally, there was a formal complaint from a group of male employees that only the attractive female workers were being promoted to assistant managers or shift leaders even though the men had worked at the restaurant longer than most of the promoted women. The case assignment questions follow†¦ PERFECT PIZZERIA – CASE QUESTIONS (Please type your responses by listing the question number/letter and then your answers to the questions.) 1. List two different managerial functions/activities the manager has performed. Then give specific examples or evidence from the case that explains these two management functions the manager has performed. 4. points) 2a. Which of the managerial skills was the manager best at? Explain. 2b. Which of the managerial skills did the manager need to improve? Explain. (4 points) 3. List and/or give examples of four (4) different forces or factors from Perfect Pizzerias’ external environment. Then give a specific example of how each of these could have an impact on Perfect Pizzeria. Please be specific.(4 pts.) 4a. The case mentions that some employees put extra ingredients on their friends’ pizza or take a nibble or two of pizza during their shift. Please discuss whether you feel this is ethical and your reasons why you feel this way. (2 pts.) 4b. What actions could an organization take to prevent these potential ethical violations from happening based on the concepts in the textbook? Explain by applying these ideas to this case situation. (4 pts.) 5. Review the organizational approaches to managing diversity from Chapter 6. Then discuss or give an example of how you would apply two of these concepts to address the complaints of the male employees regarding the unfair promotions? Be specific. (4 points) 6. Give an example from the case of a poor management action and discuss two (2) specific ways you would correct the situation if you were the manager. (3 points)

Biographical Sketch Essay

-refer to a brief biography of an individual. This may contain the dates of one’s birth, and death if they are dead and small outline of their background. -must be no longer than 300 words -a (biosketch) brief summary of you or someone else’s professional or educational accomplishments, publications, and affiliations- -an abbreviated curriculum vitae (resumà ©)-meant to highlight important aspects of your training, experience, and areas of interest. -a ‘light sketch’ of a persons life Below is an example: Mae Jemison:Space Star Have you ever dreamed of flying freely through outer space, surrounded by a sea of stars? Mae Jemison fulfilled that dream. On September 12, 1992, aboard the spaceship Endeavour, she became the first African-American woman to blast into outer space. This wasn’t the only time, however, that Jemison had reached for the stars and realized her dreams. Jemison was born on October 17, 1956, in Decatur, Alabama, but she grew up in Chicago, Illinois. There weren’t many well-known African-American female role models while Jemison was growing up, but she didn’t let that stop her from achieving her goals. She was especially interested in anthropology, archaeology and astronomy. Luckily, her parents encouraged those interests. That encouragement drove her to excel. She graduated from high school at 16. Then she earned degrees in chemical engineering and African-American studies at Stanford University. Later, she graduated from Cornell University’s medical school. No challenge was too great for Jemison to take on. Jemison’s accomplishments did not end there. In 1981, she joined NASA’s space program in Houston, Texas. And in 1988, Jemison realized her biggest dream. She finally became an astronaut! Just four years later, she was named science mission specialist (another NASA first) on an Endeavour flight. Today, Jemison encourages young people–especially women and girls–to study the sciences. Her life example teaches us to follow our dreams, no matter how great. Capsule Biography-a biography in which all the important elements of the persons life are included, in summary form, kind of like an expanded obituary. -a detailed description or account of a person’s life. It entails more than basic facts (education, work, relationships, and death) a biography also portrays a subject’s experience of these events. – Feature Story-a special human interest story or article that is not closely tied to a recent news event. It focuses on particular people, places, and events, and it goes into great detail regarding concepts and ideas of specific market interest. -in journalistic terms, it is an article in newspapers, magazine or on the internet which is intended to add depth and perspective in a story. It mostly dwells on the background of an event and gives a human interest perspective to a story or a commentary on a particular issue.

Literacy Autobiography Essay

I did not come from a household in which reading and writing was promoted, although both my parents were literate. My motivation to start a new family legacy comes from looking at how my literacy skills were formed. Growing up I cannot remember when I began to write. I do remember my fourth grade teacher â€Å"Ms. Pickering. I did my school work, because I had to. I do not remember a pivotal moment about writing. My parents mind set was it’s the schools job to teach you how to read and write. In hind sight I should have initiated more reading on my own, or been more interested, but I wasn’t, I was worried about baseball, soccer and then football. As I grew, my attitude towards writing did, I was not good at it so I was insecure when I had to write. I thought it was a waste of time. I am not an English professor (obviously) but my writing began to improve when I was taught how to make documents at work- schedules, order lists, inventory sheets. Then when emails became a bigger part of communication I would look at how my boss would format their writings and how the big bosses would write their letters†¦ Did I learn proper writing, probably not, but it was better than what I was doing before. Looking back I guess it is corporate/email writing etiquette. I am a slow reader, but I tell people I like to savor books! I never learned how to read fast, I envy people who can read a paragraph or page once, sometimes I will need to read a two sentence or paragraph two to three times to really understand it. Reading has always been a chore to me. As I have gotten older I have started to actually enjoy reading more. I will read news on the internet. I guess I never had that fairytale teacher or parent that lit the reading fire. Reading and writing is definitely not the constant in my life, it does not fill my soul, I really wish I could say the opposite.

Media have transformed sport Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Media have transformed sport - Essay Example Now, with the help of media, live broadcasts have become very famous among people from all walks of life. Mass communication and mass media came into existence and became popular by the end of 19th century. Examples would be; print media, cigarette cards, cinema newsreel, radio and the latest television era. Then came the tabloid revolution, new men’s magazines, advertising and electronic media like satellites. In the era of print media, social commentators played an important role, new guides and sports magazines began to be published and ‘graphic revolution’ of 1961 as referred to as by Boorstin. Pulitzer established the first ‘sports department’ in New York Times in1883 (McChesney 1989: 53). Sports news has been dominated by national newspapers and has outsourced multi sports magazines (Horne, 1992). As for the cigarette cards; they were invented in France. Cinema brought movement and hence sporting action to the audience for the first time (Aldgate 1979: 17). In Britain, the first cinema performance held in public was in 1896, and there came into being around 4000-5,000 cinemas by 1914. Radio had its own advantages. It was a medium that provided listeners with immediacy. 1922 is the year when this happened in the UK and thus British Broadcasting Corporation was formed. After the formation of BBC in 1927, sport broadcasts became a well known element in the schedules (see Whannel 1992). Next development was in the form of the television; which was established in the 1930s but received more recognition in the 1950s to 1970s. By 1965, BBC had established Sportsview (1954), Grandstand (1958) and Match of the Day (1962) as regular programmes, ITV had launched World of Sport, and in the USA, ABC Sport had launched Wide World of Sport, with its subtitle "the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat", and adopted its slogan "up close and personal" (Powers 1984: 118-21). These developments transformed the nature of sport stardom. Stars and