No More Used Cars

No More Used Cars No More Used Cars No More Used Cars By Maeve Maddox Time was, a car that no longer belonged to its original owner was a used car. Clothing that had changed hands was second-hand clothing or, in a family, hand me downs. Not anymore. Apparently, in our consumer society, thrift is still practiced, but admitting to it is not cool. Old clothes are now sold in consignment shops, not second-hand stores. Used cars are advertised as previously owned. but now even that euphemism may be on its way out. This week I received an advertising mailer offering deals on reprocessed cars. At first I thought the printer had made a mistake for repossessed. Apparently the company sending the mailer anticipated such a reaction because a definition was thoughtfully provided: Reprocessed Vehicle (noun) A late model pre-owned vehicle that has undergone a 27-point interior and exterior mechanical and safety inspection and conditioning and has been warranted for reliability. British writer David Rowan offers several more euphemisms for the embarrassing word used : pre-enjoyed, previously cared for, and experienced. Rowan has gathered a fascinating list of very scary euphemisms from serious news stories. Many of the expressions are U.S. coinages. The Pentagon seems to be an especially prolific contributor to the class of words that fall upon the facts like soft snow, blurring the outlines and covering up all the details. See how close you can come to what these euphemisms are supposed to mean. fiscal underachiever HRP immediate permanent incapacitation NBC suit real-time precipitation situation sidewalk counseling toy soldier urban camping welcome station wildlife conservation park Check your answers against Rowans list (Update: link no longer online). 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 Expressions category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:What is the Difference Between "These" and "Those"?The Six Spellings of "Long E"20 Names of Body Parts and Elements and Their Figurative Meanings

The Improvements of Health Through Technology Professor Ramos Blog

The Improvements of Health Through Technology https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1dN_u2aHoZKcujZBEF-DZclH_qnuztW9f-X2oFuCwCyk/edit#slide=id.p

Internal Analysis and SWOT Analysis slp 03 Essay

Internal Analysis and SWOT Analysis slp 03 - Essay Example The chapter provides the basics of the topic and is simple to read and understand. The chapter also provides a clear understanding and provides a seep insight into the topic. The references for the Steps 2 and 3 have been taken from the website of LOWE Home Improvements. The website is one of the most reliable sources of information for the company and to gain the all financial figures. Also a research that was conducted by one in January 2008 has also been used as it provides a deep analysis of the company and also provides all essential information and details about the company. The benefits of using these references are that they provide reliable and accurate information along with being recent. The references are also easily accessible and the details provided are easy to understand and are apt as they are focused for the investors. Bharatbooks, 2008, ‘Premium Company Profile: Lowes Companies, Inc.’, Accessed on 29th November 2009, Retrieved from http://www.bharatbook.com/Market-Research-Reports/Premium-Company-Profile-Lowes-Companies-Inc.html Heller, Z., 2009, ‘Home Depot vs. Lowe’s: Where is the  Difference?’, 6th July 2009, Accessed on 29th November 2009, Retrieved from

State Research Elements that Influence State Government Essay

State Research Elements that Influence State Government - Essay Example Members are encouraged to vote for these state and local leaders presented by the union. Another way they seek to influence state government is through their Political Action Committee called Political Action Committee for Education (PACE). Pace contributions are given separately from union dues. This money is used for lobbying and election contributions. PSEA spent nearly $1,000,000 on lobbying salaries and efforts for FY 2006-2007. Democratic candidates are the main recipients of PSEA member and PACE contributions. Many of these candidates favor increased funding for public schools, blocking voucher programs that would send public money to private schools and merit pay for teachers. These initiatives have been identified as some of the most troubling issues for teachers and PSEA members in Pennsylvania. Traditionally, Democratic candidates have been able to count on PSEA as an ally in most elections in districts where education is an issue. Republicans in Pennsylvania have usually been in opposition to PSEA in every way. The whole concept of unionized public sector employees upsets many Republicans. They often point out the fact that some school districts require all members to pay a portion of dues even if they do not join the PSEA. These sorts of ideological and structural differences between the PSEA and Republican Party have traditionally kept them on opposite sides of legislation that seeks to weaken unions or change rules. The effects of the PSEA on state elections is debatable, especially in a weak economy. Pennsylvania has experienced a record number of teacher furloughs since the economic downturn began in 2008. The localized structure of public education in Pennsylvania weakens the effectiveness of PSEA at the state level as well. Pennsylvania is divided into 501 independent local school districts. Each one of these districts has a school board that oversees local expenses and

Cinnamon Chex Retailing Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Cinnamon Chex Retailing - Research Paper Example Manufactures, warehouses, and transporters maintain a timely delivery of products to their consumers. This paper explore the Cinnamon Chex; a food product popular in United States. It will endeavor to trace the production of Cinnamon Chex, its natural ingredients, and added ingredients. The paper further seeks to discuss supply chain, processing, delivery, and SWOT analysis. Finally, it will give the relevant recommendations about the product to consumers. Cinnamon Chex is a product taken as breakfast by many people. This food appears in a cereal meal that is highly nutritious (Crocker 49).Cinnamon Chex contains plant nutrients, mineral salts, and fiber. It is a whole grain meal. Cinnamon consumers have little information about its natural source. Cinnamon comes from the inner bark of several trees. These trees belong to genus cinnamonium that has a wide range of use in savory and sweet foods (131). The trees grow naturally in South East Asia, such as Bangladesh, and Sumatra. Cinnamo n cultivation takes two years to mature. After full maturity, drying of branches takes place subsequent removal of the rough, wooden outer barks through a scrapping process (58). Drying of Inner barks takes four hours in an ideal dry, warm environment. Use of wet surfaces promotes growth of pests. This form of agriculture is an export oriented. Exportation of cinnamon promotes foreign exchange, which creates trade links amongst nations. Cinnamon is a spice that enhances marketability of the products that utilize it in their preparation (121). To make it appealing to the consumer to buy this product, incorporation of various products is desirable. Some of these products include salted whole almonds, brown sugar, chopped dry apples, and vanilla yogurt-covered raisins. The major nutrients in Cinnamon Chex include proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, fibers, and mineral salts. To prepare a sixteen -serving Cinnamon Chex, the recipe contains, one cup chopped apple, and two tablespoons ligh t corn syrup. It also has half a cup of vanilla yogurt covered-resins, one table spoon of ground cinnamon, a third cup of packed brown sugar, and five cups of wheat Chex. Margarine is also part of ingredients in a quarter -cup portion (243). Timely manufacturing and delivery of Cinnamon Chex is essential. Manufactures should observe safety issues. All practices involved in the processing must be in accordance with Food and Drug Act. Ignorance to maintain high health standards means endangering lives of consumers. It also risks the Cinnamon Chex sales because of the probability of closure of the manufacturing companies (79). Food and Drug Act has mandate to issue orders for immediate termination of services for the manufacturing company that violates Food and Drug Act. Traceability of Cinnamon Chex is an essential tool in a business venture. This tool ensures proper management of inputs and outputs, which results into major improvements in terms of quality and efficiency. A mechanism such as external auditing and advice on safety plays a big role to stabilize depreciating quality of Cinnamon Chex product. Cinnamon Chex retailers employ a standardized system of traceability. This enables an easy trace back of recent sales through immediate buyers. Traceability helps to restore of company’s reputation. However, it is not always perfect in food. Cinnamon Chex retailers are no exception. SWOT analysis endeavors to evaluate Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and

Concepts and Problems in Macroeconomics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Concepts and Problems in Macroeconomics - Essay Example Japan is a consumer society where consumer spending fuels the economy. Analyzing the relationship between consumer confidence, GDP, and unemployment can give some insight into how closely perceptions are aligned with reality. Figure 1 indicates the relationship between the GDP and confidence levels. Both employment confidence and consumer confidence are closely related. However, the Figure 1 (Data from Worsley 2007) confidence levels trail the change in GDP by 12 months. The GDP bottomed out in 2002, but confidence did not hit a minimum until 2003. Likewise, the decline in 2005 did not impact confidence levels until the middle of 2006 when employment confidence fell and consumer confidence flattened out. Figure 2 shows the relationship between relationship between GDP and real unemployment. The steep rise in GDP between 2002- 2004 precipitated a Figure 2 (Data from Japan: Unemployment rate 2007) steady decline in the real unemployment rate beginning in 2003 and continuing through 2006. The Japanese public is keenly aware of the unemployment rate and is reflected in their spending confidence. The public's real measure of economic health is employment and trails the change in GDP by 12-24 months. Predicting consumer confid... By monitoring the GDP, Japan can expect the unemployment rate to follow the same trend in a period of 12-24 months later. Confidence levels, both consumer and employment, will track the unemployment rate directly. Investors can take advantage of this situation by preparing for an upturn in spending 12-24 months after the GDP begins to move upward. GDP 1. 1. Calculate real GDP for 2005 and 2006 using 2005 prices. By what percent did real GDP grow 2005 GDP = (90*18) + (180*100) = 1620 + 18000 = $19,620 2006 GDP @ 2005 prices = (100 *18) + (190*100) = 1800+19000 = $20,800 GDP Growth = (20,800 - 19620) / 19620 = .0601 = 6.01% 2. Calculate the value of the price index for GDP for 2006 using 2005 as the base year. By what percent did prices increase (90*20) + (180*110) = 1800 + 19800 = $21,600 PI = (21600 - 19620) / 19620 = 1980 / 19620 = .1009 = 10.09% 3. Now calculate real GDP for 2005 and 2006 using 2006 prices. By what percent did real GDP grow GDP 2005 @ 2006 prices = $21,600 GDP 2006 = (100*20)+(190*110) = 2000+20900= 22,900 Growth = (22900 - 21600) / 21600 = 1300/21600 = .0601 = 6.01% 4. Review the GDP information for the past few years from the Bureau of Economic Analysis's Website. Provide a brief summary of the GDP trends over that timeframe and discuss two or three events which may have caused these trends. GDP has generally steadily risen in recent history. It stagnated in the early 70s due the oil embargo. Since Q2 in 2001, the GDP has risen every quarter except Q3 in 2001. This was probably a result of 9/11. The GDP had recovered by Q1 of 2002 and has had steady growth through this period of deficit spending. Hong Kong and

Pay Equity In Labor Force Movement Essay Example for Free

Pay Equity In Labor Force Movement Essay Debates about women’s rights at work and the gendered dimensions of employment inequality were notable and contested features of Canadian political discourse throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Concern about these issues took root during the 1940s, when women experienced dramatic shifts in their employment opportunities as a result of being drawn into and later jettisoned from the reserve army of wartime labor. Pressure to improve women’s employment conditions, particularly in the burgeoning public sector, recurred in the mid-1950s. However, it was in the 1960s, once the second wave of feminism took root in Canada, that women began to develop a sustained critique of the employment inequalities they experienced and pressure their governments to address the problem through policy innovation and change. (Westhues, 45-58) From the outset of second-wave feminism, women advanced analyses of employment inequality that took account of their labor in both the public and domestic spheres. As Brockman noted, activists â€Å"drew attention, as had never been done before, to the fundamental incompatibility between reproductive labor and child care, on the one hand, and paid work on the other, as well as to the profound consequences of this incompatibility. † (Brockman, 78-93) While liberal, radical, and socialist feminists approached this issue from different ideological vantage points, they shared a common belief that the causes of gender inequality in employment were not rooted solely in the workplace. Only, they claimed, if questions about women’s employment in the public sphere were addressed in tandem with questions about their labor in the domestic sphere would the gendered dimensions of employment inequality be fully understood. In particular, feminists thought that women’s maternal work had to be recognized in discussions about promoting gender equality in the workplace. As Westhues, a well-known socialist feminist, once argued, â€Å"As long as women have the primary responsibility for maintenance of the home and for child care, we will be less than able to pursue job opportunities and our domestic commitments will be used to justify discriminatory employment practices. † (Westhues, 45-58) Growing awareness of the need to link questions about production and reproduction in analyses of women’s economic position was by no means unique to Canadian feminism. It was, for example, well established in the early writing of second-wave feminists in Britain and the United States. What did, however, distinguish Canadian feminists from their counterparts in these other liberal democracies was an ability to work together, despite ideological differences, in order to advance this double-edged critique of gender inequality in employment. Right from the start of the contemporary women’s movement, Canadian feminists engaged with the state, demanding policies that recognized the link between women’s employment opportunities and the provision of child care. Canadian feminists lobbied both federal and provincial governments about the need to improve women’s employment opportunities and expand the provision of child care. It was in the federal arena, however, that women (outside Quebec) focused their demands for the development of policies that acknowledged the link between these two issues. In some respects, this federal focus was surprising. After all, only one-tenth of the Canadian labor force is regulated by the federal government, and even at the start of second-wave feminism both federal and provincial governments had been involved in employment opportunity and child care initiatives. Moreover, even though the federal government has the constitutional capacity to use its spending power to underwrite the provision of state-subsidized child care, it is the provinces that retain constitutional control over the delivery of this service. The federal focus of women’s campaigns was encouraged by the fact that the renaissance of Canadian feminism occurred within the context of a broader social project to achieve universal welfare guarantees, assured by the Canadian state. It was reinforced by the government of Canada’s decision to establish the 1967 Royal Commission on the Status of Women (RCSW) to inquire how best the federal government could ensure that women enjoyed â€Å"equal opportunities with men in all aspects of Canadian society. † It has since been sustained by the work of activists in national organizations, in particular the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC), founded in 1972, and the Canadian Day Care Advocacy Association (CDCAA), established in 1982 and renamed the Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada (CCAAC) in 1992. However, despite a long history of feminist engagement with the federal state, women’s repeated campaigns for the development of policies to address the double-edged nature of gender inequality in employment, and the clear recognition of these demands in reports of royal commissions and task forces, the federal policy response has been uneven. Policies to eradicate sex discrimination at work and promote women’s employment opportunities have been developed and implemented in the federal policy sphere. By contrast, the federal government has not developed policies to promote a publicly funded system of child care in order to enhance women’s employment opportunities, save as emergency measures during the Second World War or as an element of broader initiatives to get â€Å"welfare mothers† out to work. Instead it has treated child care as a fiscal issue for which parents can receive subsidies through federal taxation. This paper examines why a double-edged interpretation of women’s employment inequality, which recognizes the public and domestic dimensions of women’s work, has not been fully absorbed into federal policies to promote gender equality in the sphere of employment. The analysis follows the development of debates about women’s rights at work from the period of reconstruction after the Second World War, when questions about eradicating employment discrimination against worker-citizens first emerged in Canadian political debate, through to the close of the twentieth century. It examines federal policy developments under Liberal and Conservative governments, showing that even though the reports of federal royal commissions and task forces encoded feminist demands for a double-edged attack on employment inequality, questions about promoting women’s employment equality and child care were continually driven apart in the federal policy process. Women’s Paid and Caring Work  While this is by no means the first time that scholars have considered the relationship between Canadian women’s work inside and outside the home, it is noticeable how the link between these two aspects of women’s labor was explored by historians and sociologists before being addressed by analysts of public policy. In the late 1970s, members of the Women’s History Collective at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education and the Clio Collective in Montreal pioneered research in Canada on how women’s labor had shifted from the unpaid domestic sphere into the world of paid employment. In the process, they unearthed textual and oral histories that demonstrated how, despite this transition, women still faced the double bind of a double-day in which they went out to work for pay and home to work for love. Their findings were reinforced in late 1970s and 1980s by sociological analyses of women’s work arguing that because women so often entered employment while maintaining primary responsibility for the care of their children, they frequently found themselves concentrated in low-paid, low-status employment. Despite the fact that historians, sociologists, and feminist activists drew attention to the â€Å"double ghetto† of women’s working lives, discussions about policies to promote women’s employment opportunities and improve the provision of child care evolved as distinct scholarly debates. The literature on policies to promote Canadian women’s employment opportunities emerged within the context of broader discussions and debates about the development of policies to root out discrimination in the workplace. By contrast, the literature on Canadian child care policy evolved around questions about the development, cost, and politics of implementing public policies to promote the welfare, education, care, and development of young children. In recent years, however, policy analysts have paid much greater attention to the link between women’s paid and caring work. Jacobs, 120-128) Nonetheless, no one has yet considered why Canadian government policies to promote women’s employment opportunities and improve the provision of child care have been developed at such different rates and, despite repeated calls to the contrary, not linked in the design of public policies to promote gender equality in federally regulated employment. This pattern of inquiry is understandable, given the discrete historical development of policies concerned with child care and those concerned with women’s employment. However, it unduly limits our understanding of the gendered dimensions of employment inequality in Canada and fails to capture the empirical reality of many women’s working lives. Double-Edged Nature of Women’s Employment Inequality Why did women’s double-edged demand for equal employment opportunities and child care emerge in Canada in the 1960s and 1970s? After all, from the mid-1950s Canada experienced one of the fastest rates of labor force feminization in the Western industrialized world. The decline of manufacturing industries and the concomitant growth of the tertiary sector in the 1950s and 1960s meant that while industries that had traditionally attracted men closed down, those demanding support skills that had long characterized women’s traditional domestic roles expanded. Moreover, in countries like Canada, where welfare states were being established, the growth in women’s employment intensified most quickly. The much trumpeted rise in female labor force participation rates did not, however, mean that women engaged in paid employment on the same terms as men. The occupational segregation of Canadian men and women persisted in both horizontal and vertical forms. In fact, this process intensified with the increased participation of women in the paid labor force. As a result, the vast majority of women found themselves working in poorly paid occupations, situated in the lower echelons of private companies and public sector organizations. Moreover, as Jacobs have noted, although the creation of welfare states meant that â€Å"women as a group had more employment opportunities open up for them than men† in the mid-twentieth century, the growth in women’s employment was in the part-time sector of the labor force, which was increasingly dominated by women in all OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries. Jacobs, 120-128) This simply intensified the inequalities of employment opportunity that women experienced because part-time work is concentrated in the least-skilled, lowest-paid, and most poorly organized sections of the labor force, where benefits are usually more limited than in the full-time sector. The rapid growth in women’s participation in part-time rather than fulltime employment reflects two other factors about the feminization of the Canadian labor force. On the one hand, it relates to the type of work that the service sector has generated and to the increasing flexibility demanded of its employees. On the other hand, it reflects the fact that the greatest increase in female labor force participation rates since the 1960s has been among women with young children. In the early 1960s, most female employees in Canada would leave the workforce when their first child was born and return only when their youngest child had entered school. By the mid-1980s most women with young children went out to work. Indeed, as Pendakur have noted, â€Å"By 1991 all traces of the reproduction function had disappeared with female labor force participation rates peaking in the major family-rearing age categories†. The double burden that women experience from juggling their employment while continuing to care for their children has been reinforced by the limited provision of subsidized child care spaces in Canada. In the late 1960s, when women began to pressure the federal government to address the minimal provision of child care for working women, federal subsidies for child care were limited to support for welfare mothers under the 1966 Canada Assistance Plan. This pattern changed very little in the course of the twentieth century, although federal subsidies to support child care for low-income families became increasingly tied to efforts to get mothers receiving welfare out to work. Although recent federal publications on the status of day care in Canada boast â€Å"a twenty-five-fold increase† in child care spaces since the government first gathered these data in 1971, in fact the proportion of children of working mothers who have access to regulated child care remains very low. As a result, most working parents remain highly dependent on informal, unregulated child care. Indeed, as Brockman noted, in the mid-1990s â€Å"children in informal child care arrangements accounted for eighty per cent of all child care used by parents in Canada. † (Brockman, 78-93) The federal state in Canada has addressed questions about promoting equal employment opportunities for men and women in the public sphere with relative ease but has failed to recognize that this project cannot be achieved without addressing the questions of child care that affect so many women’s working lives. While the reasons for this are complex, some insights from feminist theory may help us to begin this exploration. In recent years, a number of feminist theorists have discussed how the concept of worker-citizenship that took root as welfare states were developed in countries such as Canada did not take account of the different contexts in which women and men often assumed employment. (Pendakur, 111-120) As a result, when questions about promoting equal employment opportunities for men and women began to emerge in the 1950s and ’60s, they were framed in terms of women achieving the same opportunities as men. Indeed, Canadian have tried to develop a more nuanced concept of worker citizenship that not only respects the objective of equality of opportunity but also takes workers’ particular circumstances into account and, in the case of women, enables them to integrate their paid and caring work better. In the process, women have argued that a state that upholds the principle of gender equality must develop policies that take account of the interconnectedness of the public and domestic spheres and recognize the different contexts in which men and women often assume employment. Conclusion Nonetheless, although Canadian feminists have a long history of active engagement with the state, developed through a â€Å"visible and articulate women’s movement† that has successfully placed issues on the political agenda, the result, more often than not, has been that their demands have been contained within a limited set of reforms. As a result, those aspects of gender discrimination in the workplace that concern practices within the public sphere have been acknowledged through the introduction of anti-discrimination and employment equity policies. By contrast, women have had more difficulty getting their proposals for policies that transcend the public/ private divide, by linking questions of equal employment opportunity with those of child care, acknowledged in the federal policy arena. Despite their efforts to forge these links through two major royal commissions and other government inquiries, problems of gender inequality in employment are still primarily defined as issues located within the public sphere of employment. Without doubt, over the past thirty years there have been clear improvements in the position of women in the federally regulated section of the Canadian labor force. Nonetheless, women continue to cluster in the lower echelons of companies and organizations and remain under-represented in more senior positions. While this persistent pattern of inequality has many causes, paper shows how it reflects a federal policy process that concentrates on ensuring the comparable treatment of male and female employees once they have entered the labor market, yet, for complex reasons, repeatedly stalls on developing a more expansive approach to child care. As a result, federal policies to promote gender equality in the sphere of employment neglect the inequalities of access and participation that many women experience as they continue or resume employment once they have dependent children.