Clinical Issue Article Analysis Step 4 Research Paper

Clinical Issue Article Analysis Step 4 - Research Paper Example in Urology Patients are that all healthcare members need to understand the diagnostic criteria and the utilization of tools used for daily assessment. The article on a pragmatic study exploring the prevention of delirium findings is that there is there is the need to use end-user support in the implementation of evidence based clinical decision support tools. The last article on Delirium Prevention for Cognitive, Sensory, and Mobility Impairments findings is that nursing protocols used will not be in a position of preventing delirium in elderly patients. The three qualitative and three quantities research articles have been thoroughly researched with the researchers using pre-intervention and post-intervention study as design and this makes the findings trustworthy and valid. There exist conflicts and gaps from the six articles as each provides a different conclusion and findings. However, in all the articles come to a similar conclusion as they provide different ways of dealing with delirium in hospitalized patients. Holroyd-Leduc1, R., Abelseth, G., Khandwala, F., Silvius, J., Hogan, D., Schmaltz, H., Frank, C. (2010). A pragmatic study exploring the prevention of delirium among hospitalized older hip fracture patients: Applying evidence to routine clinical practice using clinical decision support. Implementation Science, 5, 1-6. Foreman, M. D., Mion, L. C., Trygstad, L. J., & Fletcher, K. (2003). Delirium: Strategies for assessing and treating. In M. Mezey, T. Fulmer, I. Abraaham, & D. Zwicker (Eds.). Geriatric nursing protocols for best practice (2nd ed., pp. 63-75). New York:

Why chinese mothers are superior Essay Example for Free

Why chinese mothers are superior Essay How do you raise your child in the best way? Is it the Western or Chinese methods to prefer? That is the big question in this article. Amy Chua takes her starting point in her own life, where she raises her two daughters, Sophia and Louisa. Their upbringing is influenced by the Chinese methods. Amy Chua never allowed them to attend a sleepover or get any grade less than an A for instance. 1 The sender of this article is the 50-year old Chinese woman, Amy Chua, who is a professor at Yale Law School, USA. She argues that the Chinese methods are the most effective way of raising a successful child. According to Amy, there are three main differences between Western and Chinese parenting. First of all, Western parents are concerned about their children’s’ psyches, while Chinese, roughly said, aren’t. For instance, if a child comes home with a B on the test, some Western parents would still praise their child. The Chinese mother would probably gasp in horror and start an immediate long and hard practice session. Secondly, Chinese parents believe that their kids owe them everything, while Western parents like Jed (her husband) has the opposite view. The Westerners will most likely say, the children don’t choose their parents and the children don’t owe their parents anything. â€Å"Their duty will be to their own kids†. 2 Third, Chinese parents know what is best for their children, while Western parents will probably say that the children must figure out themselves what’s best for them. As you can see, there is a huge cultural barrier between the Chinese and Western parenting. She uses studies in her article, which increases her credibility like, â€Å"In one study of 50 Western American mothers and 48 Chinese immigrant mothers, almost 70 % of the Westerns mothers said either that â€Å"stressing academic success is not good for children†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. By contrast, roughly 0 % Chinese mothers felt the same way†¦Ã¢â‚¬ 3 Even though she uses a lot of studies to increase her credibility, it is still important to notice that the article is entirely subjective. Throughout the story, you can sense that Amy Chua thinks the Chinese methods are the most effective way to raise a successful and happy child. It is exemplified in her story about Lulu, who tries intensively to learn a piano piece called â€Å"The Little White Donkey†. Lulu cannot do it in the beginning, because it is a very difficult piece of art for young players. That is not acceptable for Amy Chua, who keeps pushing and threatening her (according to Western mothers). According to Amy Chua, she is just motivating Lulu to achieve her goals. Amy Chua’s husband says, he does not want to see Lulu get insulted and mistreated like that. â€Å"Sophia could play that piece, when she was this age†, Amy responded. So Amy and Lulu continued practicing and all of a sudden, Lulu did it. Even Jed gave Amy credit for that one. Jed (as a Western parent) worries a lot about her self-esteem, because Amy pushes Lulu to the edge. But as a parent according to Amy, one of the worst things you can for your child’s self-esteem is to let them give up. â€Å"There’s nothing better for building confidence than learning you can do something you thought you couldn’t†. The story about Lulu and the title of the article provokes the reader. She uses a provocation for the intended reader, who is most likely parents in the USA, by naming the article â€Å"Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior† which demeans the reader’s parenting skills. It engages the reader to read the story, because they want to know why she would say such thing. Furthermore, Amy constantly compares the Western and the Chinese mothers and it is often to lead the reader in a certain direction. She uses the story to increase her credibility by telling the reader that the Chinese method is an effective way to success. The children must possess a strong psyche to survive the very rough Chinese methods of upbringing. The Chinese methods can have fatal consequences for the children. You can for instance lose your individuality as a human being by trying to satisfy everyone but yourself. You also lose the ability of self-realization, where you can do exactly what you want to do. The Chinese methods, roughly said, transform you into an object instead of a human being. It is documented that the methods cause psychological damage to a lot of children in China. The high suicide rates, depressions and rebellious behavior are a consequence of the very rough methods of upbringing. Lots of children’s academic excellence is â€Å"forced† rather than chosen. Some children may respond well to â€Å"Chinese mothering†, and hopefully for Amy Chua’s sake, her own daughters are among them. But on the other hand it is impossible to be â€Å"the No. 1 in every subject except gym and drama. †4 It is important to have diligence, but on the other hand, you’ve got to have some talent as well – especially, if you want to be the best at everything. Let me conclude by repeating that it is not healthy for every child to be forced to achieve academic excellence. You have to respect every child’s individuality and support their decisions, so they do not end up by doing something they actually do not want to do.

Pride And Prejudice - Point Of View Essay -- essays research papers

Marry For Love The point of view of a novel usually decides which characters we sympathize with. In the novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, Elizabeth Bennett is the focal character, which causes the reader to feel closest to her. The reader can relate more easily to her feelings and actions, and given that all of Elizabeth’s opinions on large issues are known and understood, the reader tends to side with her. By making the story from the point of view of Elizabeth, Austen is able to take advantage of the closeness between reader and character to make a political statement about the institution of marriage, and thus shows her own feeling that it is a mistake to marry for any other reason besides love. One way that she shows her feelings on matrimony is by using Elizabeth’s voice as her own to approve of some characters decisions about marriage. Elizabeth’s approval of certain characters shows Austen’s approval, and in this case, Elizabeth approves of the marriage between Jane and Bingley. Jane and Bingley show throughout the novel their genuine affection for one another, and Elizabeth observes about Bingley’s affection for Jane, "I never saw a more promising inclination. He was growing quite inattentive to other people, and wholly engrossed by her†¦ Is not general incivility the very essence of love?" (106). Mrs. Bennett approves of the match mostly on a monetary basis, and exclaims, "Why, he has four or five thousand a year, and very likely more. Oh my dear Jane, I am so happy!" (260). Elizabeth, however, looks down on her mother for this, and approves of the marriage because she can tell that the two are truly in love with one another. Austen also makes those in love the happiest of all the characters. Jane and Bingley are truly in love, consequently, they are two of the happiest characters in the novel. Jane announces that, "’Tis too much! By far too much. I do not deserve it. Oh! why is not everybody as happy?" (259) and, "I am certainly the most fortunate creature that ever existed!" (262). Jane and Bingley’s happiness shows the author’s approval of their marriage. Austen uses Elizabeth’s voice as her own to make the statement that love is the only acceptable reason to marry. Another way that Austen uses Elizabeth to show her feelings on the issue of matrimony is b... ...iven to Wickham by Darcy, they are the ones in the worst financial situation. "They were always moving from place to place in quest of a cheap situation, and always spending more than they ought" (290-291). By using Elizabeth as the character from whose point of view we see the other characters, we are shown by Austen how to feel about each specific situation. In the case of Lydia and Wickham, we are to agree with Elizabeth (and thus Austen) that they have gotten what they deserve for jumping into marriage for the wrong reasons. Therefore, Austen’s voice comes through Elizabeth to make the statement that it is foolish to marry for any reason besides love. Jane Austen uses Elizabeth as the focal character in the novel Pride and Prejudice to relay a message to the reader. Her own voice comes through Elizabeth to make the political statement that it is unwise to marry for any reason other than love. Elizabeth (and thus Austen) feels that true happiness cannot be achieved in a marriage unless there is a great deal of love between the partners, and so explains her pursuit for true love, and her disapproval of marriage between those she knows are not in love.

Are Concerns over Immigration to Do with Culture of Economic Reasons Essay

Almost all economists are in agreement that immigration has positive economic effects. Indeed in the United States it â€Å"provides natives with a net benefit of at least $80,000 per immigrant, or as much as $10 billion annually† (Bolin, 2006). However despite this there are huge numbers of advocacy groups pushing the pros and cons immigration to the populations of the host countries, with natives having negative views towards immigration (McLaren & Johnson, 2007). Through the course of this essay I will examine whether the root cause of these often xenophobic views towards immigration have root causes in economic reasons (immigrants taking jobs from natives, and leading to lower wages) or symbolic reasons, where the natives are fearful that the immigrants will bring their culture to the host country and cause change. Enoch Powell, the Conservative British politician, gave a warning that immigrants were causing such strife that â€Å"like the Roman, I seem to see the River Tiber foaming with much blood† (Powell, 1969). This turned out to be nonsense, and his advice that immigrants should be encouraged to leave, would have left Britain, and many other countries that rely on cheap foreign labour in a horrific state of affairs. Immigrants are now taking far longer to integrate into their host country and this is upsetting many natives. â€Å"In the past a third-generation migrant, for example in America, would have been expected to have shed much of his grandparents’ identity† (The Economist, 2008), not speaking his mother tongue and having little loyalty to the country his family originated from. This is changing â€Å"as migrants feel loyalty to more than one country† (The Economist, 2008). For example, Moroccans in Europe, even fourth generation, are encouraged by the Government to identify with the African country, and are granted Moroccan citizenship under the constitution. As many source countries such as India and China grow intent on gaining remittances from their emigres, â€Å"migrants even several generations on may come under great pressure to retain some of their old identity† (The Economist, 2008). This can all lead to immigrants never becoming fully integrated into the host country, causing social problems such as immigrants bunching together in the same place. Due to globalisation and time-space compression, it has become far easier for migrants to emigrate further away from their own country, this causes problems as they subsequently have little in common with their host country and find it harder to integrate into the community. Traveling long distances to emigrate is no longer a problem and in the future there will be the problem of â€Å"people moving greater distances and settling among different ethnic, religious and cultural groups† (The Economist, 2008), meaning they will have problems integrating. â€Å"Danes in Sweden or Albanians in Greece have little trouble integrating into the relatively familiar societies next door. Even Poles in Ireland prosper, perhaps thanks to the incomers’ good standard of education and skill and the shared Catholic faith. But Iraqis in Sweden, Somalis in Canada or Pakistanis in Norway typically find integration harder† (The Economist, 2008). Samuel Huntington blames this on the â€Å"great divisions among humankind† (Huntington, 1993) that are the differences between civilisations. He believes that immigration will ‘intensify civilization consciousness and awareness of differences between civilizations and commonalities within civilizations’ (Huntington, 1993). This leads to a ‘them versus us’ attitude, with the natives having the xenophobic view that the immigrants are qualitatively different from themselves. As the natives of the host country would have spent time constructing â€Å"discursive practices that attempt to fix meanings which enable the differentiation between the inside and the outside to be made† (Doty, 1996), they will resent immigrants not properly integrating themselves into the community. Research on social identity appears to conclude that identity is highly important to individuals, with individuals protecting these identities even if they have no realistic meaning (Monroe, et al. , 2000). People use these identities to provide a sense of self (Sniderman, et al. 2004), partly in order that they may distinguish between those similar to themselves and those different. The ‘identities tend to have their basis in perceptions of differences’ (McLaren & Johnson, 2007)with those viewed as outsiders thought to have radically different values and approaches to life. â€Å"The threat posed by minorities and immigrants may be symbolic in nature and may stem from concerns about the loss of certain values or ways of life† (McLaren & Johnson, 2007), due to immigrants having a significant presence in the host country. Immigrants also often congregate in areas of the host country, London for example has a huge immigrant and minority presence with only 44. 9% classing themselves as ‘White British’ (Gye, 2012), in the 2011 census. This all means that natives are fearful that immigrants will cause them to adapt or change their ways of life. Migrants who preserve â€Å"a strong religious sense that cuts across any national loyalty may be the hardest of all to assimilate into broadly secular Western societies†. In the post-9/11 world Muslims are often seen as being the greatest cultural threat to Western societies. In a recent survey McLaren and Johnson measured anti-Muslim feeling in the United Kingdom. They found that 62% of people agreed with the statement that British Muslims are more loyal to Muslims around the world, than to other Britons, only 12% disagreed. Only 30% of Britons felt that Muslims living in Britain were committed to Britain, with 47% feeling that they could never be committed to Britain. 52% of people thought that Britain would begin to lose its identity if more Muslims came to live there. Clearly there is considerable anti-Muslim feeling in Britain and concern that British-Muslims pose a threat to the identity and culture of Britain (McLaren & Johnson, 2007). Most economists are in agreement that immigration has very little effect on native’s wages; this should mean that natives won’t oppose immigration based on the misbelief that immigrants lower wages. Although conventional economic wisdom states that an increase in supply of labour will lead to a decrease in price, this doesn’t happen. Friedberg and Hunt conclude that a 10% increase in immigrant levels in the population, decreases wages by 1% (Friedberg & Hunt, 1995). Economist Francisco Revera-Batiz came to the same conclusion, noting that although immigration has increased the supply of low skilled workers into the United States, there has been very little impact on the wages of high school dropouts, the lowest skilled people in America (Rivera-Batiz, 1998). One of the most influential studies is Card’s 1990 study on the Miami Labour market after the sudden influx of 125,000 Cuban immigrants in 1980 due to a sharp downturn in the Cuban economy. Surprisingly the arrival of so many immigrants didn’t affect native wages, although it did lower the overall wage level in Miami; due to the immigrants being employed in low-wage jobs (Card, 1990). This tallies with the outcomes of other natural experiments in recent history such as the homecoming of 600,000 Portuguese after the collapse of their empire in Africa in 1974-76, the return of 900,000 Frenchmen from Algeria in 1962 (The Economist, 2008) or the influx of 610,000 Russian Jews into Israel 1990-94, increasing the labour force by 12%; all had negligible effects on native wages. Immigrants don’t decrease wages because as well as increasing the supply of labour, they become a domestic consumer for goods as well as services, they â€Å"create jobs as consumers and fill jobs as producers† (Bolin, 2006). A higher total population, ceteris parabus, will lead to the production of more goods and services, boosting the host countries gross domestic product (GDP). In some rare cases immigrants can even boost native’s wages. Illegal Mexican immigrants, who are â€Å"predominantly low skilled† (Bolin, 2006), have a positive effect on other workers’ wages (Bean, et al. 1998). This is due to immigration increasing the productivity of native workers by â€Å"taking low-skilled jobs, freeing higher-skilled workers to work in higher-skilled employment where they can be more productive† (Bolin, 2006). Based on the results of a range of economists, using results based on a â€Å"range of methodologies† (Bolin, 2006), it can be seen that immigrants have a small negative impact on native wages, although mainly low-skilled workers. Based on this, natives shouldn’t be concerned over immigration levels based on their own wages falling. The popular theory that immigrants ‘come over here and take our jobs’, has been shown to hold very little truth, as most studies â€Å"find no or negligible effect[s]† (Bolin, 2006) on employment rates. The ‘lump of labour fallacy’ is the mistaken idea that there are a set number of jobs in the economy, and when an immigrant takes one of those jobs, it is a job lost for a native. This is incorrect for three reasons. Firstly, by coming to a country â€Å"immigrants increase the supply of labour and hence reduce wages. In turn, cheaper labour increases the potential return to employers to build new factories or expand their operations. In so doing, they create extra demand for workers† (Grinda, 2006), and more jobs are created. Secondly, immigrants are consumers as well as producers. When there is a large influx of immigrants such as the 610,000 Russian-Jews into Israel in the early 1990’s, they are in need of goods and services. People are employed to provide these goods and services, meaning more jobs added to the economy, and immigrants simply enlarge the economy. Thirdly, immigrants are 10 to 20 percent more likely to become entrepreneurs and start their own business than natives (Briggs & Moore, 1994). In 1999, The Wall Street Journal reported that â€Å"Chinese and Indian immigrants run nearly 25% of the high-companies started in [Silicon] Valley since 1980†¦The 2,775 immigrant-run companies had total sales of $16. 8 billion and more than 58,000 employees† (Thurm, 1999). â€Å"Immigrants not only take jobs, they make jobs. They open new businesses that employ natives as well as other immigrants and themselves. And they do so in important numbers† (Simon, 1999). Similarly, the findings by Friedberg and Hunt discovers â€Å"no evidence of economically significant reductions in native employment†. Card, as well as examining the impact of the Muriel boatlift on wages also examined the impact of it on employment. Even though Miami’s workforce was increased by 7%, virtually overnight, with an influx of relatively unskilled Cuban workers he finds â€Å"no evidence of an increase in unemployment among less skilled blacks or other non-Cuban workers. Rather the data analysis suggests a remarkably rapid absorption of the Muriel immigrants into the Miami labour force† (Card, 1990). Again with immigrant’s impact on wages, the evidence seems to suggest that a lack of evidence that immigration causes native unemployment. This should mean that concerns over immigration should not be linked to worries over employment. Due to immigrants being â€Å"disproportionately low-skill[ed]† (Bolin, 2006) they tend to have lower wages than natives. It is often assumed therefore that they depend more upon the welfare system than natives. The level of benefits are often higher in the host country than the source country, and it is often suggested that it is this difference that brings in migrants. Borjas coined the term â€Å"welfare magnet effect† (Borjas, 1999), making the point that immigrants are drawn to the country with the highest benefits. This however has all been shown to be completely false, and many economists believe that over the long term immigrants more than pay for the public services they use (Simon, 1999). In the United States â€Å"most immigrants, including Mexicans, are usually less likely than comparable natives to receive welfare†, with the per capita cost of social welfare for immigrants being 8% less than the per capita cost for natives (Bean, et al. 1998). It is plain to see that objections to immigration come from those who are worried about the identity and culture of their nation being eroded, rather than for economic reasons. Immigrants are solving many problems for the host countries, such as the problems of aging populations and those participating in the workforce being increasing choosy about the jobs they do. Immigrants have few economic disadvantages, although high immigration may bring about a small decrease in jobs for the natives, the tax revenue that they bring in more than displaces this negative effect. As the immigrants have little impact on jobs, and simply create more jobs in the economy, disproving the lump of labour fallacy, they don’t have a negative impact on wages which is a positive for the economy as a whole. The argument that immigrants have a negative impact on the identity and culture of a nation holds some truth. Due to the fact that a nation’s identity is made up of what its inhabitants believe it to be, immigrants having different views, can water this identity down.

The Impact of Medical Technology on Health Care Finance

| The Impact of Medical Technology on Health Care Finance| Patricia Brewer| | | | | Health care costs have been rising for several years. United States health care Expenditures surpassed $2. 3 trillion in 2008, more than three times the $714 billion spent in 1990, and over eight times the $253 billion spent in 1980 (Kimbuende, 2010). Slowing this growth has become a major policy priority, as the government, employers, and consumers increasingly struggle to keep up with health care costs.In 2008, U. S. health care spending was about $7,681 per resident and accounted for 16. 2% of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product. This is among the highest of all industrialized countries. Total health care expenditures grew at an annual rate of 4. 4 percent in 2008, a slower rate than recent years, yet still outpacing inflation and the growth in national income. There is a general agreement that health costs are likely to continue to rise in the near future.Many analysts have cited controllin g health care costs as a key for broader economic stability and growth, and President Obama has made cost control a focus of health reform efforts under way. By 2016, total health spending is projected to rise to $4. 2 trillion. Rising health care costs raise health insurance premiums, which are also growing at a much quicker pace than overall inflation or workers' earnings. Health spending has been rising two and a half percent a year, faster than the gross domestic product over the past four decades (Covington, 2008).Although Americans benefit from many of the investments in health care, the recent rapid cost growth, plus with an overall economic slowdown and rising federal deficit, is placing great strains on the systems used to finance health care, including private employer-sponsored health insurance coverage and public insurance programs such as Medicare and Medicaid. Since 1999, family premiums for employer-sponsored health coverage have increased by 131 percent, placing incr easing cost burdens on employers and workers.The average cost of a one-day stay in a hospital has now risen to over $500, the total cost of a coronary bypass operation and follow-up treatment has reached $37,300, and the average cost of delivering a baby now exceeds $2500. As costs have increased, fewer people have been able to afford the medical care they need. Over 37 million Americans, including over 12 million children, carry no health insurance at all and are unable to afford private health care, they must rely on a public health system that cannot deal with such a burden.With workers’ wages growing at a much slower pace than health care costs, many face difficulty in affording out-of-pocket spending. Government programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, also account for a significant share of health care spending, but they have increased at a slower rate than other private insurance. Medicare per capita spending has grown at a slightly lower rate, on average, than private health insurance spending, at about 6. 8 vs. 7. 1% annually between 1998 and 2008.Medicaid expenditures, similarly, have grown at slower rate than private spending, though enrollment in the program has increased during the current economic recession, which may result in increased Medicaid spending figures in the near future (Kimbuende, 2010). A major cause of the rise in health care spending is due to advancements in medicine and technology. Both have improved and lengthened the lives of many Americans, but as most know they do not come without a cost. Newly rising procedures are often expensive to give and increase overall health care spending. According to theCongressional Budget Office, â€Å"the bulk of increases in health care spending could be attributed to the development and dissemination of new technologies and medical services. † Such advancements also lead to changes in practice, which together tend to increase spending. Consumer demand and increased utilization a dd to costs (â€Å"Changes in Medical Technology,† 2007). Ethics comes in at this point because medical technology is highly valued as a â€Å"beloved feature of American medicine. † Patients expect up to date procedures, doctors are primarily trained to use it, and the medical industries make billions of dollars selling it.The rising costs are seen as a major issue because many people in the United States aid from the new procedures and treatments produced each year. Medical technology refers to the procedures, equipment, and processes by which medical care is delivered (Barbash, 2008). Changes or advancements in technology would include new medical and surgical procedures, as well as new drugs and medical devices, such as scanners and defibrillators. Also the recent rise and interest in universalizing Electronic Medical Records and the use of preventive medicine has attributed to the growing costs.Technological innovation has given us vaccines, antibiotics, advanced heart disease care, splendid surgical advances, and fine cancer treatments (Barbash, 2008). Most health policy analysts agree that the long- term increase in health care spending is principally the result of the health care system’s incorporation of these new services in clinical practice. A robotic surgical device is an example of how technology advancement can increase health care costs. These high tech procedures of becoming extremely popular and seem to be the future of surgery.These robots allow surgeons to operate remote-controlled robotic arms, which may facilitate the performance of laparoscopic procedures. Laparoscopic surgery is associated with shorter hospital stays than open surgery, as well as with less postoperative pain and scarring, and lower risks of infection and need for blood transfusion. Robotic technology has been adopted rapidly over the past four years in both the United States and Europe. The number of robot-assisted procedures that are performed worl dwide have nearly tripled since 2007, from 80,000 to 205,000. Robotic technology affects expenditures by increasing the cost per procedure.Robotic surgical systems have high fixed costs, with prices ranging from $1 million to $2. 5 million for each unit. Surgeons must perform 150 to 250 procedures to become adept in their use (â€Å"Robotic Surgery Technology,† 2006). The systems also require costly maintenance and demand the use of additional consumables. The use of robotic systems may also require more operating time than alternatives. Robot- assisted procedures may contribute to shorter hospital stays, which will decrease costs, but at the same time require physicians to train on these instruments. Each instrument is a pricey expenditure for a hospital to pay for (Barbash, 2008).To maintain these instruments and keep them up to date will be an added cost as well. These instruments perform miracles and may seem like a wonderful addition to the surgical world, but are not ch eap. Advancements in scanner technology, such as CT’s, allows for greater visibility at a higher resolution than was possible before. Innovative scanners, advanced applications, and exciting breakthroughs in clinical procedures are driving an increased use of a CT as a primary diagnostic tool for procedures such as colonography, cancer detection and staging, lung analysis, cardiac studies and radiotherapy planning (â€Å"Diagnostic Imaging,† 2011).Hospitals and other health care facilities are pressured to purchase such equipment to keep up with the public demand for these high-specialized tests. With out such machines and technology the public will turn elsewhere to receive the care that they so desire and need, which will end in a loss of profit for such hospitals and other facilities. Another technological advancement that has a great impact on healthcare finance is the emergence of the Electronic Medical Record. Electronic Medical Records is a computerized medical record created in an organization that delivers care, such as a hospital or physician's office.Electronic medical records tend to be a part of a local stand-alone health information system that allows storage, retrieval and modification of records. The 2003 IOM Patient Safety Report describes an EMR as, â€Å"a longitudinal collection of electronic health information for and about persons, immediate electronic access to person- and population-level information by authorized users, and provision of knowledge and decision-support systems that enhance the quality, safety, and efficiency of patient care (â€Å"Electronic Medical Records,†2011). † The adoption of these records can be quite costly.The price of an EMR system can range from a thousand dollars to ten thousand dollars, and in some cases they can cost even more. EMR costs increase as the system becomes more feature-rich. Huge facilities can buy complete EMR systems that cost around plus forty thousand dollars. Tr aining and maintenance costs also have to be taken into account when purchasing EMR’s. All staff must be trained to operate the new machines, coming familiar with the new software and patient records. If you want to utilize the EMR product to its full potential, then you need hardware that perfectly complements the software.Purchasing computers and up to date software that will last for the long term is also an added cost. These systems also require maintenance to keep them working sufficiently. A facility may also need to hire a networking professional to monitor and maintain the network in their facilities. A networking expert will ensure that the workstations remain connected to each other and seamlessly exchange data (â€Å"Electronic Medical Records,† 2011). The installation and upkeep of EMR’s is not a cheap process. Many hospitals and private facilities are hesitant to make the improvement.The costly technology can improve the quality of care for patients by knowing ones medical history and prescription drugs they are on or allergic too. It can also decrease unnecessary testing in many cases. President Barack Obama, as part of the effort to revive the economy, has proposed a massive effort to modernize health care by making all health records standardized and electronic. His aim is to computerize all health records within five years. He believes the quality of health care for all Americans gets a big boost, and osts will decline. Independent studies from Harvard, RAND and the Commonwealth Fund have shown that such a plan could cost at least $75 billion to $100 billion over the ten years they think the hospitals would need to implement program. The healthcare initiative will be one of the priciest parts of the plan. Along with the high costs a major concern of the government is that lack of skilled workers to build and implement the necessary technology. The biggest cost will be paying and training the labor force needed to create th e network.The savings of such a plan could be substantial. The government estimates that a fully computerized health record system could save the industry $200 billion to $300 billion a year, and could ultimately slow the rapid rise of health care premiums, which have cut into Americans' pay checks. There are many advantages that the Electronic Medical Records pose for both patients and physicians. The EMR can reduce errors in medical records. Handwritten records are subject to lots of human errors due to misspelling, illegibility, and differing terminologies.On-screen or printed text is often far more legible than handwritten. This can help prevent patient’s receiving the wrong medication or procedures, saving doctors from medical malpractice suits (Molar, 2010). Clinical errors cause at least 44,000 deaths annually in the United States. These deaths largely result from process errors, or the failure to provide recommended treatments for patients with certain medical conditi ons. With direct medical costs estimated at $17 billion annually, these errors impose a substantial burden on both the health care system and society as a whole.The real time paperless record include reducing the need for costly reproductions of laboratory findings and diagnostic reports, which in many health care facilities are still typed, copied, and physically carried to a hospital floor, clinic office, or medical records room to be placed in the patient's chart (Hunt, 2009). Loss of reports, or delays, are common until this information reaches the chart and the providers. While wages are rising at a rate of around 3% a year, health care costs are growing at about three times that rate (Goldman, 2009).Prescription drugs also play a role in Health Care finance. Advances in pharmaceuticals have transformed health care over the last several decades. Today, many health problems are prevented, cured, or managed effectively for years through the use of prescription drugs. In some case s, the use of prescription medicines keeps people from needing other expensive health care such as being hospitalized or having surgery. In 2007, 90% of seniors and 58% of non-elderly adults rely on a prescription medicine on a regular basis (Kimbuende, 2010).Since the 1990s spending on prescription drugs has been a much more prominent component of growth in total spending. From 1995 to 2005, it grew by an average of about 10 percent per year and is still on the rise as the future of prescription drugs lies in the baby boomer generation (â€Å"Technological Change,† 2008). Increased Medical Technology has led to the use of defensive medicine by many health care physicians. Defensive Medicine refers to services that have little or no clinical value, but that physicians order or perform at least to avoid lawsuits (â€Å"Technological Change,†2008).With high malpractice premiums, more physicians everyday are turning to this type of practice. It is raising health care cost s by performing unnecessary tests and procedures on patients that may not need them. There is reason to believe that new technology can in fact reduce health care spending. Some vaccines may offer the potential for savings, and certain types of preventive medical care may help some patients avoid costly hospitalization for acute care. Future advances in molecular biology and genetics, may one day offer the possibility of savings if they make curative therapies available.Continued advances in understanding the genetic origins of disease offer the credible possibility that future providers will accurately predict the health risks faced by individual patients and design therapies tailored specifically to them (Convington, 2008). Overall, examples of new treatments for which long-term savings have been clearly demonstrated are few. Many medical advances to date have increased spending because they made treatments available for conditions that were previously impossible to treat or were not aggressively treated.Furthermore, improvements in medical care that decrease mortality by helping patients avoid or survive acute health problems paradoxically increase overall spending on health care because surviving patients live longer and therefore use health services for more years (â€Å"Technological Change,† 2008). With the baby boomers approaching retirement age and living past recent life expectancy age, health care costs are projected to rise even further. Technological advances and new medicines and prescription drugs are keeping people alive longer and putting a strain on our health care system.In coming decades, the share of the population that is covered by Medicare will expand rapidly as members of the baby- boom generation become eligible for the program, and the share that uses long-term care services financed by Medicaid will also probably increase. According to the American Hospital Association, â€Å"the first boomers will reach 65 in 2011 and 37 mi llion of them will be managing one chronic condition by 2030. † Also 14 million Boomers will be living with diabetes, that's one out of every four Boomers. Almost half of this generation will live with arthritis, and that number peaks to just over 26 million in 2020.More than one out of three Boomers, over 21 million, will be considered obese. As these patients live with multiple chronic diseases, demand for services will increase. The number of physician visits has been increasing for all adults, up 34 percent over the last decade, and this trend is expected to continue. By 2020, Boomers will account for four in 10 office visits to physicians and over the next 20 years, Boomers will make up a greater proportion of hospitalizations as they live longer but with multiple complex conditions.At the same time, the number of registered nurses, primary care and specialty physicians will not keep pace with demand. As the Boomer generation is more racially and ethnically diverse, there will also be a greater need for caregivers who reflect the diversity of and increase in this population (â€Å"How Boomers will change Health Care,†2007). With changing demands, expectations and new technology, care delivery will also change. Boomers have lived through an amazing array of medical advances, from polio vaccine to radical heart surgery, and that trend will continue over the next two decades.Medical Advancements are taking place every day and are given rise to growing health care costs. Rising health care expenditures lead to the question of whether we are getting value for the money we spend. Compared to other high-income countries, the U. S. spends more, but this spending is not reflected in greater health care resources, such as hospital beds, physicians, nurses, MRIs, and CT scanners per capita  or better measures of health. The United States needs to figure out a way to use these advancements to our benefit and reduce cost while maintaining good quality o f care to every patient.With the growing elderly population, medical technology is in high demand as many people over 65 are suffering with at least one chronic condition. The Untied States government and health care providers need to figure out a way to reduce the health care costs. The incorporation of preventive medicine and Electronic Medical Records can aid in cost reduction for the future. Unnecessary testing should be avoided to also help reduce costs. Hopefully, EMR’s can reduce the amount of tests being performed and duplicated.Policies focusing on new and expanding technologies may have success in reducing the rate of growing health care costs but can be difficult to implement. In the long run, bringing health spending growth closer to the rate of overall economic growth would require finding ways to slow the development and diffusion of new healthcare technologies and practices, as well as developing ways to weigh the costs and benefits of new technologies (â€Å" Technological change,† 2008). References Barbash, G. (2010). New Technology and Health Care Costs. New England Journal of Medicine.Retrieved from http://www. nejm. org/doi/full/10. 1056/NEJMp1006602 Convington, L. (2008). An Alliance for Health Reform. Retrieved From http://www. allhealth. org/publications/cost_of_health_care/health_care_costs_toolk Diagnostic Imaging. (2011). Hospital and Healthcare Management. Retrieved From http://www. asianhhm. com/medical_sciences/advances_CT_technology. htm Electronic Medical Records. (2011). Open Clinical. Retrieved From http://www. openclinical. org/emr. html Goldman, D. (2009). Obama’s big idea: Digital Health Records.New York Times. Retrieved December 2, 2011, from http://www. nytimes. com/subscriptions/Multiproduct/lp3004. html? campaignId=384LY How Boomers Will Change Health Care. (2007). American Hospital Association. Retrieved From http://aha. org How Changes in Medical Technology affect Health Care Costs. (2007). Retrieve d From http://www. kff. org/insurance/snapshot/chcm030807oth. cfm Johns Hopkins University (2006, November 28). Robotic Surgery Technology Gives Doctors ‘Sense Of Touch'. ScienceDaily. Retrieved December 6, 2011, from http://www. ciencedaily. com ­ /releases/2006/11/061128121916. htm Kimbuende, E. (2010). Health Care Costs. Kaiser Family Foundation. Retrieved From http://www. kaiseredu. org/Issue-Modules/Prescription-Drug-Costs/Background-Brief Technological change and the Growth of Health Care Spending. (2008). Congressional Budge Office Retrieved From http://www. cbo. gov/ftpdocs/89xx/doc8947/01-31-TechHealth. pdf The Long Term Outlook for Health Care Spending. (2007). Congressional Budget Office Retrieved From http://www. cbo. gov/ftpdocs/87xx/doc8758/11-13-LT-Health. pdf

Difference Between Atomic Weight and Atomic Mass

Difference Between Atomic Weight and Atomic Mass Atomic weight and atomic mass are two important concepts in chemistry and physics. Many people use the terms interchangeably, but they dont actually mean the same thing. Take a look at the difference between atomic weight and atomic mass and understand why most people are confused or dont care about the distinction. (If youre taking a chemistry class, it could show up on a test, so pay attention!) Atomic Mass Versus Atomic Weight Uranium has two primordial isotopes (uranium-238 and uranium-235). Uranium-238 has 92 protons plus 146 neutrons and uranium-235 92 protons and 143 neutrons. Â  Pallava Bagla/Getty Images Atomic mass (ma) is the mass of an atom. A single atom has a set number of protons and neutrons, so the mass is unequivocal (wont change) and is the sum of the number of protons and neutrons in the atom. Electrons contribute so little mass that they arent counted. Atomic weight is a weighted average of the mass of all the atoms of an element, based on the abundance of isotopes. The atomic weight can change because it depends on our understanding of how much of each isotope of an element exists. Both atomic mass and atomic weight rely on the atomic mass unit (amu), which is 1/12th the mass of an atom of carbon-12 in its ​ground state. Can Atomic Mass and Atomic Weight Ever Be the Same? If you find an element that exists as only one isotope, then the atomic mass and the atomic weight will be the same. Atomic mass and atomic weight may equal each other whenever you are working with a single isotope of an element, too. In this case, you use the atomic mass in calculations rather than the atomic weight of the element from the periodic table. Weight Versus Mass: Atoms and More Mass is a measure of the quantity of a substance, while weight is a measure of how a mass acts in a gravitational field. On Earth, where we are exposed to a fairly constant acceleration due to gravity, we dont pay much attention to the difference between the terms. After all, our definitions of mass were pretty much made with Earth gravity in mind, so if you say a weight has a mass of 1 kilogram and a 1 weight of 1 kilogram, youre right. Now, if you take that 1 kg mass to the Moon, its weight will be less. So, when the term atomic weight was coined back in 1808, isotopes were unknown and Earth gravity was the norm. The difference between atomic weight and atomic mass became known when F.W. Aston, the inventor of the mass spectrometer (1927) used his new device to study neon. At that time, the atomic weight of neon was believed to be 20.2 amu, yet Aston observed two peaks in the mass spectrum of neon, at relative masses 20.0 amu and 22.0 amu. Aston suggested there two actually two types of neon atoms in his sample: 90% of the atoms having a mass of 20 amu and 10% with a mass of 22 amu. This ratio gave a weighted average mass of 20.2 amu. He called the different forms of the neon atoms isotopes. Frederick Soddy had proposed the term isotopes in 1911 to describe atoms that occupy the same position in the periodic table, yet are different. Even though atomic weight is not a good description, the phrase has stuck around for historical reasons. The correct term today is relative atomic mass - the only weight part of the atomic weight is that it is based on a weighted average of isotope abundance.

In Search of Peace essays

In Search of Peace essays What the world needs today is a civilization based on love and compassion, and not on competition. A civilization that is not dying to be victorious, but which is keen to live with peace. Nowadays terrorism, war and human killing are in vogue. Powerful nations control the less powerful nations as their right. Humanity is suffering at the hands of brutal politicians. There is no peace in the world and within the self. Innocent children are asking their parents, teachers and friends what is going on around them. Everybody is in search of peace. Where is peace? The world religions long ago defined peace as individual responsibility for the wellbeing of others. Let us remind ourselves of that forgotten lesson and reflect on how everyone of us individually can contribute towards peace in the world? Let us briefly survey the concept of peace given by the world religions. Peace means freedom from war and unrest. In ancient Hebrew thought, peace was not only the absence of war, but also the wellbeing, if not prosperity, of people. A famous passage which appears twice in the Bible (Is: 2-4 Mi. 4: 1-3) describes "... all nations are going to Jerusalem to learn the divine law; beating their swords into plowshares and their spear into pruning hooks, abandoning their swords and learning war no more." The study of Israelite traditions shows that peace was a social concept. It was visible and produced harmonious relationship in the family, in local society and between nations. The salutation shalom expressed positive aim of encouraging friendship, cooperation and living together for mutual benefit. The New Testament defines peace as "an orderly obedience to the eternal laws of God", so peace in the God's city is the perfect union of hearts in the enjoyment of God (19:13). The salutation of peace frequently appears in the New Testament. In the Quran, the Arabic word Salam has been used for peace. It has been generally used as a greet...

3 Cases of Misuse of Dashes

3 Cases of Misuse of Dashes 3 Cases of Misuse of Dashes 3 Cases of Misuse of Dashes By Mark Nichol In each of the following sentences, dashes are erroneously employed, resulted in confused sentences. Discussion following each example explains the problem, and one or more revisions illustrate solutions. 1. When driving long distances- know that children get restless. A dash is not applicable when one clause naturally follows another. â€Å"Know that children get restless† does not abruptly break from the subordinate clause that precedes it, so a comma suffices here: â€Å"When driving long distances, know that children get restless.† 2. Few banks can afford their customer experiences to plateau for long before customers with ever-increasing expectations choose to do business with a competitor- or worse- with a disruptive market entrant. â€Å"Or worse† is treated here as a parenthetical phrase but is not intended as one. Because what follows the first dash signals a syntactical break, only that first dash is called for. In addition, because worse, on its own, is parenthetical to the phrase â€Å"or with a disruptive market tenant,† it should be bracketed by punctuation, but two mere commas suffice (and a pair of dashes would confuse in proximity to the preceding one): â€Å"Few banks can afford their customer experiences to plateau for long before customers with ever-increasing expectations choose to do business with a competitor- or, worse, with a disruptive market entrant.† 3. Some features predicted in this article- like seat belts- became ubiquitous, while others- like braking distance indicated on speedometers- never caught on. As mentioned in the discussion for the previous example, employing one or two dashes more than once in a given sentence can be confusing, as readers see several phrases separated by the dashes with no indication of syntactical hierarchy, so avoid doing so: â€Å"Some features predicted in this article, like seat belts, became ubiquitous, while others, like braking distance indicated on speedometers, never caught on.† If two complementary phrases, such as those specifying examples in the original sentence, are going to be used parenthetically, the pairs of punctuation marks must be identical to indicate their equivalence. However, in this case, because a comma already exists in the sentence, the sentence organization is still muddled (and the statement is crowded with commas), so it is more helpful to the reader to frame the two examples in parentheses: â€Å"Some features predicted in this article (like seat belts) became ubiquitous, while others (like braking distance indicated on speedometers) never caught on.† Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Punctuation category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:30 Religious Terms You Should KnowRunning Amok or Running Amuck?Shore It Up

Can freedom of speech guaranteed by 1st Amendment be lawfully and Essay

Can freedom of speech guaranteed by 1st Amendment be lawfully and soundly used to advocate abolishment of 1st Amendment - Essay Example Even advocating illegal acts is legal. Therefore, if we can use our freedom of speech to, for example, control someone with our lies, or to impose our personal convictions to others, there is no reason why we could not use that same freedom to advocate its own abolishment. Every single individual has the right to express their opinion. Although, sometimes not entirely. In some cases an individual may not be allowed to fully express his right of free speech because it may lead to criminal actions or have a bad effect on the society. This way of prevention is called censorship and it is a crucial symptom of collectivism. Furthermore, if everything gets under the control of the government (gets nationalized), it will mark the end of free speech. No matter how offensive its content is, freedom of speech is protected by the first Amendment and it is believed that academic freedom is a â€Å"bedrock of education in a free society†, furthermore, it cannot be denied, unless the speaker breaks the rules of the first Amendment that forbid the use of fighting words (which are not essential part of exposition of ideas and are likely to provoke a person to take revenge). Everyone has a right to express themselves freely, as long as they respect the few of restrictions of the first Amendment. Using that right, we can lawfully speak about almost anything. And, yes, we can use that right to speak against the first Amendment without doing anything that is illegal. But the fact that we have the legal right to speak against the first Amendment does not mean that anyone has to hear about it. â€Å"Free speech does not require anyone to listen.† But who would want to limit or completely abolish his rights? Theoretically, freedom of speech can be lawfully used to advocate abolishment of the first Amendment, but there are not many people who would agree that it would be a good thing to abolish it, and, without the support of the listeners, the one who advocates the

Elements of change and continuity in the history of London and its Essay

Elements of change and continuity in the history of London and its cinematic representation - Essay Example It was the Normans who introduced the feudal system to Britain (Norton, 1829). And even before and after that, London has been a town of merchandise mainly (Norton, 1829). It was a city of banks as well (Michie and Williamson, 2004, p.12). These two features of the city have remained till date. And from a very early period, the citizens of London had many privileges given to them by the respective rulers, which were not enjoyed by the rest of the Britain's inhabitants (Norton, 1829, p.50-75). Even in the present scenario, Londoners are more well-off that all other British people. And the position of London as one of the most important places of commerce in the world, though dimmed, has not been entirely lost. The history of merchandise has imparted this city a unique system of governance: Formerly every man in London followed a trade: he therefore belonged to a company. And as the commonality, all the men of London together assembled, i.e. all the members of all the companies, elected the Mayor, so to this day the electors of the Lord Mayor are the members of the companies† (Besant, 2010, p.209). Though many people have shifted from trade into other vocations, the power given to the members of the companies remain (Besant, 2010, p.209). Secondly, the presence of West Minster abbey in the heart of London city is yet another mark of constancy. Even after London adopted democracy, the vestiges of monarchy lingered and even in cinematic depictions of London, the monarch and the palace inevitably finds a place. (Alfie, 1966, Together, 1956, London, 1994). The twentieth century London evolved as a city completely controlled by the rule of law, in the aftermath of the World War 1 (Michie and Williamson, 2004, p.2). Throughout the twentieth and twenty first century, the city has shown great political stability. In the 1950s, city of London, as a business hub, was under a transformation from the dominance of British currency to the rule of US dollar (Schenk, 2004, p.326). The crisis imparted by this diminishing economic dominance has returned to this city now and again and cost it man y developmental pitfalls. And this is why the recent economic recession that affected the United States first had a severe impact on this city as well. 1950s was a decade of the opening up of the economy of the city to such foreign influences. The

Public finance Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Public finance - Essay Example This paper analyzes the possible impact of welfare reform over labor supply incentives. For so many years, the US has been involved in welfare reforms that any dating of the beginning of welfare reforms is irrational. In many ways, the welfare reforms in the past two decades have given rise to labor supply. The life of the people relying on welfare reforms has become more difficult due to the work requirements for welfare recipients, the decline in the real value of welfare benefits, and the sanctions for not complying with the requirements imposed by the state for welfare recipients, such like the work related participation activities held mandatory for the welfare recipients. Due to which, people would be encouraged to opt for being in or entering in to the labor force rather than leaving or applying for the social welfare programs. Such decisions or choices are based on the perceived toughness of the state’s welfare program and thereby, are influenced by the state’s rhetoric in relation to the welfare reform and not just enforced by the requirements of the law of the state. However, the sanctions imposed on the welfare recipients may simply compel them to seek work by throwing them off the welfare rolls. Also, the time limitations of the number of years for which a particular welfare recipient can benefit from the social welfare program may subsequently lift some welfare recipients off the welfare program. ... nalysis, which are: the precise evaluation of response elasticities, comprehensive specification of the distribution of income, as well as some perspective of the social welfare weights. The former two elements are positive and can be determined through thoughtful evidence based analysis. On the other hand, the last element mentioned above is normative and thus, something at which perspectives may differ. Now, we will discuss that how these elements will operate in the structure of earnings and taxation. In relation to labor supply responses, an important distinction lies between the intensive and extensive margins of labor supply. The studies on optimal taxation investigate the outcomes for tax design (Diamond 1980; Saez 2002; Laroque 2005). When the people are permitted to respond to the variations in the tax schedule by selecting to work or not, and how hard to work, then the schedule of optimal tax can vary to a great extent. Particularly, when this choice of employment becomes c omparatively more significant, then the rates of optimal marginal tax can reduce dramatically, even to a negative value, for the people with low earnings capacity. According to Brewer, Saez, and Shephard (2010), an impelling inference is that if the state government commends redistribution then the workers having low income should be given an earnings subsidy since the participation tax rate for low earnings would be negative. Therefore, the extensive model signifies that work contingent credits or earnings subsides, such like the working tax credit or the earned income tax credit, should be the constituent of an optimal tax system, which is in acute contrast to the intensive model. This is among the vital lessons from the new optimal tax design. Due to the large extensive elasticity, the

The Social Cost Prison has tours a family and communitty Research Proposal

The Social Cost Prison has tours a family and communitty - Research Proposal Example e population in 2007 was estimated at 1,321,851,88, which represents approximately one fifth of the world’s total population, and nearly 5 times the population of the United States, has a prison population of only 1.5 million people nearly half the size of the U.S. prison population. This represents roughly one in every one thousand Chinese (Ibid.). China is a communist totalitarian state. The United States prides itself on being the world’s greatest democracy. Go fiqure! Between 1980 and 1992 per capita spending on corrections in the U. S. rose by an amazing 306.2% (Davey 2). Similar to the present housing crisis, the prison building boom of the 1990’s, has ultimately resulted in the severe overcrowding which is currently bloating the budgets of nearly all 50 states. It has the added effect of totally devastating families and communities throughout this nation (Warren 3). Furthermore, although African Americans make up only 12-13% of the U.S. population, they ar e currently 49.2% of the nation’s prison population. This is shameful. However, on top this is the neatly contrived bogus media perceptions of African Americans. Although young Black men actually experience the highest rates of criminal victimization in the country, and White women experience the lowest, the manufactured corporate media image is for the most part, that of young Black men who exist in this society as the overwhelming perpetrators of crime; and White women who are the overwhelming victims (Dorfman 8). You can easily see that the reality does not jive with the illusion. Isn’t that something? The picture is that of a nation drunk with the rule of law; and tinged with an overtly racist cultural worldview. It is the image of a ‘Criminal’- Justice System that is to often seen by a substantial number of American citizens as a system that is nothing more than perfectly worded. In 2007 an average of nearly one billion dollars per state was spent on ‘corrections’, and the prison

The Money Game Book Report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

The Money Game Book Report - Essay Example I began considering to have a â€Å"budget† and decided to put off some planned but unnecessary purchases. I just opened a savings account with a passbook dedicated for future investment. The course affected me and I would like to answer the questions below with how I understood the subject except on some occasions that it will be best for understanding to lift something from the book. I believe it will best serve the purpose of this course to use my own words as much as possible and also for my better understanding, to conceptualize my answers as I understood it. B. Questions for Book Report 1. Why is the book called â€Å"The Money Game?† The book is called â€Å"The Money Game† because it teaches us to understand the dynamics of how to secure our future from a pragmatist perspective. When I said, pragmatist, it tackles the subject not merely from academic point view, but on its real life application. Moreso, when it also presented the perspective of the both s ides of the coin, the Wall Street view and the Main Street with the author being partial on us the consumers on how we could avoid the financial pitfalls and better secure our future by giving us a hindsight about the other side of the fence. The author has no pretension about the reality on how we should go about in handling our finances, especially in dealing with financial institutions inorder to be financially secured. In fact, a game plan was introduced called Big Dog Playbook II which details the play on we can better our financial position and get rid of debts. 2. Why do many Americans die before they ever have a chance to live? Many Americans die before they ever have a chance to live because they work all their lives and never had the chance to enjoy it. This is because of wrong mindset and priorities and being unprepared for the financial uncertainties and old age. During the most productive part of their lives, they worked so hard to acquire the â€Å"bling-blings† or facade of success and thus raising the standard of their lives but not the actual quality of their lives. They are so mired with work that they did not notice how good the â€Å"rose smell†. As they acquire, they fall to the trap of indulgence, living for today (and more often than not, beyond their means) and not preparing for tomorrow. Such that when financial uncertainty and/or retirement come upon them, many of them are caught unprepared and had to continue working despite retirement age. 3. Who are the three main characters in the book and what impact do they have on your finances? The Invisible Man- The Invisible Man represents the unaccounted expenses that we don’t usually notice because they are just small. But when they are totally accounted for, we will be surprise to learn how much they add up so quickly. The real danger about the Invisible Man is that we do not know that he is already taking toll on our resources. The Money Monster – The Money Mo nster represents our tendency to consume; our endless wants that could never be satisfied. This Money Monster is insatiable and will continue to eat our resources no matter how we much feed it. If we do not tame or put the Money on a diet, we will always be on spending binge without any savings with a mounting debt to surmount. The Precreditor- â€Å"The Precreditor has a growing appetite for our money and will influence law to keep the gravy train going. His hunger has manifested into hundreds of billions of dollars in opportunity cost for consumers

Testing the Stability of Okuns Law Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Testing the Stability of Okuns Law - Term Paper Example However, this inverse relationship was not replicated in the year that followed. In other words, while average growth in real Gross Domestic Product slowed down in the year that followed, the downward trend in the unemployment rate continued. Many economists could easily view this situation as an anomaly. Given the importance of economic growth and job creation to both policy makers and the citizenry, it is important to study the relationship between the two in order to ensure a more effective and efficient decision-making. Okun (1962) made the first attempt to study this relationship and he found that real GDP and unemployment are inversely related to each other and this has come to be known as the Okun’s Law. More specifically, a 2% rise in output is associated with a 1% decline in the unemployment rate. In another version, a 3% rise in the Gross National Product is associated with a 1% decline in the unemployment rate. While the relationship determined by Okun appears to have some empirical deficiencies, it, nonetheless, serves as a guide to policymakers in making crucial economic decisions. This paper seeks to determine whether or not there is some variability in the relationship between changes in real GDP growth rate and changes in the unemployment rate over an extended period. It is done by means of a recursive Ordinary Least Squares or rolling regression techniques.

The Money Game Book Report Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

The Money Game Book Report - Essay Example I began considering to have a â€Å"budget† and decided to put off some planned but unnecessary purchases. I just opened a savings account with a passbook dedicated for future investment. The course affected me and I would like to answer the questions below with how I understood the subject except on some occasions that it will be best for understanding to lift something from the book. I believe it will best serve the purpose of this course to use my own words as much as possible and also for my better understanding, to conceptualize my answers as I understood it. B. Questions for Book Report 1. Why is the book called â€Å"The Money Game?† The book is called â€Å"The Money Game† because it teaches us to understand the dynamics of how to secure our future from a pragmatist perspective. When I said, pragmatist, it tackles the subject not merely from academic point view, but on its real life application. Moreso, when it also presented the perspective of the both s ides of the coin, the Wall Street view and the Main Street with the author being partial on us the consumers on how we could avoid the financial pitfalls and better secure our future by giving us a hindsight about the other side of the fence. The author has no pretension about the reality on how we should go about in handling our finances, especially in dealing with financial institutions inorder to be financially secured. In fact, a game plan was introduced called Big Dog Playbook II which details the play on we can better our financial position and get rid of debts. 2. Why do many Americans die before they ever have a chance to live? Many Americans die before they ever have a chance to live because they work all their lives and never had the chance to enjoy it. This is because of wrong mindset and priorities and being unprepared for the financial uncertainties and old age. During the most productive part of their lives, they worked so hard to acquire the â€Å"bling-blings† or facade of success and thus raising the standard of their lives but not the actual quality of their lives. They are so mired with work that they did not notice how good the â€Å"rose smell†. As they acquire, they fall to the trap of indulgence, living for today (and more often than not, beyond their means) and not preparing for tomorrow. Such that when financial uncertainty and/or retirement come upon them, many of them are caught unprepared and had to continue working despite retirement age. 3. Who are the three main characters in the book and what impact do they have on your finances? The Invisible Man- The Invisible Man represents the unaccounted expenses that we don’t usually notice because they are just small. But when they are totally accounted for, we will be surprise to learn how much they add up so quickly. The real danger about the Invisible Man is that we do not know that he is already taking toll on our resources. The Money Monster – The Money Mo nster represents our tendency to consume; our endless wants that could never be satisfied. This Money Monster is insatiable and will continue to eat our resources no matter how we much feed it. If we do not tame or put the Money on a diet, we will always be on spending binge without any savings with a mounting debt to surmount. The Precreditor- â€Å"The Precreditor has a growing appetite for our money and will influence law to keep the gravy train going. His hunger has manifested into hundreds of billions of dollars in opportunity cost for consumers

Philosophy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 61

Philosophy - Essay Example As for Robin Penslar and Aaron Ridley, utilitarianism is teleological moral theory which asserts that the correct action is a function of its consequences ("the greatest good for the greatest number") which can be predicted. The consequences of the good must be distributed as widely as possible; the person making moral choice should look not only for personal good or for whom they care about, but also for welfare. The choice made is provided by the rationale and logical argument and a person can use it on an individual basis. According to this ethical theory, the correctness of behavior is determined by its final use. The supporters of the theory say the utilitarian principle is the only moral criterion of human acts, and this principle is to ensure that we should always seek to maximize the predominance of good over evil. The ethics of utilitarianism defines natural process in a person coming into antagonism with itself in consciousness. According to the utilitarism morality is based upon the common good (happiness for most people) which Bentham called the common benefit, of course, distinguishing it from self-interest, or personal benefit. Under the principle of common benefit he understood the principle of action selection and evaluation of acts, which focuses on the greatest possible benefit. If the act concerns the interests of the community, we are talking about the benefits (happiness) of community, if it is about the interests of the individual, so, the benefits of the individual is a predominant thing. Utilitarism is also a theory directed against selfishness. The admissibility of pleasure or profit made in each case is determined by whether they contribute to a higher purpose. The definition (assessment) of phenomena and events either good or bad is also based on that principle. And according to the theory a person should (bearing in mind the supreme moral principle) strive to provide at

Lives of the Saints Essay Example for Free

Lives of the Saints Essay In Shakespeares Hamlet and Nino Ricci’s Lives of the Saints both demonstrate different visions of women. Comparing weak and indecisive women in Hamlet as to strong and independent women in Lives of the Saints. Ophelia in Hamlet is characterized many times as a weak women especially in the quote, â€Å"frailty thy name is woman.† She is completely dependent on her father and proves her dependence when she acts cruel to Hamlet. Which goes against her true feelings toward Hamlet. Afterwords Ophelia agrees to not see Hamlet anymore, â€Å" I shall obey my lord.† Which shows Polonious’s control over his daughter. Ophelia’s actions show that she will do anything to please her father, even making a personal sacrifice which she doesn’t agree with. Ophelia’s desire to please her father leads her to be used as a puppet in order for the King and Polonious to spy on Hamlet, Ophelia’s willingness to spy on a person she truly loves, shows her true nature toward her father. Even when Hamlet harasses Ophelia and tells her to go to a nunnery, Ophelia had the inability to defend herself. When her father passes on, Ophelia is left by herself, with no one to give her guidance. Instead of trying to move on with her life, she calls for her brother hoping he will have a plan for her, â€Å"My brother shall know of it and so I thank you for your good counsel.† Polonious’s was irreplaceable and finally Ophelia realizes this â€Å" I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died.†The significance of the violets are that they symbolize faithfulness and they all died because she felt useless without her father. Ophelia’s death is in result of her dependence and weakness of character.Overall, Ophelia goes mad because she has no position in society. Men have continuously ordered her around, used her, pulling her mind in every direction. She put her faith in one person and never made her own decisions. Similar to Ophelia is Gertrude. She is also characterized by the quote, â€Å"frailty thy name is woman.† Gertrude depends on her husband. Gertrude longing for the attention that she loses when her husband dies, quickly marries Claudius, her husbands brother. Shakespeare displays that women have no back bone and our weak. As if they could not live with out others, men especially. Nino Ricci demonstrates a whole different side of women, he shows that women are strong and independent. The character that illustrates these qualities is Cristina, she raised her child Vittorio alone. Unlike the women in Hamlet, Cristina didn’t need a man to help her raise her child or to get through life. When her son gets beat up at school, she doesnt just ignore it. She takes physical action about the situation Ill make her pay for this, Vittorio, youll see, by the blood of Christ Ill make her pay. The wiping at some tears in her own eyes, she took me suddenly by the hand and marched me out the door into the street. (107). Cristina is defiantly not a pushover and stands up for what she believes in. She lives in a village where the women stay at home and the men work out in the field and everyone believed in strange superstitions. Cristina was against her village’s expectations and went against what everyone thought. Cristina is outspoken and self-assured. She has a feminist point of view and is vey confident in it, she says â€Å" He’s probably slept with every whore in America by now, but for me its a disgrace. (154)†. Cristina is explaining about her husband Mario but it is also a statement in general about men. Guys can go around going from girl to girl to girl and its not a problem. But if a women were to do the same thing, even if it was just with one guy its an absolute disgrace. This book was based in 1960 and the same sentence could apply to 2012. Also has significance to the text because she had an affair and the whole town found out, which then they treated her with disgu st. Cristina also states â€Å"Women have had their faces up their asses for too long, they let their men run around like goats and then they’re happy if they don’t come home and beat them! (154)† It is demeaning that women are seen as whores when they have affairs, especially when its said by other women. They’re oppressing their own gender when saying it. She finally decides to move away and says her final words to the village â€Å" You are the ones who are dead,not me, because not one of you knows what it means to be free and to make a choice, and I pray to God that he wipes this town and all its stupidities off the face of the earth! (184)† Most women wouldn’t have spoke there mind, especially a woman like Ophelia or Gertrude. Cristina constantly fought with her father and always disagreed â€Å"Long arguments were carried on daily between kitchen and bedroom, tension hovering around.(154).† She finally got fed up with living with her father and hearing his opinion she said â€Å" Then to hell with all of you! I’ll go to Rome, Naples, anywhere.† She had the courage and strength to leave her father and start a life somewhere else, mean while Ophelia couldnt last a couple days with out her father and killed her self. Nino Ricci illustrates women to be outspoken, independent and powerful. In the end of each story both women characters die. The difference is the way they lived their life. Cristina at least lived her life, standing up for what she believe in and having her own opinion. As for Ophelia lived a lie, as she was a spineless imbecile always doing what others told her to do and had a pathetic death. Shakespeare and Nino Ricci may have very different vision on women but at the same time they are both very accurate views.

Competition law in Nigeria

Competition law in Nigeria INTRODUCTION SCOPE OF THESIS The area of Competition law in Nigeria remains an area of law that has not been fully tapped. Currently, there is no competition law operating in Nigeria and although there has been a bill, it is yet to be passed to law. The ongoing lack of a competition law regime has quite predictably led to price-fixing, excessive pricing of products , market concentration as well as domination being the order of the day, all to the detriment of the consumer. The primary objective of this thesis therefore, is to discover the value of introducing Competition law in Nigeria and indeed a sector specific Competition Law to the Nigerian Communications Industry. The theses will begin by examining the global significance of Nigeria and the position of Nigeria as a developing economy. This research further seeks to examine the state of the Nigerian telecommunications industry and the steps that have been taken by the Nigerian Government towards the opening up of the telecommunications industry in Nigeria. The thesis will also look at both the arguments for and against the introduction of a competition law in Nigeria and a specific competition law in the telecommunications industry which forms the main focus of this research. The present situation in Nigeria can be likened to a market where all the telecommunications providers provide their services at the same price, a price that always seems to be a little higher week after week, In such a case, what might have happened is that the telecommunications providers have formed cartels so that they can force up prices and make large profits. If such is the case, it is the welfare of the customers that suffers because of the lack of competition. Competition issues in various sectors of the economy are handled by other regulatory regimes such as The Special Trade and Malpractices Investigation panel, standards organisation of Nigeria, Nigerian Civil Aviation authority, Securities and Exchange commission, Central Bank of Nigeria, and of particular importance to this thesis, The Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC) which is the national regulatory authority for the telecommunications industry in Nigeria. The question that arises however is whether the regulations set out by the NCC are sufficient to promote and preserve competition. This thesis will analyse the position of the NCC as a regulator of the Nigerian telecommunications industry. RATIONALE AND RESEARCH METHODOLOGY In carrying out this research, the author will rely on a collection of theories, comparative study of the Law in different jurisdictions and Interviews with various individuals who have experience in this field. Primary and secondary sources of information will be used to collect and analyze data to come to a viable conclusion. The primary sources which the author will utilize include authoritative materials of the law such as the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, statutes and legislations in force, official publications and judicial decisions relating to competition law, telecommunications law and Privatization in Nigeria. Books, journals, articles, dictionaries, periodicals, newspapers, The Federal Competition Bill and internet documents will constitute secondary sources of information. These are materials which pertain to law but are not themselves authoritative records of legal rules. A comparative study of competition law systems in other jurisdictions will also form a part of the study. In order to make this thesis logical, the author will sketch headings and arrange materials to accommodate research findings. Headings and cross headings will not only assist to readily identify where a particular point has been dealt with, it will also make the theses flow in a logical way and keep the readers interested. Because the area of law to being researched in this thesis is relatively young in Nigeria, it is necessary to perform foundation research and as such, secondary sources of research will be highly relied upon in this thesis. Challenges of Research Methodology: It is widely accepted that competition authorities in developed and developing countries alike encounter challenges and obstacles in their effort to promote competition and enforce their various competition laws. While the challenges faced are similar in nature their degrees vary across countries. It has been observed that Developing countries such as Nigeria do not generally place the implementation and administration of competition law on their priority lists. They are generally of the mind that it is like giving a silk tie to a hungry child. However, with the changing global landscape, trade barriers being removed and markets becoming more integrated, developing countries find themselves in the situation in which they now have no choice but to institute the relevant legislation. The implementation of institutional reform that the developed countries took several decades to accomplish is now being thrust upon developing countries which do not have the luxury of time, the requisite skill or the resources. In the same vein, in carrying out research on competition law in the Nigerian telecommunications industry, the author came across various research challenges. The main challenge has been the inability to get research materials. This is due to the fact that the area of research is still in its infant stage in Nigeria as a result there is not enough written material on it. Further, it is a very contentious and political issue as a result; companies, institutions and individuals who have access to necessary material or information are not willing to release information. The Bureaucratic nature of Nigerian Institutions also posed as a major challenge to this research. This is because there are many levels of management, much paperwork and impersonal officials working to a fixed routine who seem to find it difficult to provide necessary information or give necessary interviews which would be advantageous to this research paper. The unstable state of the Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL) which operated monopoly status in the Nigerian Telecommunications industry for a long time also proved to be a challenge in getting research information. This is because as management of NITEL changed, the operations change and this makes it difficult to get information on previous happenings in the company. Other challenges faced by the author in the research process came in the telephone interview process. This is because some people do not have telephones or do not have their telephone numbers listed. People also often dislike intrusion of a call to their homes and never have time for a telephone interview at work. Also telephone interviews need to be relatively short or people get impatient or feel imposed on. The use of the internet as a form of research also came with its own challenges some of which include accuracy and reliability of information obtained from online sources and difficulties in verifying a writers credentials. COUNTRY PROFILE AND GLOBAL SIGNIFICANCE OF NIGERIA The Federal Republic of Nigeria consists of 36 states and 774 local governments administrations. The Capital city is Abuja, located in the Federal Capital Territory and it is geographically situated in the middle of the Country. Nigeria has a population of over 148 million making it the largest market in sub-Saharan Africa with reasonably skilled and potential manpower for efficient and effective management of investment projects within the country. Nigeria is a regional power and it is listed among the Next eleven economies Nigeria is a nation blessed with an abundance of natural and mineral resources as well as renewable energy sources. Its oil reserves make Nigeria in the league of the top ten petroleum rich nations, and by far the most affluent in Africa. Nigeria is a member of the organisation of petroleum exporting nations which makes it significant to the world at large. The petroleum industry in Nigeria has brought unprecedented changes in the Nigerian economy, particularly in the past five decades when it replaced agriculture as the cornerstone of the Nigerian economy and contributes the lion share of in the nations gross domestic product, accounting for the bulk of federal government revenue and foreign exchange earnings. The Nigerian economy can be described as most promising. Nigeria has however been long hobbled by political instability, corruption, inadequate infrastructure, and poor macroeconomic management. Nigerias former military rulers failed to diversify the economy away from its overdependence on the capital-intensive oil sector, which provides 95% of foreign exchange earnings and about 80% of budgetary revenues. Following the signing of an IMF stand-by agreement in August 2000, Nigeria received a debt-restructuring deal from the Paris Club and a $1 billion credit from the IMF, both contingent on economic reforms. Nigeria has a mixed economy which accommodates all; individuals, corporate organisations and government agencies to invest in almost all economic activities. Over the last decade, the Nigerian government has introduced some economic measures such as liberalisation and privatisation of sectors that had been monopolies, with the purpose of introducing competition, wealth creation and encouraging foreign investors. In 2003, the Nigerian government instituted the National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS), a domestically designed and run program modelled on the IMFs Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility for fiscal and monetary management[4]. NEEDS focused on four key strategies; poverty reduction, wealth creation, employment generation and value re-orientation. The initiative has recorded remarkable achievements, meeting most of its targets, and in some instances surpassing them. In November 2005, Nigeria won Paris Club approval for a debt-relief deal that eliminated $18 billion of debt in exchange for $12 billion in payments a total package worth $30 billion of Nigerias total $37 billion external debt. The deal requires Nigeria to be subject to stringent IMF reviews. OVERVIEW OF THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS INDUSTRY The telecommunications industry forms a major infrastructural requirement for any meaningful economic development to take place in a country. The importance of a robust telecommunications infrastructure cannot be over emphasized as it is pertinent to economic growth, and constitutes a significant portion of the worlds economy. This chapter discusses the historical and present state of the global telecommunications industry with particular focus on Nigeria. The Chapter will consider the policy approach to deregulation of the Nigerian telecommunications industry, as well as provide an overview of the evolution of the Nigerian telecommunications industry from the colonial times to full liberalisation as is the position now Over the last one hundred and thirty (130) years, the global telecommunications industry has experienced an unprecedented growth from an almost unnoticed analogue telephony to a modern digital mobile communication with billions of subscribers worldwide. This is evident in the Europe and Latin American telecommunications market worth â‚ ¬424bn in 2007, with mobile services accounting for 51%. The Evolution of the Global Telecommunications Industry The African telecommunications market being the fastest growing telecoms market in the world plays host to the next wave of global competition. In 2006 alone, mobile companies signed up about 60 million new subscribers across the continent, as many people as the entire population of the United Kingdom. Africas unique infrastructure challenges have made telecommunications (particularly mobile phones) an indispensable business and social tool. Despite impressive recent growth in telecommunications, penetration rates in Africa remain relatively low, thereby suggesting a large underlying potential market in this populous continent. It is expected that 260 million new subscribers will be added across Africa by 2014, nearly equal to the present population of the entire United States of America. THE NIGERIAN TELECOMMUNICATIONS INDUSTRY In consonance with the global trend in the telecommunications industry, Nigeria shares a similar success story over the past 130 years of navigating its telecommunications operations. The figure below shows incremental successes achieved within the Nigeria telecoms industry. The Evolution of the Nigerian Telecommunications Industry HISTORY OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS IN NIGERIA Telecommunications facilities came into being in 1886 by the colonial administration. The initial purpose was merely to carry out administrative duties as opposed to the provision of socio economic development for the country. Thus, the introduction of public telegraph services connecting Lagos by submarine cable along the west coast of Africa to Ghana, Sierra-Leone, Gambia and on to England was more important than an efficient telecommunications network. Subsequently, as at 1960 when Nigeria gained her independence, there were only 18,724 telephone lines available for a population estimated at 40 million people. This translated to a tele-density of about 0.5 telephone lines per 1,000 people. The telephone network consisted of 121 exchanges out of which 116 were of the manual (magneto) type and only 5 were automatic. Since independence, there have been a number of development plans for the expansion and modernisation of the telecommunications networks and services. Most of these plans were not fully implemented. After the Nigerian Independence in 1965 and up until 1985, the telecommunications industry was divided into: The department of Posts and Telecommunications (P T) and The Nigerian External Telecommunications (NET) Limited, P T took charge of the internal network while NET overlooked the external telecommunications services and provided the gateway to the outside world. By the end of 1985, the installed switching capacity was about 200,000 lines as against the planned target of about 460,000. All the exchanges were analogue, and telephone penetration remained poor equal to 1 telephone line to 440 inhabitants, well below the target of 1 telephone line to 100 inhabitants recommended by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) for developing countries. The quality of service was largely unsatisfactory, the telephone was unreliable, congested, expensive and customer unfriendly. These unsatisfactory services led to the split of P T in January 1985, it was divided into Postal Division and Telecommunications Divisions. The telecommunications division was merged with NET to form Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL),a limited liability Company, while the Postal Division was reconstituted into another organisation called the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST). NITEL On establishment, NITEL became the national operator for telecommunications services in Nigeria. Although efforts are being made to privatise NITEL, and indeed there was a recent privatisation attempt where by 51% equity stake of NITEL was sold to core investors, this privatisation attempt was reversed and NITEL remains wholly owned by the Government of Nigeria. NITEL was set up to reverse the defects which characterised telecommunications development from independence up until 1984[11]. Its main objective was to harmonise the co ordination of the external and internal telecommunications services, rationalise investments in telecommunications development and provide easy access, efficient and affordable services. The historical key businesses of NITEL include fixed telephony services including international, internet, payphone and interconnection; Long distance carrier including fixed international calls and satellite services; cellular, including all cellular activity carried out within M-Tel. After the inception of NITEL,little progress was made in the development of the telecommunications industry and it was still characterised with poor management, lack of accountability and transparency and inefficiency. At this time, NITEL occupied a monopoly status and being owned by the Government, this resulted in its having a weak infrastructure base, high unmet demand, Lines concentrated in selected urban areas, slow growth of subscriber base and limited investment into the telecommunications sector. In order to tackle these short comings, and in line with what obtains in several developed nations, The Government of Nigeria identified that Liberalisation of the Telecommunications market was essential for rapid network growth. Private sector participation was essential for attracting financial resources, innovation and new technology. The industry was thus deregulated through the establishment of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) by Decree No. 75 of 1992. The NCC has since approved almost 200 operating licenses for private providers of various telecommunications services, including internet services providers, which of course has in turn generated a high demand for telecommunications equipment, accessories, consultancy and technical partnerships. In addition, NITEL has approved various private firms to be connected to its switching systems so as to provide more lines (with greater efficiency and service) and thus act as a buffer for the grossly inadequate NITEL services. Despite all these efforts, it was quite clear that there was a dire need for the Nigerian Government to be more pro-active about improving telecommunications. As such, in 2000, the NCC awarded licenses for Global System of Mobile Communications (GSM) to NITEL by auction to two preferred bidders Econet Wireless Nigeria Limited and MTN Nigeria Limited. The licenses were bought at almost US$240million dollars, the highest amounts ever paid for such licenses in the world. The GSM technology has completely overshadowed NITELs land lines, as the demand is high for them due to efficiency, despite the astronomical tariffs its consumers are subjected to. These cumulative events eventually spurred the NCC, through the Bureau of Public Enterprises (its secretariat) to seek to privatise NITEL by requesting for Core investors to acquire controlling interest in the entity and manage its day to day activities. The privatization of NITEL has always been shrouded in controversies and politics. Many people are of the view that the Federal Government has not shown enough seriousness or sincerity in the many attempts to sell the telecommunications company. The first attempt in 2002 to privatise NITEL could not materialise due to the failure of Investment International Limited (ILL) of Britain to pay the $1.317 billion it offered for the 31 per cent shares of the company. ILL paid up the mandatory 10 per cent deposit, but was unable to make up the balance by the end of several deadline Periods, thereby derailing the process. Another attempt was made in 2003 with the engagement of a Dutch company, called Pentascope to manage NITEL and put it on sound footing preparatory to its sale. This one also collapsed. In the third attempt, Orascomm of Egypt offered $256.43 million for 51 per cent shares of NITEL. This offer was considered ridiculously low, and, so the government cancelled the deal. This has been the story of the efforts to privatize this big and potentially rich government-owned telecommunications firm. One deal that stood out was the Pentascope agreement. While Pentascope was expected to revitalize NITEL, Pentascope ended up not only ruining the company but it mounting up huge debts for the company as well. In particular, when Pentascope took over NITEL in March 2003, NITEL had about N17.7 billion in its coffers. However about a year later when its agreement with NITEL was terminated, it had left NITEL with a debt burden of N38 billion and a reduction in the number of functional land lines from 455,000 to 288,000. It therefore seems correct to state that the singular error of picking Pentascope as the management consultant to NITEL in 2003 is largely responsible for the pitiable condition the company finds itself in today. In 2006, 51 per cent equity in NITEL was sold to another company, Transnational Corporation[16], (TRANSCORP), for US $ 500 million. However, this process also failed to turn around the operator as TRANSCORP has been unable to raise the money to overcome the many problems of NITEL. The Nigerian government holds 49% of NITEL. The government however, wants Transcorp to sell 27% of Nitel to a new investor, which would then purchase a further 24% from the government to take control. This new core investor was scheduled to take over in February 2009; however this has not yet happened. In the meantime, the NCC has awarded a second national carrier license to Globacom Nigeria Limited, the only company out of three who expressed an Interest that was able to come up with the US$20 million 10% deposit of the Auction price requested by the NCC. Government was of the belief that a second National carrier would offer much needed competition to NITEL. Globacom has since commenced operations and as of today, it has the third highest subscriber network in the Country. POLICY APPROACH TO DEREGULATION AND PRIVATIZATION Liberalisation and privatisation It was only a matter of time before it became clear to Nigerian policy-makers that a shift in its policies was required. The over-regulation of the economy had become unhelpful, the economy was anaemic, and the Government had trouble keeping up with subventions to State owned enterprises, many of whom, at any rate, were inefficiently and unprofitably run. For SOEs in the telecommunication sector such as NITEL, the implications of its inefficiency for the entire economy were very far-reaching as it contributed to the retardation of the countrys overall industrial development. The merits of a deregulated economy were thus too overpowering for the Nigerian Government to ignore: much-needed foreign direct investment was to be attracted, bringing in tow the required technology, management and technical skills that would not only boost the economy but would transform the SOEs. To achieve this, however, it was obvious that radical legal reforms would have to be undertaken. Following the collapse of communism and apartheid, more countries joined the race for foreign investors. Investment climates therefore needed to be competitive. Before then, through the indigenisation policy pursued since the early 1970s, foreign investors in Nigeria had to contend with ceding a portion of their business to local investors. The real challenge, however, lay in removing regulation and monopoly so that foreign investors could have a level playing field. What followed was a rash of laws designed to facilitate foreign direct investment in Nigeria. Significant among these reforms was the repeal of the Nigerian Enterprises Promotions Decree 1989 (under which the indigenisation policy was sustained), and in its place came the Nigerian Investment Promotion Decree No.16, 1995 which made it possible for an enterprise to be 100 per cent owned by foreign investors. Also, the Exchange Control Act 1990 under which foreign investors required the approval of the Minister of Finance in order to transfer profits abroad was repealed in favour of the Foreign Exchange Decree No.15, 1995 that guaranteed free transfer of capital. The Companies Act 1968 was also repealed in favour of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990, a more comprehensive and forward-looking company code. Against these reforms, Nigeria began its gradual journey towards deregulation, privatisation and a free market economy. However, as the free market was a model that had never previously been applied in Nigeria, its handlers had trouble grappling with it, and this led to the initial efforts being short-lived.This was followed by another privatisation law, the Bureau of Public Enterprises Decree, 1993. Privatization In every great monarchy in Europe, the sale of crown lands will produce a very large sum of money, which if applied to the payment of public debts, would deliver from mortgage a much greater revenue than any which those lands have ever afforded to the crownWhen the crown lands become private property, they will in the course of a few years become well improved and well cultivated ADAM SMITH, WEALTH OF NATIONS (1776). The term privatization is used to describe a range of different policy initiatives designed to alter the balance between the public and private sectors. It commonly refers to the transfer of ownership and control of enterprise from the state to the private sector.This may occur in various ways, such as, the sale of all or part of the privatized companys equity to the public, or the sale of the company as a complete entity. It may also take the form of joint ventures, where the private sector will invest in a public enterprise Privatization as a tool for economic management came about in the early 1970s when Chile became the first country to turn public businesses to private operators. Since then, over 140 countries have embraced privatization as a route to economic growth and prosperity. In the process of privatization, more investible capital has been injected into the various economies through local and foreign investors to the benefit of the country at large. In the process, funds that would have been committed to the maintenance of otherwise inefficient enterprises have been freed into more productive sectors of the economy. Privatization in Nigeria Privatization in Nigeria was formally introduced by the Privatization and Commercialization Act of 1988[25], This Act set up the Technical Committee on Privatization and Commercialization (TCPC) with a mandate to privatize 111 public enterprises and commercialize 34 others. In 1993, having privatized 88 out of the 111 enterprises listed in the decree, the TCPC concluded its assignment and submitted a final report. Based on the recommendation of the TCPC, the Federal Military Government promulgated the Bureau for Public Enterprises Act of 1993, which repealed the 1988 Act and set up the Bureau for Public Enterprises (BPE) to implement the privatization program in Nigeria. As at May 1999 the Federal Government investment in these public enterprises was in the region of US$100 billion. In spite of these massive investments, however, public enterprises have failed to perform the functions and attain the objectives for which they were set up. The gross failure of these enterprises to live up to expectations is partly responsible for the current move towards economic liberalization, competition and privatization. The philosophy behind privatization in Nigeria therefore is to restructure and rationalize the public sector not only to lessen the dominance of unproductive investments in the sector but also to initiate the process of gradual cession to the private sector of public enterprises which are believed to be better operated by the private sector. It is also expected that the privatization programme will provide the channel for reintegrating Nigeria back into the global economy as a platform to attract foreign direct investment in an open, fair and transparent manner. THE ENABLING PRIVATISATION LAWS Public Enterprises (Privatisation and Commercialisation) Act 1999 provides the enabling legislation for the implementation of the privatization and commercialization programme. This Act created the National Council on Privatization (NCP) whose functions include: making policies on privatization and commercialization; determining the modalities for privatization and advising the government accordingly; determining the timing of privatization for particular enterprises; approving the prices for shares and the appointment of privatization advisers; ensuring that commercialized public enterprises are managed in accordance with sound commercial principles and prudent financial practices; and Interfacing between the public enterprises and the supervising ministries in order to ensure effective monitoring and safeguarding of the managerial autonomy of the public enterprises. The 1999 Act also established the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) as the secretariat of the National Council on Privatization. The functions of the bureau include among others to do the following: implement the councils policies on privatization and commercialization; prepare public enterprises approved by the council for privatization and commercialization; advise the council on capital restructuring needs of enterprises to be privatized; ensure financial discipline and accountability of commercialized enterprises; make recommendations to the council in the appointment of consultants, advisers, investment bankers, issuing houses, stockbrokers, solicitors, trustees, accountants, and other professionals required for the purpose of either privatization or commercialization; and Ensure the success of privatization and commercialization implementation through monitoring and evaluation. The Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 Nigerian laws dealing with the issues of privatization do not exist in a vacuum. It is part of the body of laws governing the transfer and acquisition of property in Nigeria. The most fundamental legal document in Nigeria is the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999. Under sections 43 and 44 of the Constitution, the right of the individual to own movable and immovable property is guaranteed by the Constitution. As a corollary to this guarantee, these properties cannot be acquired by the Government without the payment of compensation. The issue that has been discussed very frequently is whether the guarantees protect the sale of shares. This depends on whether the shares are movable property under the Constitution. It has been argued that since shares are choses in action they are not strictly so called movable property. They are special specie; consequently they are not protected under the Constitution. If this argument prevails it means that if a NEW Government which does not share the philosophy of the recent Governments ascends to power, it can reacquire the shares which it had disposed off through privatisation without any obligation to pay compensation for the share. At present the position of the Constitution should not create any serious alarm because, Under the Nigeria Investment Promotion Commission Act, Decree No. 16 1995 (the law enacted to encourage inflow of investments in Nigeria) the Government of Nigeria guarantees expressly that no compulsory acquisition of enterprises and interests shall take place in Nigeria. This clearly includes chooses in action. Foreign Exchange (Monitoring and Miscellaneous Provisions) Decree 1995 A major factor which provided a catalyst for the privatization process was the need to attract foreign investment. The commanding height of the economy theory had failed to attract investments. The oil boom had disappeared and it was necessary to augment national revenue through foreign investment. The laws governing the allocation of foreign exchange had to be adapted in such a manner as to make it very attractive to the foreign investor. Consistent with this spirit of liberalization and privatization of the economy the rules