Dayton Hudson Corporation Case Analysis :: GCSE Business Marketing Coursework

Analysis of Dayton Hudson Corporation Case In the case of Dayton Hudson Corporation, the company fell into a situation of a hostile takeover attempted by the Dart Group in 1987. At that time, Kenneth Macke was the CEO of the Dayton Hudson Corporation and sternly disagreed with letting the company fall into the hands of the Haft’s. Macke’s decision on what could be done to terminate the takeover turned the circumstances over to the hands of the state of Minnesota where Dayton Hudson’s headquarters resided. Macke requested a special session of the legislature to revisit the Minnesota corporate takeovers statute. This proved to work in Dayton Hudson’s favor and a statute was enacted that left the decision of a takeover up to the Board of Directors of the company. The actions that were taken by Kenneth Macke to assist the company with the their takeover situation were an example of how business relies on the government to be responsible for social issues. When pleading their (DHC) case to the governor, Dayton Hudson made sure to make know all of the contributions that they have made to the community and how they have provided safe and secure jobs for its residents. They claimed that if they were to be taken over, the Haft’s would probably break up the company and sell it off to pay for the expenses incurred from the takeover. Jobs would be lost and there would most likely be no social contributions made by the Hafts. Out of the thinkers that we have studied regarding business’ responsibility, I think that the two that would agree with Macke’s decision to look to the government would be both Freeman and Friedman. In the readings that we have covered, we have seen that they are believers in that the government is who should be responsible for social issues in some way or another. I think that Freeman may feel a lot more strongly about Macke’s decision than Friedman because he argues that government is the sole caretaker when it comes to taking responsibility for social issues while Freeman argues that it is mainly government’s job, but that business plays a huge role in that responsibility. Friedman’s views are that business’ main responsibility is to maximize shareholders wealth and that in doing so, they are being socially responsible. He also contends that corporations are not people and therefore they cannot be responsible for social issues.

Teaching - Every Day Brings Something New :: College Admissions Essays

Teaching - Every Day Brings Something New I started seriously thinking about what I wanted to do with my life, concerning my career, in the 11th grade. From my junior year until my first semester in college, I was certain my purpose in life was to teach. However, people I spoke with, including some family, friends, and even schoolteachers, repeatedly crushed this choice: "Why would you want to be a teacher? Don't you know how much they make? Why would you want to deal with bratty kids all day? Don't you know teaching is one of the most stressful jobs you can have?" Being the naà ¯ve, 17 year old that I was, I listened, and changed my career choice-3 times! I went through 2 years of computer classes to become an administrative assistant, 1 year studying law for paralegalism and 1  ½ years focusing on business management. Throughout those 4 years of unfulfillment, the idea of teaching still lingered in my head. I started asking myself why I decided teaching was not for me. I discovered that even though teaching did ca rry a few negative aspects, they could never come close to the positive. For the past 5 years, I have been coaching the varsity dance team at Woodhaven High School. Although there have definitely been some difficult, stressful situations, I have found the experience very rewarding. The greatest thing about coaching is the satisfaction you feel after a student succeeds in what he or she has set out to accomplish-not only physically, but also mentally. Being a coach is more than just a 9 to 5 job. It's more than staring at a computer for 8-10 hours, not caring about the people around you or your work. This is even more apparent in teaching in a classroom 5 days a week, for as much as 7-9 hours a day. Teaching is adventurous, challenging, and exciting, because every day brings something new. As a teacher, you're not only working for a living, you are acting as a role model to every child around you. A teacher has the chance to change a child's life everyday. The main element of lifelong learning is to never stop learning. One must understand that there's no such thing as a person who knows everything.

Advanced Microeconomics Essay

Question 1: Consumer Theory 1.1: In both the Marshallian and Hicksian consumer optimisation problems, it is assumed that consumers are supposed to be rational. The main focus of these problems are cost minimisation and utility maximisation, which play a huge part in consumer demand, but in real life, these are not the only problems that are considered. Also, it is assumed that every consumer’s indifference curve for two goods would be the same – they are very generalised models, and do not take into account other factors. For example, not many consumers would spend their entire budget on said goods – one thing to consider would be a consumer’s marginal propensity to consume and save. Though both of the problems provide a framework and model of consumer decisions, they are not plausible when applying them to real-life terms, because we have imperfect knowledge. 1.2: The expression given in the question, is the rearranged derivative of the Hicksian demand being equal to the Marshallian demand, when income from the budget constraint is equal to minimised expenditure, whereby m=ep, ÃŽ ¼. This is given by: dDdp= dHdp- dDdm . dedp using m = e. Shephard’s Lemma provides us an alternative way of deriving Hicksian demand functions, using e. It is given by: dedp= x* It is important to note that e is strictly increasing in p, due to Shephard’s Lemma, and x* >0,by assumption. Substituting this into the above expression gives: dDdp= dHdp- dDdm x*  This expression now represents a complete law of demand, as it has combined both Marshallian and Hicksian demand, whereby income from the budget constraint of Marshallian demand, is equal to minimised expenditure of Hicksian demand. Therefore, it has maximised utility and minimised cost simultaneously, to create an optimal quantity of demand in x*. The first term, dDdp, means that Marshallian demand (maximising utility) increases, relative to the price of the good. dHdp represents the Hicksian part of the expression, whereby expenditure is minimised, relative to the price of the good. Question 3: Adverse Selection, Moral Hazard and Insurance 3.1: Insurance markets are needed when risk is present. Risk occurs when there is uncertainty about the state of the world. For example, car drivers do not know if they will crash their car in future, and suffer a loss of wealth – so they would purchase insurance to eliminate this risk of loss, and protect them if they were to ever crash their car. Agents (buyers of insurance) will use insurance markets to transfer their income between different states of the world. This allows insurance markets to trade risk between high-risk and low-risk agents/states. These can be described as Pareto movements. A Pareto improvement is the allocation, or reallocation of resources to make one individual better off, without making another individual worse off. Another term for this is multi-criteria optimisation, where variables and parameters are manipulated to result in an optimal situation, where no further improvements can be made. When the situation occurs that no more improvements can be made , it is Pareto efficient. A condition for efficiency is the least risk-averse agent bears all the risk in an insurance market. If a risk-averse agent bears risk, they would be willing to pay to remove it. A risk-averse agent has a diminishing marginal utility of income; whereby his marginal utility is different across states, if his income is different across states. The agent would give up income in high-income states, in which his marginal utility is low, to have more income in low-income states (e.g. bad state of the world causing a loss of wealth), where his marginal utility would be high. If the insurance market is risk neutral, they will sell insurance to the customer, as long as the payment received is higher than the expected value of pay-outs that the insurer is contracted to give to the customer in different states of the world. Whenever the agent bears some risk, unexploited gains from trade exist. Absence of unexploited gains from trade is a requirement in an efficient insurance market, therefore the situation must arise, whereby the agent’s income is equalised across the states of the world. A risk neutral insurance company can charge a premium to equalise the agent’s income across states of the world, in the best interests of the risk-averse agent. Also, for an insurance market to be  efficient, a tangency condition is implied. The tangency of the indifference curves of a risk-averse agent, and a risk-neutral agent, is where efficiency occurs. At this point, one cannot be made better off, without the other being made worse off (Pareto efficiency). However, an insurance company will never be completely efficient in real life, as information asymmetry exists. The first type of information asymmetry to arise in an insurance market is moral hazard, whereby the actions that an agent may take after signing the contract cannot be observed. This gives the company a trade-off decision between giving full insurance or offering incentives for the agent. Full insurance is first-best in the absence of asymmetric information, when the insurance company is risk-neutral and the agent is risk-averse. However, if the agent is fully insured by the company, they have no reason to prevent a bad state of the world from happening. To solve this problem, the insurance company will not offer full insurance, in order to provide the agent with an incentive to avoid losses. The second type of information asymmetry to occur in an insurance market, is adverse selection. This is when the agent has private information about his risk type and characteristics, and agents in the market are heterogenous. As the insurer doesn’t know which agents are high-risk or low risk, the company will not offer different types of full insurance to match risk-types, as high-risk agents will prefer contracts that are designed for low-risk agents. To solve this, the insurer will offer low-risk agents less insurance – this ensures that high-risk types do not have the incentive to choose a contract for low-risk customers, as they will want more insurance, because they know they will need to claim more. This ensures that the insurance company maintains non-negative profit, as high-risk individuals cost more to insure. However, these solutions carry agency costs, because the result is less efficient than if symmetric information was present. I believe that risk neutrality of an insurance company is a sufficient condition for insurance to take place. Insurance companies are risk-neutral to maximise expected profits, therefore as the principal, will design contracts to achieve this, as well as making certain that the agent picks the desired effort (i.e to prevent a bad state of the world) for that contract, and to make sure that the agent even picks the  contract in the first place. Making sure incentives are compatible, and ensuring participation by the correct risk types, are constraints on maximising expected profits. If an insurance company was risk-averse, without the availability of symmetric information, they cannot differentiate between different risk-types, and therefore would not want to take on the risk of possible high-risk agents buying low-risk contracts. They would charge a higher premium to offset this, which would discourage low-risk customers to sign a contract with the company, as it would not be maximising their own utility. This would lead to a missing market, where trade would be prevented, because other risk-neutral companies would offer better contracts, and they would be able to steal all the low-risk customers. The magnitude of this would depend on the number of low- and high-risk people in the population. This leads me to believe that risk neutrality is also a necessary condition for insurance to take place. 3.2: An insurance company will sell a policy, c, r, if it makes non-negative profits, then:  Ã¢â€ â€™ r-pic ≠¥0,  where c = payout, pi = probability of the loss state, r = premium. Competition in the market drives profit down to zero, therefore r-pic = 0 in equilibrium. For the contract to be at equilibrium, it must satisfy two conditions: the break-even condition, whereby no contract makes negative profits; and absence of unexploited opportunities for profit, because if there was a contract outside of the offered set, with non-negative profit, would mean the offered set is not in equilibrium. If all agents are homogenous, if all agents face the same probability of loss, pi=p, insurance companies would know each buyer’s pi. The firm must maximise each agent’s utility subject to the firm breaking even. This would be at the point of tangency of the agent’s indifference curve and zero-profit constraint. This would be in equilibrium as another profit-making polic y could not be offered. Therefore, as they can observe agent’s risk types, they can offer different policies, to different types: ÃŽ ¸i= ri, ci. It follows that each is offered full and fair insurance. In real life, heterogeneity is usually the case. This is when pi varies with all individuals. Assuming that there are two types: high-risk types, H, and low-risk types, L, where the probability  of loss for H is higher than for L. Individuals know their own probability of loss i=H, L, but insurance companies are unable to observe this. In this case, there are two different kinds of equilibria that insurance companies could opt with: the candidate pooling equilibrium and the candidate separating equilibrium. The pooling equilibrium is where all risk types buy the same policy. In contrary, the separating equilibrium is based on each risk type buying a different policy. In the pooling equilibrium, if both H and L risk-types choose the same policy, the probability of loss is p and the probability of no l oss is 1- p. Therefore, the slope of the ‘aggregate fair-odds line is -1-pp. The pooling contract must lie on this line to be in equilibrium, to ensure the firm breaks even exactly. The contract must also ensure both types want to buy it – it must take both L and H to higher indifference curve than the indifference curve they would be on if they stayed uninsured. Agent L ends up below his fair odds line, and H above his, which means L pays more than expected costs, and H pays less – both pay the fair pooled premium, but H claims on the policy more. So if L prefers to buy the contract, so will H. This leads me to believe both L and H will be able to get full insurance, though it’s not completely fair, as the firm does not need H to choose a different policy to remain breaking even. However, this brings to mind the notion that if full insurance is offered, the agent will not have the incentive to prevent a loss state. Therefore, less insurance will probably be offered, and as both risk types are paying the same premium of the same policy, neither will receive full insurance, as it impossible to differentiate between the two – they will both choose the same policy offered. In the separating equilibrium, one contract would be offered to L, and another to H. Each risk type must prefer the contract designed for that type (i.e. the incentives must be compatible). The contracts offered should give each type the highest possible utility, subject to the firm breaking even. If full insurance contracts were offered to both L and H, where their respective indifference curves are tangent with their respective zero-profit constraints/fair-odds lines, low risk customers would prefer the policy designed for them, but high-risk customers would also prefer the same policy, not the policy designed for them. So they would not both be offered full insurance, as this gives rise to the problem of preventing H from imitating L – low-risk agents are cheaper to insure for the firm (claim less  often) so they get a better rate. Therefore, instead of offering L full insurance, they are offered C, which is still on their fair odds line, but on a lower indifference curve, still ensuring the zero-profit constraint. Now, if the high-risk agents were to choose between the policy designed for them, and C, they will choose the policy designed for them, because they prefer to have more insurance for less money. So, in conclusion, in the separating equilibrium, high-risk (H) customers receive full insurance, and low-risk (L) customers only receive partial insurance – they pay the price to prevent H from imitating them. L is worse off than if there was symmetric information in the market, but no difference to H.

Fast Food in the Cafeteria Essay

Many people think that fast food is bad for our health and that it shouldn’t be allowed in school. More healthful options should be promoted but what’s the use of healthy food in school if the kids don’t want to eat it? Nobody least of all adults LIKE eating healthy if given a choice everyone always goes for the fast food. When we eat lunch at school we get the bad end of the stick. they feed us cardboard pizza, meat that isn’t even meat and has been washed in ammonia to kill bacteria, we get fries that aren’t fries, slimy ravioli, and lunch that generally looks unappetizing and tastes little better than that. the dilemma is should schools offer fast food such as KFC, Taco Bell or McDonalds? I say yes. Based on 2009 US Industry report, there were 303,989 fast food locations in the US alone. â€Å"Fast food was the main food source for up to 38% of children† stated researcher Shanthy Bowman, PhD, with the U. S. Department of Agriculture in Beltsville, Maryland. She also demonstrated that when kids eat fast food, they eat more food all day long and over one year time period, a child can pack on 6 extra pounds because of high fast food eating. The result of overeating is a nation that is becoming obese and overweight. The result of obesity? More illness and soaring healthcare problems. When we say fast food, we are thinking ‘junk food’ yum†¦ (insert drool here). Fast food has become one and the same from hamburgers to pizzas, to French fries, hot dogs and more. Fast food has high calories, fats, saturated fats, sugar and salt content. The fats, sugar, and salt in fast food draw us kids like a magnet and because fast food doesn’t contain much fiber we don’t feel full afterward so we tend to eat more later on. Compared with kids didn’t eat fast food, fast food eaters ate an average of 187 more calories a day. At that rate, â€Å"the child would gain 6 extra pounds each year, if they didn’t get enough exercise to burn it off†, wrote PhD Bowman. At the same time, fast food causes a number of health problems in children. The excess of sugar in fast food and sodas lead to diabetes in children; their bodies failing to produce the insulin that controls the sugar levels and metabolism. Fats and saturated fats lead to high levels of cholesterol in the blood, Cholesterol leads to various heart problems, These heart problems increase the risk of major heart diseases such as Coronary Heart Disease. Also the lack of vitamins can make the children become anemic, lethargic and get tired very easily. Deficiency in calcium makes their teeth, nails and bones weak. Many times the added preservatives and coloring agents used in fast food can cause cancer in children. The most common and the core cause of all the diseases in children, is obesity due to fast food. Obese children spend little time doing physical activities or sports, and this lack of activity leads to a sedentary lifestyle, which further on leads to mental stress and other emotional disturbances. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, results from 2007-2008 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey showed that 17 percent of children and teenagers ages 2-19 years are obese. That means one in 6 children is obese. Are you tired of eating nasty, dried, greasy, overcooked, overpriced cafeteria food? I know I am. It’s time to make a change. It would be a good idea for a fast food chain to consider opening their newest location in schools because doing so would help students and increase money for the school. â€Å"As they try to keep pace with student taste, lunchrooms across the country have given up meatloaf and mashed potatoes for brand-name fast-food items. † (source B) Bringing in a fast food restaurant as a matter of fact would be good because it would help students. Students would stop skipping lunch a start eating in the cafeteria, Eating lunch is better than not eating. Studies show how test scores improve when students eat. When students like lunch, they’ll eat it! They won’t be tempted to throw it out or give it to another student. In addition to helping students, a fast food restaurant in the cafeteria would benefit the school because first of all, the restaurant would give a percentage of its profits to the school and secondly the restaurant might even participate in the Adopt-a-School program. With more students buying lunch, profits would increase, and if other students hear that that school has fast food in the cafeteria they might be attracted to the school because of the restaurant, increasing profits even more. All this extra money could be used for supplies, computers, or books, all of which would make our educational experience at school much better than it is now. Helping students and schools is something that everyone enjoys doing. Putting a fast food restaurant in place of cafeteria food would do both. Hopefully if we got this restaurant no one would ever think of the food as being nasty, greasy, overcooked or overpriced, everyone would be happy. Cafeterias are a vital part of a student’s high school career. It is a place of social interactions and various degrees of shenanigans, whether it is over breakfast, lunch, or walking to classes with friends. Cafeterias are not just for keeping society’s niches alive, however, as school cafeterias are also used to provide a form of food for the general student body. Cafeteria food has been a theme of debate for years and will remain to be so for years to come. From the bagged-lunch versus the school-prepared dilemma, to the question of what exactly is in the meat-like substances cafeteria food has an air of mystery and intrigue. While there are admittedly many reasons not to consume the cafeteria food, it has a few redeeming qualities about it. Food provided through the public education system can sometimes have a less-than-savory flavoring when first chewed over, but soon becomes edible when the taste is acquired. Cafeteria food may be tasteless and inedible at times, but remember: â€Å"what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. † After four years of consuming the bland entrees, students graduate high school with brand-new taste buds and an aversion to all things flavorful and delicious. If variety is the spice of life, cafeteria food is as spicy as a Flamenco dancer. One never knows what he or she will receive on Wednesdays- pizza, hotdogs, or a creative combination of the two. Not only is the student unsure of exactly where the â€Å"chicken† patties come from, or what they are really made of, but the school lunches provide an array of fruit and salad. Most students have no choice in what they eat for lunch they eat it because they are hungry and have no other option. fast food in the cafeteria though would change that. Students could eat what they liked and even if they paid for it the funds would go to the school and the school could use that money to buy things for the students that would enhance our learning experience. every student would go to lunch and actually eat the food even if they had to pay for it because it’s something they like to eat, not tasteless junk. So overall putting fast food in the cafeteria is a good thing but also a bad thing. It’s a debate that would probably go on forever but nobody would win. decide whether to put it in the cafeteria or not. either way it makes no difference except to our taste buds. BIBLIOGRAPHY Nicole Harms ehow contributor â€Å"obesity & coronary heart disease† Monycutza007 â€Å"Children Adn Fast Food† 11/27/10 < http://www. cyberessays. com/Term-Paper-on-Children-Adn-Fast-Food-23508/> Amy Kalafa August 22nd, 2011 â€Å"Whats in Your Childs School Lunch? † â€Å"The unsavory nutrition facts on cafeteria food† google. com fast food in the cafeteria.

Discovery Museum Gold Rush History Center

The visit I made to the Discovery Museum Gold Rush History Center in Sacramento, California, proved to be highly informative, entertaining, and a two-hour well spent. The experience afforded me a lot of learnings from the Gold Rush period that I didn't know before. Before I made the tour of the four galleries inside the building, I first went to the visitors' information center, wherein an introduction regarding the building's construction has been shown in a nine-minute film clip.Based on the clip shown, I learned that the museum is a replica of the original building that was built in 1854 that previously housed the City of Sacramento's city hall, dormitory for the fire department, jail, police station, and court. The original structure had suffered from structural problems and was declared unsafe many years later. It was finally demolished about sixty years later in 1913.The replica building has been modified on some sides in line with its being a museum showcasing history, science and technology. The Gold Rush Center's exhibits are in The Lure of Gold gallery. The museum's arrangement of events is well organized and unique. From there, I was able to see gold nuggets on display and artifacts and implements used by miners from the Gold Rush era. The Gold Rush in California was a defining moment in history that changed Sacramento forever.Sacramento became the center of that event in 1849. People from all over the world went to this city hoping to make themselves rich. Previously, this gallery has showcased a typical miner's travel and lifestyle. Aside from the exhibits, there are also hands-on activities for children and interactive programs to help the present generation get a better understanding of the past.

Japan Civilization Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Japan Civilization - Essay Example Secondly, the analysis will also discuss the way in which Confucianism was imported and ultimately adopted from the Chinese culture. The purpose of choosing to cultural/religious inclusions within Japanese history and culture is with regards to the fact that religion has a powerful means of altering the way in which a given culture approaches key concepts and topics. In short, religion in and of itself can transform a culture and differentiated in a way that other cultural inclusions may very well not. Whereas many religions spread around the world and into new areas due to the fact that a strong or resilient native religion is nonexistent, this is very much not the case with regards to how Buddhism spread within the Japanese culture. Ultimately, Japan had many forms of resilience and native religions that were extant far prior to the introduction of Buddhism from Korea. However, nonetheless, this interpretation of a new religious paradigm was not something that met with a great deal of strife or violence. Rather, Buddhism was oftentimes incorporated alongside the various native religions, such as Shintoism, that were already practiced within Japan. Moreover, Buddhism had yet another tangential effect due to the fact that the writing system of the â€Å"Kanji† was Incorporated alongside the religion within Japan. ... In such a way, these religious interpretations existed almost unquestioned up until the Meiji restoration. Regardless of their impact, the reader should come to the realization that the role that religion plays with regards to allowing a degree of transcultural development and integration in which many other forms of culture exchange could not hope to achieve in and of themselves. As a result of the widespread acceptance and integration of these religiously motivated norms and mores, Japanese society continues to indicate the influences that these religious interpretations have had upon the current times. Unlike many of the other nations or cultural patterns in history, conquest and violence did not define the means by which either of these religious interpretations spread in and around Japan; however, the cultural impact that they had upon the way in which society is currently evidenced and the means by which the religious history of these movements have developed the Japanese cultu re. Likewise, within the modern era, Japan has embraced a clear and distinct form of Western ideals, economics and culture. This can be seen since the time of the Meiji Restoration up until the current era. Although Japan is one of the most resilient and strongest embodiments of culture retention within the world, the nation has, nonetheless, been able to evolve and grow with the changing of the times and adopt and react to the prescient needs that the global influences that are acting upon them invoke. Specifically, the reader can realize that within the past several hundred years, Japan has opened itself to global commerce, shifted towards a industrialized nation, and adopted a capitalist model. None of these were normative factors of the indigenous culture of Japan;

Qualitative methods Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Qualitative methods - Essay Example 2013). In order to avoid any probable deviation this research method focuses on limited sample or delimitating the research area. In the end of qualitative research certain suggestions are also given which are optional and general. Theory is taken to explore solution of hypothesis and data is collected. Data is collected from two sources i.e. primary and secondary. The primary methods are the interview, group discussion, observation, case study, different texts, visual images etc. The secondary methods are consultation of reference material, certain pictures related to focus data and visiting different libraries. Advantages 1. The basic question of a human is† why† and it is satisfied here in this research method. 2. It is easy to conduct as it does not require too much money. 3. It’s more focused with delimitation of sample. Disadvantages 1. Its limited to just a particular chosen sample so what applies to one sample cannot be applied to other sample of same popul ation. 2. It does not give statistics of a fact. Participant observation   It is an approach to collect data in qualitative research. This technique is used for disciplines as sociology, psychology human geography etc.  Often it comes close to certain group or parties like a group of a certain occupation, culture or religion and their behavior at a given time. It is of four types. How it is Useful This method is used to observe informal behavior of participant. It gives a better understanding to the researcher when he or she himself/herself gets involve practically. Different approaches are used as Informal interviews, direct  observing the sample, group participation and discussion,  tracing the personal history, derived results from these approaches. It may take time as months till years to derive results (Profile, 2012). Advantages 1. It’s valid and accepted more because it is an observation. 2. It brings social grooming on the part of observer and he/she gets to l earn how to interact in a better way. Disadvantages 1. It’s difficult to remain objective while observation because a researcher may get biased or participant can have influence on him. 2. A participant may behave artificially so it may give fake observation. 3. It takes too much time. Interview Checklist Interview Checklist is dos and don’ts of an interview. It is a formal criteria to judge an interview if it goes successful or not. Certain factors as appearance, application, personality, attitude, response, body language impressions are counted. Two types of interview are taken normally i.e. structured and less structured. How it is Useful It is useful to conduct a good interview. It gives an understanding of whole environment of interview and the particular behavior of respondent and interviewer. It gives the key to successful interview. Advantages Depending upon the types we discuss advantages as follows Structured Interview 1. It has a vast sample, so it’s beneficial. 2. Questions are arranged in sequence to