Racism has always existed with humans. Racial discrimination treats others unfairly because they belong to other ethnic communities or have different religions or nationalities. It is called racism when someone thinks that their race is better than other races and superior to other races because of their race. Over time, many people lost their lives, lost their families and children, and racially separated their homes. Racism causes a war that can ultimately destroy humanity. A good example of racism is World War II. The main reason for the war is that people feel that they are superior to other races. That leads to war and many people lose their lives and their families. Another example of racism is slavery, which has influenced Africans. One tribe has used the power and power to rule and enforce other tribes.
Get original essayI believe we can stop racism in three ways. First, educate as much as possible about racial discrimination. Second, I see people as equal and human. Third, do not give up or say when racism actually appears. The first step in stopping racism is to educate as much as possible about racism. People often do not know the impact on their behavior. People should teach their friends and family about racism. If one does not learn the right way to act, it can ultimately endanger someone's life. Sometimes a misunderstanding is so toxic that we forget what we have to do. It can also happen if my parents do not teach me good things to hang out with people and understand the feelings of others. You may have been harassed if you did not learn from your parents, and it would be difficult to have friends and family every time I went. My family can help me and do good work because of what I taught me.
The second point we must follow to prevent racism is to see people as equal and as human beings. Because many people are superior and heroic, I see others differently. A good way to prevent this is to teach empathy for others. For example, you should practice honestly and patiently with kind words such as "please", "thank you", "please forgive". My idea of equality is humanity, in which everyone lives without fear and has the right to live with hope and love. But we need everyone to work as a team, not just for themselves. For example, if a teacher assigns a group, one or two people will not be allowed to do everything. We need to ask each person their ideas and discuss them. Working as a team, listening to everyone's thoughts, and sharing that idea can help change the world.
The second point we must follow to prevent racism is to see people as equal and as human beings. Because many people are superior and heroic, I see others differently. A good way to prevent this is to teach empathy for others. For example, you should practice honestly and patiently with kind words such as "please", "thank you", "please forgive". My idea of equality is humanity, in which everyone lives without fear and has the right to live with hope and love. But we need everyone to work as a team, not just for themselves. For example, if a teacher assigns a group, one or two people will not be allowed to do everything. We need to ask each person their ideas and discuss them. Working as a team, listening to everyone's thoughts, and sharing that idea can help change the world.
Racial discrimination has lasted forever, but a great deal of effort can certainly be reduced. Education is at the heart of many complex problems that we face in this world. Education can change the way people think and lead us to a better world. We can fight racism with education. If we teach and teach sympathy, the need to talk about how to stop racism will be reduced. If racist ideas are still with us, it will be difficult to stop racism. It is up to us to educate the family and others about the challenge of racism to prepare for the future.
EBay is the biggest Internet auction company in the world, and it has the largest number of users, and it still grows now. That is the reason that eBay must realize their strength and weakness to let the company grow more safe.
Get original essayCore competencies:
EBay has a large market in the world that eBay had a presence in 28 countries in 2003. Customers can buy and sell other countries’ goods easily in the eBay.
EBay has large number of customers in Internet auction market that eBay does not need to care about its fund that it just needs to charge the sellers’ fee when they sell their goods.
EBay has lots of categories of goods that it can content with most of customers.
These services are other company are difficult to imitate that eBay has biggest auction market that customers can buy and sell most of goods from the whole world. EBay can get huge funds to maintain and grow the company because eBay has large number of customers in the world. EBay just need to charge the fee from sellers and eBay can get huge funds. Other online auction companies are difficult to do this. So, I believe the hugest online auction market, large number of customers, and lots of categories of goods are eBay’s core competencies.
However, these core competencies are also eBay’s weakness. EBay is very difficult to manage their customers because all of people can easy to join eBay, and eBay did not check their customers very seriously. It is easy to get two, three, even more ID in eBay.
Customer perspective:
The way to let all of people see and use eBay’s system is that the system must as easy as they can, let customers feel comfortable when they use eBay. So, the company must realize the customers, and the system must easy and safety to use.
Financial perspective:
The best way is show the growth rate, but it may be a serious part in the future because the Internet market does not have so much space to grow. So, eBay can try to develop other countries’ market.
Internal Business perspective:
EBay have large market and all kinds of goods, in order to nimbly use this strong point, eBay should make a powerful and useful search engine.
Innovation and learning perspective:
To improve eBay’s problems, eBay must check the fake ID to protect sellers control the price and feedback.
Customer:
EBay’s auction style is person to person trading community. There are six types of users use online auction:
In these customers, “power and corporate sellers,” who are the small to medium-sized business, are the most important that they responsible over 80% business even if they just counted 4% in eBay. In other word, if eBay lost “power and corporate sellers,” eBay must be bankrupt.
In another way, “bargain hunters” is the largest numbers of customers that there are over 50% eBay’s customers are “bargain hunters.” Lots of them are “visitors,” not buyers. This is the gap about servqual gap 1, and it is a seriously problem that over 50% visitors cannot find what they want, and do not buy and sell anything. “professional buyers” are also the symbol for gap 1 that eBay’s system cannot give the customers enough information to let them become active online users.
I believe there are some fake ID exist that some people will use it to make fake auctions, and some seller will use it to control the price and feedback. I think this is the gap about servqual gap2 that eBay’s management cannot clear improve this problem.
Industry:
Internet grew very soon from 1990s, and it became a part of everyday life. However, Internet was not expected to have same growth in the future. The total growth rate of Internet may lower than 20%.
Opening an Internet retail store is very easy, and there are some excellent search engines, like Google, can help people to find the goods which they want and help them to compare the price.
Do not like retail stores, the auction companies create a stage to let other people or companies easy to trade, so buyers and sellers are the customers of auction companies.
Competitor:
EBay has lots of competitors in the world, so it is very important to realize the strengths and weakness to compete with its competitor.
Strength:
EBay has the largest online market in the world, so people can find and easy to buy and sell their goods from other countries.
The systems in the eBay are very easy to use, and everyone can become a buyer and seller in eBay.
EBay’s brand power is strong, so it attracts lots of people to join eBay.
EBay does not charge the fee from the buyers, and it just charges a little fee from sellers.
Make feedback system that help buyers and sellers to build solid reputations.
Use all kinds of way to get and analyze the customers’ information.
Weakness:
EBay has too many customers, and it is difficult to manger the ID and check the ID is true or not.
Without the checking the ID, the fake and illegal auctions happen easily. Sometimes, some person will sell the stolen goods, and it is difficult to differentiate the goods is stolen goods or not.
Some sellers will create the fake ID to control the price and feedback. First, they many a fake ID to compete with other buyers and let goods prices up to as high as they except, so they can earn more money. If the fake ID wins the auction, they will use fake ID to control their feedback. It can let they have more positive comment. The fake ID will let eBay lost the credit in Feedback system.
Some companies have more powerful search engine than eBay.
Over 50% of eBay’s business depends on power and corporate sellers which are only 4% in eBay customers.
The auctions take time to finish the trading. These actions may take 2~3 days to complete, but it takes too much time for some people.
EBay’s transactions are person to person, so the auction’s credibility may be lower than the business to business’s and business to person’s transaction because people do not have any information from each other.
Distribution/ Supplier:
EBay develop its market not only in the U.S.A., it also developed its market to Europe and Asia, make a largest online market in the world. When it made new market in other countries, it tried to develop the system that other countries’ customers easy to use. For example, it made a system that can exchange dollar and Japanese yen. This system let Japanese users use eBay’s system comfortable.
They also collaborated with PayPal and UPS. With the PayPal people can more safely, and they can check their package by UPS very easily. These are very well supplier for eBay.
Now, eBay tries to challenge and create the new trading like accept large sellers, they also warm about the companies which have strong search engine like Google, Yahoo!, MSN, etc.
With the information, now people can start SWOT to analyze eBay.
Before growing eBay’s market, there are several serious problems that eBay must be improve. EBay must start to manger the customers, sellers especially, more seriously. I believe that there are lots of fake and illegal happened in eBay, so it is important to manage the customers and make security programs controlling the to block certain illegal and fake auctions. At least, eBay should check the sellers’ ID. It might need lots of cost, but it is the really way to improve the company’s credit and reduce the auctions’ risks.
EBay’s main servers’ security programs are also important, too. In these servers, it saves more than 90 millions users’ personal information and it also save some important information, like credit cards’ information. If these information is leaked out, there will be an astronomical liabilities happened, and eBay might be forced into bankruptcy. So, make a complete and safe security system is the first, but most important process that eBay must do before it grows.
Internet market’s growth rate is expected under 20%, so the new entrants and small companies may difficult to compete with the big online company, like eBay, because they do not have enough market share to compete, but it is dangerous if these companies collaborate with the companies which have strong search engines, like Google. It may become a huge threat that it may have the power take the place of eBay. One of the ways to improve this problem is collaborated with the companies which have strong search engine.
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Get custom essayIt is easy to find that eBay’s managers and leaders expend large of cost to develop eBay, and they do not hope the eBay‘s grow rate decreasing. However, the time is different than before, Internet do not have so much space to grow and create new market. So, before to think about the way to grow, I believe that eBay must improve the inside problems to make good foundation. If they have good foundation, I think they will grow very quickly and have enough power to compete other companies.
“Annabel Lee” is a poem about a beautiful but agonizing memory to the narrator. The speaker is commemorating his lost love who is Annabel Lee. As narrated by the speaker, he knew Annabel Lee a long time ago when she was still a girl, and they all lived in a place that was near the sea. In the poem, it is clear that the two were only children but their love was so severe that even the angels were jealous. Apparently, the speaker blames the angels for killing his love due to their jealousy. As the speaker argues, the wind came from the clouds and led to Annabel Lee’s sickness and eventually resulted in her death. Readers get conversant as the poem end that her relatives took her and buried her in a tomb. The speaker’s narration is an elaboration of the topic of love that is evident in the poem.
Get original essayLove is evident in the poem given that the speaker’s narration purely revolves around issues of love. The speaker loved Annabel right from their teenage in a kingdom by the sea, but their love was apparently challenged by the death of Annabel Lee. Still, the narrator does not forget her gone love, Annabel. He instead continues to dream about her, believes that their souls are knotted. He even sleeps in her tomb at night just to remember the gone love. As narrated by the speaker of the poem, love led to the jealousy that he believes led to Annabel’s death. The speaker courageously mentions that the angels were not even half as happy as he and Annabel were. The narration implies how strong the angels’ envy was since everybody assumes that the angels are a very being in heaven. One would categorize the topic of envy in its own, but it also fall under the topic of love in Edgar Allan Poe’s poem “Annabel Lee”. It is the love that has led to the envy as narrated by the speaker in the poem.
Edgar Allan Poe might have written the poem to refer to a number of women in his life, thou there is one specific wife who apparently married him at a tender age and passed on soon after their marriage. Poe mentions the youth of the unnamed narrator in Annabel Lee poem and rejoices the childish emotions similar to the principles of the romantic era back in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Poe does not describe the setting of the poem with any specificity even as he describes the romantic atmosphere in the kingdom by the sea.
The choices of words used by Edgar Allan Poe do not directly implicate the angels and the demons for being responsible for the death of his love. The speaker tactically blames everybody for the death of Annabel by mentioning that nobody can dissever his soul from the beautiful Annabel Lee, who is already dead.
The organization of Edgar Allan Poe’s words gives the poem a peaceful musical rhythm that shows the overall musicality of the poem. The musicality, in itself, makes use of the refrain phrases such as “the beautiful Annabel” and “in the kingdom by the sea”. The repetition of some words in the poem also creates the musicality of Poe’s poem. The rhyme scheme of the poem emphasizes the words “me,” “Lee,” and “sea.” The organization of the rhyme scheme gives the poem a song like the sound even as the concepts mentioned are enforced.
Edgar Allan Poe makes use of imagery in his poem to show his unique style and subject matter. The image of the Kingdom is the first major imagery Allan Poe uses to explain the situation of their love as it was before death interrupted. The imagery is used by Poe a bunch of times but always in the phrase “a kingdom by the sea.” Just thinking about the meaning of the phrase is significant for readers in setting the tone of the poem. The imagery of the kingdom gives the whole poem the whole thing a kind of fairytale feel. The repetition of the image of the kingdom gives the readers an impression of not being so sure of where they are. For instance, Poe mentions the phrase more than four times in the poem but he does not specify on the meaning of the kingdom. The imagery used, in this case creates suspense when reading the poem and readers are left to have all kinds of imagination. Perhaps it is there to give readers an intense image of time and location very different from our own. The kingdom could also symbolize the tyranny and cruelty of the world that becomes a bad place to live for the poor speaker.
The imagery of the sea is also used again and again by Edgar Allan Poe in his poem. The imagery of the sea ties everything in the speaker’s narration together. The imagery of the sea is evident when Poe mentions the word “sea” without mentioning the other word “kingdom.” Before having to know that that it is by the kingdom, we get to imagine that it is a place full if demons mentioned by the speaker to be a part of those who are jealous of his love. We can imagine the demons slithering under water since our imagination of hell is that it is underground. The imagery of the evil things living under sea makes the sea a scary and dark phenomenon in the poem “Annabel Lee.”
The imagery of the sea is evident when the speaker also mentions his love Annabel to be in her resting place beside the sea waters. The sea pulls everything in the poem as we can imagine the water lapping against the tomb that the speaker is mentioning. The sea is apparently the last word in the poem, pushing our imagination that it rounds the whole thing out. Alliteration is created by the phrases mentioned by Poe that talks about the sea. Readers are left to believe the mysterious nature of the sea even as the poem comes to an end.
The character Annabel Lee is brought out as an imagery in the poem. She is the one the speaker narrates her story in the poem. Apparently, Annabel is the reason for the poem as her beauty, and tender age are the sweetness of the poem. The speaker brings in the memory of her death by mentioning the wind that led to her sickness. The imagery of Annabel is very strong in the poem as readers can imagine her cold body as she dies. In the sad last lines, Poe mentions the beautiful Annabel repeatedly, and her names become like an echo. Her name in the last stanza sounds as if the speak is trying to bring her back.
There is an imagination of the speaker being a kind of a guy one would wish to meet at a party and be interested in the right way. He is imagined as a person who would be charming, engaging, and maybe he would be able to tell good stories. Going, on one would wish to listen to the sad stories he would be able to tell. The speaker is imagined to be somebody in a crummy beach town with amazing towers and big steel gates to make his happiness with Annabel as greater as it seems.
There is the imagination of angels and even demons in the poem. They take the blame for killing Annabel due to their envy for the speaker. The view of the angels is not standard but the speaker has a negative attitude about everything surrounding the angels. The phrase “winged seraphs” is significant in creating a superior and legendary flavor to the poem. Readers can imagine the situation created when angels are jealous of a mere human being. The speaker also mentions that the angels had the perception that they would win by killing her love, Annabel, but the bond between their souls is still strong. We recognize the pairing of the angels and the demons under the same sea, a situation that perfectly looks like an illusion to the religious view of the world. The angels and demons are paired to be ganging up against Annabel, but there is no sense in the imagination since they ought to represent either good or evil.
In conclusion, the poem “Annabel” deals with Edgar Allan Poe’s best title, the death of a beautiful young woman. A comparison can be made between Poe’s poems and the poem about Annabel. A conclusion can be made regarding the speaker’s actions that he did not only want to expose his teenage love for Annabel but also an everlasting relationship between them.
With 11 Tony Awards and over 1 million copies of its soundtrack sold, it is no doubt that the musical, Hamilton, has grabbed America’s attention since its debut in 2015. The unlikely star of the production, Alexander Hamilton, is brought back to life through the creative mind of Lin Manuel Miranda, the musical’s writer and producer. Hamilton uniquely conveys the story of the American Revolution using a hip hop soundtrack and one of the most imaginative librettos ever written. The result is a fusion of the past and present through music and politics. With the popularity of this musical, comes critics and reviews; most of which are labeled 10 out of 10 stars. However, what if we were solely to evaluate the historical accuracy of Hamilton?
Get original essayThis research paper will compare the history of Alexander Hamilton’s political and personal life to the portrayal in the play. It will investigate what components of Hamilton’s life are excluded from or added to the production, and why Lin Manuel Miranda chose to design the production in this fashion. It is predicted to discover that many elements of the production are implemented to allow Lin Manuel Miranda to create the theatrical vision and entertaining plot that he desires.
This topic is significant as it shows a modern interpretation of historical events and how information is represented in today’s society. It emphasizes how entertainment heavily impacts the modern American population. Many individuals are fascinated and engrossed by Alexander Hamilton after the creation of this production. The musical has become so enormously popular that it evokes one’s interest in the topic among many viewers who would not have been interested without it. Hamilton emphasizes the trend of popularization of individuals through entertainment and media. It has impacted many outlets, especially regarding music and performance. The play has heavily impacted America and proves the influence of entertainment. It has infiltrated a broader conversation among all ages of people and set records in the industry. The effect of the production in America is undeniable. With this scale of effect, we must ask the question: Is the information we are gaining through Hamilton reliable and consistent?
Alexander Hamilton was born in 1757 on a Caribbean island called Nevis and spent most of his childhood on Saint Croix. His mother died of illness when he was eleven; an illness he had also caught. Hamilton survived and moved in with a cousin. Shortly after, a destructive hurricane demolished his town. He wrote a passionate letter about this tragedy for his local newspaper. Members of the community recognized his intelligence and he was motivated to move to New York City for formal education. After attending multiple schools in New York, he dropped out to fight in the American Revolution. Hamilton began as an artillery captain and moved along to become an aide to General George Washington. After four years in this role, he departed to join is new wife Eliza Schuler in 1781.
Alexander Hamilton’s political career began once he became a successful lawyer. He represented New York at the Constitutional Convention in 1786 and was active in coordinating a second meeting where the framework of the United States Constitution was drafted. However, as a believer in a strong centralized government, Hamilton was not greatly involved in the creation of the Constitution. Due to his beliefs, Hamilton quickly made enemies with those who saw him as a radical extremist. He signed the Constitution, however, immediately started to propose changes. The essays conveying these propositions, known as the Federalist Papers, were written majorly by Hamilton with assistance by John Jay and James Madison.
In 1790, when George Washington became president, Hamilton was chosen by Washington to be secretary of the treasury. Hamilton made major changes within the new government, including establishing a national bank, a national stock exchange, and a centralized currency. He also proposed that the government should assume all debts from the individual states. This became one of the many sources of conflict between himself and Jefferson.
Hamilton resigned in 1794 and was additionally involved in a significant scandal. He was involved in a three-year affair with a woman named Maria Reynolds and was blackmailed by her husband. Allegations of Hamilton using treasury money for this transaction surfaced, and he decided to publish letters to the general public. These documents, known as the Reynolds Pamphlet, were published in order for Hamilton to preserve his professional life. This, in turn, completely exposed his affair and shamed himself, his wife, and his children. This scandal is known as the first national sex scandal.
In the 1800 election, Hamilton was a key figure in allowing Thomas Jefferson to win over Aaron Burr, who Hamilton believed lacked basic beliefs. Burr and Hamilton’s relationship had already been tense, and this event further heightened the tension. They lived very similar lives, and this created an intense rivalry between them. A series of essays written by Hamilton took away Burr’s opportunity as New York’s governor. Soon after, Burr challenged Hamilton to a duel and fatally wounded him.
Lin Manuel Miranda explains the progression of his ideas in his book, Hamilton: The Revolution. Within this faux-leather bound book, Jeremy McCarter and Lin Manuel Miranda create a detailed depiction of the famous musical. The book guides the reader through the show’s composition and evolution from start to finish. The chapters provide songs from the musical, along with in-depth footnotes from the songwriter himself. The book breaks down the details of the musical in a meticulous manner, describing how and where songs were written, gives accounts of actors playing certain roles, and how scenes were constructed. The book also includes photos, clippings from Miranda’s personal journals, and writings from Alexander Hamilton. Although many people cannot see the show live on Broadway, this book is the closest thing to it.
Lin Manuel Miranda follows the story of Alexander Hamilton, closely through the lens of Ron Chernow’s book Alexander Hamilton. He was first exposed to this book while on vacation, and before finishing the copy, began to envision the text as a musical production. From there, Miranda initiated a project known as The Hamilton Mixtape, which included a version of what is now known as Hamilton’s opening number. He then spent the following year working on “My Shot”, another number that is included in the show. These tracks were soon performed at a multitude of workshops and festivals as they were still in the works.
McCarter explains that when he first heard Miranda’s idea for Hamilton, he thought it was just a drunken joke. However, as the idea progressed, he realized the genius behind the fusion of rap and narrative; and of modern times and the American Revolution. This creative idea turned into a revolution of its own, as the musical became a nationwide phenomenon and craze. McCarter and Miranda emphasize their ideas behind the multiracial portrayal they implement in the musical. This concept is based on the idea of telling the story of the American Revolution while also describing the new, more diverse America that is present today. McCarter describes this concept in the introduction of Hamilton: The Revolution: “It tells the stories of two revolutions. There’s the American Revolution of the 18th century…[and] the revolution of the show itself: a musical that changes the way that Broadway sounds, that alters who gets to tell the story of our founding, that lets us glimpse the new, more diverse America rushing our way. The fact that Lin wrote the show largely in sequence means that this book can trace the two revolutions in tandem”. The purpose of this production is not solely to inform the audience of the historical life of Alexander Hamilton, but rather to show the new, diverse America we live in today. The production, as McCarter admits, is an amplification of the straightforward story of Hamilton’s life. McCarter states, “The widely acclaimed musical that draws from the breadth of America’s culture and shows its audience what we share doesn’t just dramatize Hamilton’s revolution: it continues it”. This, again, confirms that this production is a dramatization, and is not created for purely educational use. This concept allows us to investigate which aspects of the musical lead us to misconceptions about the factual history of Hamilton.
To begin this analysis, we can refer to the song “Satisfied” which depicts Alexander and Eliza’s wedding night. John Laurens is finishing a toast and Angelica begins a rant in which she explains her longing for Hamilton. She states “I’m a girl in a world in which my only job is to marry rich. My father has no sons so I’m the one who has to social climb for one” (how to cite musical?). In reality, Angelica did not have this pressure as her father actually had fifteen children. Two of his children were sons who lived well into adulthood. In addition, Angelica had been married to John Barker Church three years before meeting Hamilton. In an interview with Genius, Miranda addresses this inaccuracy stating that he forgot Angelica was actually married when she met Hamilton. Miranda overlooked his forgetfulness saying, “I think my brain wanted me to forget because it’s stronger dramatically if societally she can’t marry him”. The absence of this fact in the musical surely adds to the drama, however, it also sacrifices the validity of the production.
Diving deeper into the lyrics of Hamilton, we find a line in Act I that resumes the rumor in which Hamilton is a repetitive adulterer. In the production, Aaron Burr sings that, “…Martha Washington named her feral tomcat after him!” to which Hamilton’s character replies, “That’s true!”. This line refers to Hamilton being known to be amorous and possessing similar characteristics to those of a feral cat. Conversely, labeling Alexander Hamilton as lusty is found to be one of his biggest mischaracterizations throughout time. This rumor has been revealed false through multiple academic accounts, including at an event featuring Michael E. Newton and his book Alexander Hamilton: The Formative Years. Many gathered to hear and discuss the truth of Hamilton and learn about Newton’s most recent discoveries. Newton reveals that the definition of the word “tomcat” prior to 1927 was simply of a male cat. He explains to the audience, “The myth surrounding the tomcat is completely untrue…it is highly doubtful Martha Washington even owned a tomcat, let alone that is was named ‘Hamilton’ and it was meant to describe [Alexander Hamilton’s] character as a womanizer.” This myth has been carried through time mostly due to the fact that people are careful to dismiss Martha Washington’s words. However, after analyzing Newton’s research, it is safe to say that Hamilton is not portrayed correctly in this scene of Hamilton.
Regarding Hamilton’s decline, multiple inaccuracies are shown in Act II of the production. While it is known that Alexander Hamilton and John Adams did not get along, Hamilton’s removal from the Adams administration is not rightly depicted in the musical. A main issue between the two men stems from the election of 1796, when Hamilton supported Thomas Pickney. Chernow writes about their relationship saying, “Hamilton bet on the wrong horse, a mistake that would haunt him the rest of his career. As treasury secretary, he had only limited contact with John Adams, who was excluded from inner policy circle. The two men had maintained a wary distance”. This debacle may lead some to believe that Adams fired Hamilton, as it is depicted in the musical. During the song “The Adams Administration”, Aaron Burr sings, “Adams fires Hamilton. Privately calls him creole bastard in his taunts”. Although this situation may seem likely, it is entirely false. Alexander Hamilton, in reality, resigned from his position in the Treasury in 1794. This instance occurred soon after his wife, Eliza, endured a miscarriage. Many wonder whether Hamilton’s decision was based off of this tragic occasion or it was a result of his humiliating public affair with Maria Reynolds. George Washington was devasted in Hamilton’s departure. Washington writes a tribute stating:
In every relation which you have borne to me, I have found that my confidence in your talents, exertions, and integrity has been well placed. I the more freely render this testimony of my approbation, because I speak from opportunities of information which cannot deceive me and which furnish satisfactory proof of your title to public regard. My most earnest wished for your happiness will attend you in retirement.
Hamilton and Washington remained friends after Hamilton resigned, and Hamilton remained politically involved. Through Washington’s writing, we can confirm that Hamilton did indeed quit his position and was not fired by John Adams. The fact is that Hamilton retired before Adams was even elected as President. Yet again, we find this as a historical inaccuracy in the plot of Hamilton. There is no evidence as to why Lin Manuel Miranda chose to incorporate this inaccuracy in the musical; however, one can assume that this scenario added tension between Adams’ and Hamilton’s characters, further creating a dramatic effect.
The Reynolds Pamphlet is an impactful document on Hamilton’s career, but not in the same ways that it is portrayed in the musical. This essay, written by Alexander Hamilton himself, was written in 1797 after his affair with Maria Reynolds was exposed. After Reynold’s husband found the two together, Hamilton paid him off to refrain from exposing the affair to the public. These transactions were found to be suspicious, and Hamilton had no choice but to disclose his secret. He used The Reynolds Pamphlet to essentially explain himself and salvage his political career, all while embarrassing and shaming his wife and children. In the musical, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Aaron Burr approach Hamilton regarding the affair. The song “We Know” shows a scene in which the three men confront Hamilton about his distrustful transactions. Madison claims, “Almost a thousand dollars, paid in different amounts” and Burr adds, “To a Mr. James Reynolds way back in seventeen ninety-one.” In reality, these were not the men to find Hamilton guilty. The Reynolds Pamphlet explains that James Monroe, Fredrick Muhlenberg, and Abraham Venable were the ones to approach Alexander Hamilton and make these remarks. Lin Manuel Miranda likely uses Jefferson, Madison, and Burr as the characters to approach Hamilton as they are well developed characters in the plot and the scene adds dramatic effect with these characters in dispute. Not only did the play use the wrong characters for this scene, it also greatly dramatizes how influential the Reynolds Pamphlet really was. The play depicts the Reynolds Pamphlet being the document that ended Hamilton’s career, however, it was a later document that is proved to cause the end of Hamilton’s career. In reality, it was a text that Hamilton wrote criticizing John Adams during the 1800 election that successfully ended Hamilton’s career.
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Get custom essayFinally, the play misleads the audience to believe that the presidential election of 1800 is what lead Burr and Hamilton to duel. While this was one of their first public oppositions, it was not what directly led to their duel. After Burr discovered that he would not be vice-president for a second term, he decided to run for Governor of New York. Burr lost, and afterwards, a letter was released stating that Hamilton had called Burr “a man of irregular and unsatiable ambition”. These statements eventually led Burr to confront Hamilton, and the result was a duel.
The key story I have chosen to follow is what happened recently in Orlando with the mass shooting. A gunman named Omar Mateen killed 49 people and wounded 53 at a crowded gay nightclub called Pulse in Orlando, Florida on June 12th 2016 making itone of the deadliest modern mass shootings for America. The three media sources I am using are from a radio station in Toronto named Kiss 92. 5 FM, a Canadian television channel CP24, and an article in the Toronto Star newspaper.
Get original essayI think out of the three media sources I used, the CP24 medium was the clearest because of the visuals it included and how well explained it was. It was the clearest to me because it really explained in depth of what happened and also because the channel kept updating me on what was happening and on anything new.
Thoughts on the story and they didn’t really use the inverted pyramid. CP24 structured the story I think in the inverted pyramid structure because first they said all the basics of what happened and did a quick summary of the event and explained it very well, and then they started to go into more detail about the shooter, his wife, about his life and more into detail about why something like this happened and could it have been prevented. Then they put cameras onto the actual scene in Orlando and tried to get information from the authorities and people handling the situation and finally ended with another summary and a cliffhanger until they could gather more information. The Toronto Star newspaper article structured the story with the inverted pyramid method because they used that same format and structure as the pyramid shows. They first did an introduction and it was quite in depth but not too much because their body paragraphs were where a lot of the information was said in detail and they also put quotes in their to make it a reliable source if information and concluded with more details and a conclusion.
Kiss 92. 5 FM used its format, which was audio to their advantage because when theywere explaining and telling us what had happened they were able to put sound effects in the background to make the whole feel of the story sad and make you feel different. They also used it to their advantages by changing the tone of their voice and making it more subtle and serious making the conversation sound very important and make you feel more engaged in the conversation in a way. The T. V. channel CP24 used its format which was mainly visuals with a bit of text to their advantage because they put many pictures of the scene and also engaged the viewers a lot by shooting videos at the actual scene live and trying to get information from anyone who knew anything. When you see stuff with your eyes I think it helps you understand the situation better and clears up your imagination because you can see it now and don’t have to create your own image. This let viewers like me to understand the situation better and also make it more interesting. The Toronto Star newspaper used its format, which was text to their advantage because they were able to change the fonts of words and emphasis on other words that were more important and needed to stand out. By adding a large predominant title it becomes the first thing the readers see and if it is catching and grabbing you tend to read the rest of the article, which was what I did. The font not only changed the way the article looked but also the way you perceived the news changing in your mind what information was more important than others.
In my opinion I think the medium that did the best overall job in reporting this story was the television channel CP24. They had me the most interested and engaged in their story and had me wanting to see what was going to happen next. They also made it very interesting to watch because they had many videos as well as many people on the spot of the shooting taping and showing what was happening in Orlando at the exact time. This made the video easier to understand for me and also didn’t make it to boring to watch. Because they also kept updating frequently on new information coming in to them it made me very occupied in it and was very clear and coherent at the same time with little texts at the bottom of the screen explaining in short form of what was happening.
Have you ever thought about how someone who is 18 years old can go to war and die for our country but yet they cannot even have a beer? There are a lot of risks involved with drinking alcohol but the risk of being injured or killed are a lot higher when you are in the military. Drinking has a lot of risks but so does war. It seems silly that they are not allowed to drink beer.
Get original essayNext, most of all new military recruits are between the ages 18 years old to 20 years old. In 2008 alone, they had close to 700,000 18 to 20 year olds join. Just imagine how many have died trying to protect us but yet it is still illegal for them to drink a beer.
Basically, an 18 year old is considered an adult. They no longer have to live at home, a parent does not have to support them anymore, and they can basically do everything they could not do previously. The only thing is, they cannot go out and have a beer. Hard liquor should stay at age 21 mostly because of the higher alcohol content, but beer should be legal for purchase and consumption by 18 year olds. Mark Andersen explains it pretty well. “In the United States, at 18 you can join the Army, sign a contract, rent an apartment, get married, and undertake numerous other fun activities like pay bills. But the one thing you cannot do is have a beer. Now think about this for just a minute: you can join the Army, you can fight and possibly die for your country, but you are barred from legally having a beer. Yet the beer and spirits industry's marketing is aimed at young men and women who likely cannot legally purchase their product” (Andersen). Most beer ads are targeting young adults to begin with. Even the young adults who are not legally allowed to drink yet.
The drinking laws in the United States seem very strict, but they are not. The penalties for getting caught drinking and driving are not hard or strict what so ever. Increasing the drinking age to 21 has not stopped people from drunk driving and killing people. There is always a way to get a hold of it, people under 21 rarely know how to limit how much they drink. That is bad, if we can lower it, young people can be properly taught what limit is the safe limit. Not that many young adults even know what happens if you get pulled over for a DUI or get caught for public intoxication. These statistics stated by Anderson make a valid point. Increasing the age made things worse instead of making things better. “Instead of teaching our children that drinking alcohol is no big deal, we make them wait until 21 to drink legally. If you tell someone that they cannot have something, it just makes it more enticing—even though most of them have already had a drink, most likely at a party in friend's basement, a frat house, or if the military, in the barracks. Since the drinking age was raised to 21 nationwide, instead of seeing a decrease in the amount of binge drinking, we have actually seen an increase:
Furthermore, if you lower the drinking age to 18, enforce the proposed penalty above, and give them the information they should know about drinking, not as many people would risk drinking and driving, getting blackout drunk, or doing something extremely stupid. If you do not enforce strict penalties, people will still do it over and over again until they kill someone or themselves. If things like this were enforced, drinking and driving would not be such a big problem.
When the drinking age was increased to 21, it did not stop young adults from drinking, it did not lower the alcohol related deaths, and it did not lower the amount of DUI’s. Congress thought that if they increased the age to 21 it would decrease the amount of deaths. It did not. "This law has been an abysmal failure, it has not reduced or eliminated drinking. It has simply driven it underground, behind closed doors, into the most risky and least manageable of settings. Like basements, fraternity houses and locked dorm rooms, where kids go to hide from the law and from adults, including parents, who might teach them some moderation. The law has created a dangerous culture of irresponsible and reckless behavior, unsupervised binge and extreme drinking, like something called "Six in Ten" - downing six cups of beer in ten seconds, kids trying to perfect the art of getting drunk as fast as possible by playing drinking games.”(McCardell).
To conclude, with all these facts and statements, lowering the drinking age to 18 is a good idea. Kids would not have to hide from the law or their parents to drink. They can be educated and supervised rather than uneducated and unsupervised. At 18 you can do everything like buy a house, a car, get married, get divorced, they can even go die for this country, but they cannot have a beer. That needs to change. Increasing the drinking age to 21 has not helped, it has only driven the underage drinking underground where people cannot be supervised and checked on.
One snowy day, in a cottage where an old lady named Ms. Haggs lived, she was awakening from her sleep. There was a dog on the right side of her bed named Brownie stretching. There was also a cat named Puffy that was sleeping with her. So Ms. Haggs got up and went to her dresser. She began to brush her teeth, and thought of pancakes for breakfast. Brownie and Puffy were sitting still next to her.
Get original essaySo Ms. Haggs walk over to the kitchen and began to put her apron on, still thinking about the pancakes. She began to grab a cookbook out of the cabinet. She opened to the page that showed you how to make pancakes. So there she went on reading the instructions. She went on to grab a bowl and got the flour bag and put some in a cup, then poured it in the bowl. Then she went to look for some eggs, and there was none. Ms. Haggs felt upset because she already was half way done with the pancake mix.
Ms. Haggs and her dog Brownie went over to the where she keeps the chickens at. She grabbed a couple of eggs and the chickens got scared and scattered. Then she went back home and put the eggs in and had to pour some milk in, but there's been not enough. So Puffy went on wit her into the cold barn to get some milk from the cow. As they walk into the house, Ms. Haggs started to pour the milk out of a pail into the milk jar. Puffy was licking his mouth staring at the milk being poured. She finished the pancake mix.
Then she went on to pouring it into an empty keg and began mixing it. She began at 5:35, as she kept stirring with all her energy she finished at 6:00. Ms. Haggs looked so exhausted and her pets also looked bored. She started to do something to the mix with a weird looking tool. She walked over and put the mix on the table and went to get the maple syrup. To her observations there was no syrup left. And the dog and cat waited desperately for the batter to be done.
So there went Ms. Haggs in the cold snowy day walking to her neighbor that sells maple syrup. So she had got a jar full and went on. What Ms. Haggs didn't know is while she went out Puffy and Brownie where doing something-bad back home. But what could they do that would be so bad, maybe eating the mix that was being prepared for breakfast. As Ms. Haggs went on walking back home thinking about making the pancakes and eating, she went on to open the door. To her surprise, her pets were eating all of the batter. She had dropped the syrup and it had broke. There goes the syrup, eggs, flour, mix, and the milk. Which of course Puffy the cat was licking off of the table.
She was so depressed that she went on over and sat down on her chair. Thinking about her beautiful pancakes flying away. Brownie and Puffy were hiding behind the chair peeking on what's wrong with her. She began to smell the scent of pancakes being cooked. "Who could be cooking pancakes now" she began thinking? So she went on over to her neighbors that is on the left of her house. She began getting happier smelling the scent of the pancakes. "Hello" she said o her neighbors, "Oh, hi Ms. Haggs" said Mr. Frey. Yup there it was Mrs. Frey was done cooking pancakes and it was set on the table. Ms. Haggs went over and grabbed all of the pancakes made and ate all of them. Mr. and Mrs. Frey were looking at her with astonishment. So as she finished the pancakes Mrs. Frey asked her "would you like to eat some breakfast". "Oh no I am very much full right now".
So there she was leaving their house going to her house to rest on her rocking chair. Brownie was also sleeping to the right of her, and Puffy was laying down a couple of feet ahead of her. To the left of Ms. Haggs was a frame on the wall and it read, "IF AT FIRST YOU DON'T SUCCEED TRY, TRY, AGAIN"
Tide, Old Spice, Crest, Ivory, Swiffer. The chances are that most consumers in the United States and the rest of the Western world have heard of these brands, and associate them with specific types of products. Procter & Gamble is one of the leading conglomerations in the world. With products ranging from baby shampoo to deodorant to cough drops, the consumer goods corporation holds brands that are marketed globally. This makes the corporation an interesting case study in the discussion of cost accounting, particularly in relationship to the global business environment. Because the corporation has operations, brands, and marketing campaigns the world over, it is crucial that the company assess the most efficient means of accounting costs across all of its operations in order to remain effective in the global business environment. The approach to cost accounting for Procter & Gamble is the main focus of this research paper. More specifically, the paper examines activity based costing and standard costing in reference to Procter & Gamble’s operations and assesses how the company could (or could not) benefit from each cost model. Overall, the paper argues that Procter & Gamble would benefit from utilizing the standard cost model in manufacturing and its day-to-day operations, due to the potential for vast differences in overhead across its various holdings, and benefit from activity based costing in its human services areas of operation, such as marketing and research and development, due to the variances in cost and productivity.
Get original essayThis is a qualitative research project, that bases its discussion of the costing models on existing academic research and primary research of the data and numbers relevant to Procter & Gamble. The research presented in this paper originates from a wide range of sources, ranging from the OECD to academic journals to Procter & Gamble itself. The combination of these sources makes for a holistic discussion of both how the various cost models work and how they related to the operations of Procter & Gamble. In other words, the available data regarding Procter & Gamble will be evaluated using the two costing models identified above. The paper combines academic sources on the costing models with primary numbers and data from Procter & Gamble to inform its discussion, ultimately forming an original synthesis of information for the discussion. As mentioned above, this is a qualitative approach, but also uses quantitative numbers in regards to the past and projected performance of this international consumer goods conglomeration.
In order to se the context of this discussion, the paper first turns to an overview of the corporation, including its principle goods and services, market share, geographic locations, and major competitors. These details will be referred back to throughout the discussion. Second, the paper turns to an overview of activity based costing and how Procter & Gamble could benefit from this model, including details on how costs could be restructured within the company using activity based costing. Third, the paper discusses standard costs and how they best apply to Procter & Gamble. As with the discussion of activity based costing, this section includes both the logic for utilizing standard costing and the ramifications of utilizing this model. Finally, the paper turns to the future of Procter & Gamble; more specifically, the paper examines how the company could benefit by analyzing future projects in terms of relevant costs. Future plans in this case include expansion into other geographic regions and consolidation of the company. All three of these main topics are discussed in relationship to the international business environment, since Procter & Gamble is an international firm and is directly impacted by changes in this environment. In other words, because Procter & Gamble is dependent on its international operations, it is crucial to consider how the two costing models work toward efficiency within this specific context. This is not meant to be an exhaustive account of the benefits and drawbacks of each cost accounting model; instead, it is simply an application of these models to the operations of Procter & Gamble. Overall, the research paper shows that Procter & Gamble can benefit by increasing efficiency and decreasing overhead in the international business environment by utilizing the standard costs model, primarily due to its static nature across geographic regions.
As mentioned above, Procter & Gamble is one of the leading consumer goods conglomerates in the world. The company is nearly 180 years old as of this year. According to the President & CEO, “A company does not last for that long if its management is not willing to change anything and everything, except for its purpose and core values, to serve consumers and create value for shareowners” (P&G, 2015, 2). In other words, Procter & Gamble ostensibly finds its success and increased value in its willingness to adapt everything from research and development to pricing strategies in the face of a changing global business environment. The focus of this paper is on what these changes have looked like, and how the company can continue to change in the future. According to the company’s annual report, the upcoming years will see Procter & Gamble “putting the strategies and capabilities in place to transform Procter & Gamble into a faster-growing, more profitable and far simpler company” (P&G, 2015, 2). This is an important context to consider with a discussion of activity based costing, standard costs, and the future of Procter & Gamble in the face of the current global business environment. But what does Procter & Gamble look like now? To create context, this brief section assesses the company’s principle goods and services, market share, geographic locations of its operations, and its major competitors.
According to the Procter & Gamble website, the company manufactures and distributes consumer goods products in what it calls its “ten core categories” – these include Baby Care, Feminine Care, Family Care, Grooming, Oral Care, Personal Health Care, Hair Care, Skin and Personal Care, Fabric Care and Home Care (Procter & Gamble, 2016, n.p.). One gets the point that the main focus of the company is on care products for the consumer. As mentioned above, Procter & Gamble brands include household names like Tide, Pampers, and Gillete. Their products also include new brands based on recent research and development, such as Unstoppable collection of scent and fragrance products (Procter & Gamble, 2015, 4). All in all, Procter & Gamble has over 300 brands (Warren, 2012, n.p.). Perhaps more importantly, the company also has a global reach with operations in 180 countries (Warren, 2012, n.p.). The selling and market operations of Procter & Gamble are split into six specific regions: Asia Pacific, Europe, Greater China, India, the Midde East and Africa, Latin America, and North America. With this, it is clear that Procter & Gamble is successful all over the world, and nearly every country.
The company’s market share varies depending on which subcategory of care its products fall in. However, according to one business report, Procter & Gamble’s average market share across all of its products is 30% of the consumer goods market (Reuters, 2016, n.p.). In this way, Procter & Gamble is the second must profitable consumer goods conglomerate in the world, only trumped by Nestle (Wheelen, Hunger, Hoffman & Bamford, 2015, p. 336). However, the company does have its share of competitors – it does not, after all, control the entire consumer goods market. The competitors vary depending on in which market segment Procter & Gamble is operating. Perhaps the company’s most direct competitors include Unilever and Johnson & Johnson, both of which operate in the majority of Procter & Gamble’s consumer goods segments, including fabric, baby, feminine, family, and home care (CSI, 2016, n.p.). Secondary competitors include Avon and Colgate-Palmolive in personal care and beauty. Nestle is not a direct competitor since it focuses on other segments of the market, such as food and drink products. Now that the paper has established Procter & Gamble’s principle goods, market share, geographic locations, operations, and major competitors, it can turn to a more detailed assessment and application of activity based costing and standard costs in the context of the global business environment.
Activity based costing is an alternative strategy for accounting for costs in a company. Standard accounting, as discussed below, simply relates overhead to direct costs. In contrast, activity based costing “is a method of assigning costs to products or services based on the resources that they consume,” with the aim of changing the way in which “costs are counted” (Economist, 2009, n.p.). The result is a more complex, but ostensibly more accurate, accounting of costs. One example is a mass-produced industrial robot in contrast to a customized one. According to standard costing, the two different types have the same amount of direct costs, as it uses the same amount of materials and labor. However, a customized robot requires much more time from a company’s engineers, which is an overhead. Activity based costing accounts for this additional overhead. Activity based costing is not a new development, as it has been around for thirty years (Turney, 2015, 1). Now, activity based costing powers “performance measures for scorecards, providing rates for customer profitability analytics, helping devise human resource plans, modeling sustainability, and supporting budget development and planning” (Turney, 2015, 1). In other words, activity based costing can be very beneficial for larger companies with global operations.
While often difficult to implement, many companies did so as pilot programs during the 80s, 90s and early 2000s. Benefits include more accurate data, the inclusion of overhead costs, and relevancy to service organizations, for which traditional costing is irrelevant (Geri & Ronen, 2005, 135). Despite its benefits, some analysts have shown that activity based costing does not live up to all that it promised, stating that from a “global value creation perspective” the costing model failed since “not too many companies retain it beyond a short pilot period” (Geri & Ronen, 2005, 133). Some of the weaknesses of activity based costing include the fact that it is “based on subjective arbitrary cost allocations,” that it “ignores constraints and does not differentiate a bottleneck from resources with excess capacity,” and that it “regards the relation between activities and resource consumption as linear, absolute and certain” (Geri & Ronen, 2005, 135). In other words, while activity based costing may provide more accurate data, it is often not pragmatic to implement this new costing model. It is worthwhile to look at these problems in detail, as well as how they apply to Procter & Gamble and its global operations and accounting.
For one, it is difficult to develop uniform cost allocations across many different subdivisions and operations. Second, activity based costing does not does not account for various production constraints, nor how to deal with products with excess capacity, as noted above. Finally, it oversimplifies the relationship between activities and resources. For these reasons, this paper contends that Procter & Gamble would not benefit in the long run by using activity based costing. The use of this costing model would simultaneously oversimplify the relationship between the firm’s activities and its costs, while also complicating accounting in a company that already has many different forms of operation around the world.
More specifically, the ramifications of implementing activity based costing in the international business environment would be overcomplicated, and not necessarily worth the effort in the long run. In the 1990s, Procter & Gamble “made some significant alterations to its corporate strategy; it aimed to reduce its cost structure and develop its differentiated business-level strategy, in an attempt to increase revenues and profits” (Warren, 2012, n.p.). More specifically, the company “implemented a hybrid organizational structure that considered the geographical dispersion of multiple marketplaces, respective specialization for particular brands and specializations and economies of scale in particular value creating functions” (Warren, 2012, n.p.). In other words, Procter & Gamble adapted its operations to the global business environment without having to fundamentally change its cost accounting structure, which would be unnecessarily time consuming and costly. Procter & Gamble has been able to retain its share of nearly a third of the consumer goods market by standardizing accounting but adding flexibility to corporate structure.
In short, to implement activity based costing in the international business environment would overcomplicate Procter & Gamble’s operations, and possibly lead to inconsistencies in its reporting. As one source states, the use of activity based costing “is especially important to businesses that provide customized products or services” (Rojas, 2015, n.p.). Because Procter & Gamble does not provide such products or services, but instead has standardized manufacturing processes all over the world for its hundreds of individual products, attempting to implement activity based costing across all of its operations would essentially be a waste of time and expensive endeavor as the best case scenario. The worst-case scenario would be the misinterpretation of data and, as a result, inaccurate external reporting. Instead, Procter & Gamble should continue to focus on its efforts to create agility and profitability in its corporate structure and strategy, leaving cost accounting to the traditional methods. For instance, the Procter & Gamble 2015 Annual Report states that the company “cannot deliver consistent and reliable growth and value creation without continuous improvement in productivity,” and as a result the company is “focusing on fewer priorities and activities” which “is leading to lower costs in overhead, cost-of-goods-sold, marketing and trade spending” (P&G, 2015, 4). Therefore, the main reason that Procter & Gamble should not implement activity based costing is that it is not necessary in light of the firm’s other efforts. Instead, the alternative standard costing model is discussed below.
In contrast to activity based costing as discussed above, the standard costing model aims at identifying underlying costs for the following year’s budget. More specifically, a standard cost is the “predetermined cost of manufacturing a single unit or a number of product units during a specific period in the immediate future” (McKay, 2015, n.p.). These ostensibly provide “a good measure against which to manage the business through the following financial year” (CIMA, 2010, 1). The direct benefit of stand costing is that it both satisfies regulatory requirements for external reporting and management and performance. As one report states, companies “use standard costs and variances to value inventory for statutory purposes, for management reporting purposes and for performance measurement and management” (CIMA, 2010, 1). In other words, the standard costing model satisfies both the regulatory and strategic requirements for a company. This is particularly important in the international business environment, since regulations and requirements vary by country and region. Whereas activity-based costing is only good for an internal strategic audit, standard costs are useful for simplified accounting and relevant external reporting. In this way, this current paper contends that Procter & Gamble could benefit – and has benefited - by using standard costs. But what are the ramifications for Procter & Gamble using this model in the international business environment? This specific question is discussed below.
There are several advantages to using the standard costing model. The main advantage of the standard costing model has already been identified above – namely, that it satisfies both internal and external strategic and regulatory requirements. However, the secondary benefit to standard costing (sometimes called traditional costing) is that it more accurately reflects costs, quantity, and variances. More specifically, standard costing “divides cost into variables and fixed categories” (Rasiah, 2011, 87). In order to be useful to a firm, costing systems “require a specific type of information such as direct labor hours and units produced” (Rasiah, 2011, 83). Standard costing provides the specific accounting of factors like labor hours and units produced, while activity based costing focuses on the specific activities enacted in the operations to achieve these factors. In doing so, activity based costing does not distinguish between variable costs and fixed costs. The model only relates costs as a whole to the activity that created these costs, and assesses productivity and strategy from this point of view. In contrast, the standard costing model not only reflects actual costs, but also assesses these costs in terms of the quantity of products (i.e. which man hours or industrial robots are most productive relative to their cost), and the variances in cost. Because Procter & Gamble’s operations are primarily manufacturing and the logistics of distribution, the standard costing approach makes the most sense, as the company’s operations can be automated and standardizes around the world. Therefore, this paper recommends standard costing across most of Procter & Gamble’s operations as a primary driver for decision making, particularly in manufacturing.
More specifically, many hold that “standard costing should be used as an indicator or measure for…inventory valuation, performance management, factory efficiency, product sourcing, one off contract pricing decisions and overall pricing decisions” (CIMA, 2010, 3). However, it is important to note that while “Standard costing remains an important part of any decision making toolkit,” it should be used as the “whole answer” (CIMA, 2010, 3). Activity based costing might make sense in some aspects of Procter & Gamble’s corporate structure. In the international business environment, it may make sense to implement activity based costing for marketing and research and development in the company. This is based on two primary factors: first, activity based costing is most beneficial for service industries and companies heavy in human capital, and second because activity based costing can be expensive to both initiate and maintain. While automation and production can remain the same around the world, the the state of the international business environment means that marketing, R&D, and even management will vary by region. Because of this, Procter & Gamble can consider using activity based costing on a limited basis, in those areas where it would be most beneficial (such as marketing and research and development), but maintain standard costing model in its day-to-day operations and manufacturing.
One final point to assess in this paper is how Procter & Gamble can benefit by analyzing future projects in terms of their relevant costs and in the context of the international business environment. In the case of Procter & Gamble, these future plans include both expansion of operations and products, as well as consolidation of corporate structure. In both cases, Procter & Gamble should benefit by primarily implementing standard costing, with the exception of the cases already discussed above. This is an important topic to discuss, as companies (like Procter & Gamble) that have a global focus in performance and production can struggle organizationally in the face of a shifting global business environment. As one report from McKinsey & Co states, “high-performing global companies consistently scored lower than more locally focused ones on several dimensions of organizational health” (Dewhurst, Harris & Heywood, 2012, n.p.). This they called the “globalization penalty” (Dewhurst, Harris & Heywood, 2012, n.p.). Even the 2015 Annual Report from Procter & Gamble recognized this detrimental impact: “Fiscal 2015 was a tough year due to weakening developing market economics and the unprecedented negative impact of foreign exchange”, with organic sales growing by only 1% that year. (P&G, 2015, 1). Given the relatively detrimental impact that the shifting international business environment has had on Procter & Gamble in recent years, how can it adapt its future plans in terms of relevant costs?
First and foremost, Procter & Gamble should consider their expansion efforts in terms of the standard costs that these efforts could incur. According to the same McKinsey & Co report cited above, the growth of global companies is directly related to a rise in complexity costs (Dewhurst, Harris & Heywood, 2012, n.p.). More specifically, “Emerging markets complicate matters, as operations located there sometimes chafe at the costs they must be as part of a group centered in the developed world: their share of the expanse of distant corporate and regional centers, the cost of complying with global standards and of coordinating managers across far-flung geographies, and the loss of market agility imposed by adhering to rigid global processes” (Dewhurst, Harris & Heywood, 2012, n.p.). In other words, Procter & Gamble can most efficiently assess the profitability of future expansion by examining the standard costs associated with this expansion, particularly into emerging markets.
In contrast, Procter & Gamble can also benefit from considering the activity based costs of consolidating its corporate structure. As the company’s 2015 Annual Report states, the company is “narrowing our focus to these ten categories” (as identified above) to become “the best-performing company in the consumer products industry” (P&G, 2015, n.p.). Part of that process is a restructuring of the corporate organization. In order to assess how to best restructure, Procter & Gamble would ostensibly benefit by utilizing activity based costing in this narrow, specific context. Because the restructuring primarily has to do with the human services side of the company, the activity based costing model will allow Procter & Gamble to assess which of its human capital is most productive and effective, and which areas can be downsized to create growth elsewhere.
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Get custom essayThis discussion paper has assessed Procter & Gamble in terms of both the various costing models available to a company of its size as well as the impact of the global business environment on its operations and cost accounting. While not exhaustive, the paper has shown that Procter & Gamble is most likely to benefit by utilizing standard costs across most of its operations, with the exception of human capital based functions like marketing and research and development. More specifically, the paper has argued that Procter & Gamble would benefit from utilizing the standard cost model in manufacturing and its day-to-day operations, due to the potential for vast differences in overhead across its various holdings, and benefit from activity based costing in its human services areas of operation, such as marketing and research and development, due to the variances in cost and productivity. Combining these two costing models on a day-to-day basis may not be pragmatic, but by separating the two types of operations will position Procter & Gamble to remain productive, nimble and open to growth in the near future.
Abortion, there are two ways to look at it, for it or against it. Both ways offer different points that make people want it, but I think that pro-choice meaning you have a choice to keep an unborn child or not is the best way to go.
Get original essayFor now abortion is legal in the US at any time during the nine months of pregnancy, and there are many organizations petitioning to change or bend these guidelines. Shouldnt every child be wanted, is a slogan for the popular Planned Parenthood, but There are many views to this quote. Yes, every child should be wanted but many arent and most unwanted children are probably going to be abused when they grow up. A lot of the time parents blame their troubles on their unwanted child.
What about a rape victim that becomes pregnant and she doesnt want to carry the rapist baby what should she do, shouldnt we aloud abortion for this reason. The majority of all abortions 95% are done as a means of birth control, and only 1% because of rape, and 4% because of mother health problems. So 1.5 million babies are born each year and 4000 babies every day. That means 1 baby every 20 seconds and 40 million since 1973.Most babies are born to teenagers and their welfare costs are outrageous, 13,900 for a first birth to a teenager and 8,400 if she is over 20. Over 1 million teenagers get pregnant each year and only 280,000 are married and 100,000 get married after pregnancy, which leaves 620,000 unmarried. For the girls under fourteen 9,650 every year.
Sometimes gender is the reason abortions are wanted, in studies girls are the ones mostly being aborted. Of 100 pregnant women that knew the gender of their baby 46 had with females and 53 had males. Twenty-nine chose to abort the females and only one chose to abort the male. If abortion is performed I think that the parent should be legally notified but they arent.
What happens to a young teenager that becomes pregnant but financially cant support her baby and abortion is outlawed. She thinks about suicide, takes drugs and abuses the child and in many cases becomes homeless. There are many bad things that would happen to the world if abortion were outlawed. First there would be many more homeless people and children on the streets, taxes would go up for their welfare, the world would become overpopulated and poverty stricken. There are many things that are wrong with the world to day and we dont need any more. That is why I think Pro-choice should stay in effect.
Hurricane Katrina was one of the top five deadliest natural disasters that have occurred. There were approximately 2000 deaths; however it was not just the storm that caused all of these deaths. There were many other reasons for deaths during Katrina and one of those was police brutality. There were multiple incidents that occurred which involved police brutality. One of the most known incidents was the Danziger Bridge, then there was the Henry Glover incident, and finally the looters incident.
Get original essayIt was September 4th, 2005 just a few days after Katrina when an incident occurred on Danziger Bridge which involved New Orleans police. Police were called to the scene and stated that 4 individuals were shooting at them. Ronald has mental problems and neither of the brothers had a criminal record. The brothers were on their way to a family member’s place where they were staying due to Katrina. The police then fired back at the Ronald and Lance Madison who they say were shooting at them. The Police then shot and killed Ronald. Lance stated that he seen a couple of teenagers that were shooting at the police. The 6 Bartholomew family members were also on the bridge at the time of the shooting. 5 of the 6 members of the family had been shot by police including Susan, she was shot and her arm by police and her arm was just attached by a piece of skin. Out of the 5 members that were hit one family friend had been shot to death by police. Now 5 current and former New Orleans police officers have been found guilty for the deaths on Danziger Bridge by Federal Jury.
On September 2nd , 2005 31 year old Henry Glover was walking through an empty parking lot, when police officers spotted and without warning a police officer fired shots at him and hit him on his chest. No police officer attempted to help Glover even though he was severely injured. William Tanner was in his vehicle driving y the empty parking lot when he spotted Glover. Tanner then attempted to help him and took him to nearby police officers. When he asked police for help they simply arrested Tanner and a police officer drove away in his car while injured Henry Glover inside. Days later the car was found near a police station with Glovers body burned inside beyond recognition. Four police officer were charged for the cover up of Henry Glovers murder. David Warren, the officer who shot Glover was convicted of manslaughter in 2010 and sent to prison for 25 years.
After Katrina police stated that they received a command to shoot all looters all though some police officers refused to go through with this command. They say they used phrases like “ "shoot looters," "take back the city," or "do what you have to do" are fragmentary.” There were videotapes where police officers would shoot people because of the command that they had received. After this “command” was given 11 people had been shot.