100 Mostly Small But Expressive Interjections

100 Mostly Small But Expressive Interjections 100 Mostly Small But Expressive Interjections 100 Mostly Small But Expressive Interjections By Mark Nichol They regularly appear to be notorious, as gloomy idlers dillydallying in an open avenue, yet they really do a ton of difficult work and are normally persnickety about the undertakings to which they are put. They are interpositions one class of them, in any case: those lacking etymological inceptions yet stuffed with importance. Be that as it may, how would you realize how to recognize comparable ones or spell them, besides? Here’s a deficient stock of additions (excluding varieties of genuine words, for example, no doubt for yes or onomatopoeic echoes of remotely created seems as though blast): Ack imparts sicken or excusal. Ok can indicate positive feelings like help or joy (for the most part, articulated with a long a). Aha signals triumph or shock, or maybe mocking. Ahem is utilized to pick up consideration. Argh, frequently drawn out with extra h’s, is about disappointment. Aw can be contemptuous or characteristic of frustration, or, when drawn out, expressive of compassion or love. Affirmative means understanding. Bah is contemptuous. Blah conveys fatigue or frustration. Blech (or bleah or bleh) infers queasiness. Boo is a shout to incite trepidation. Boo-hoo is imitative of crying and is ridiculing. Boo-ya (with a few spelling variations) is a cry of triumph. Bwah-hah-hah (differently spelled, including mwah-hah-hah) playfully impersonates the cliché archvillain’s triumphant snicker. D’oh is the spelling for the mumbling going with Homer Simpson’s trademark head-slapping self-misuse. Duh scorns somebody who appears to be thick. Eek shows a terrible amazement. Eh, with a question mark, is a solicitation for redundancy or affirmation of what was simply said; without, it is pretentious. Er (once in a while erm) plays for time. Ew means nauseate, heightened by the expansion of at least one e’s or potentially w’s. Feh (and its cousin meh) means that feeling disappointed or disillusioned. Gak is a declaration of disturb or dislike. Ha communicates happiness or shock, or maybe triumph. Ha-ha (with conceivable intensifying) imparts chuckling or disparagement. Hamana-hamana, differently spelled, and copied varying, suggests confused shame. Solid har-har, or har-har rehashed varying, conveys mock delight. Hee-hee is an underhanded chuckle, while its variations heh and heh-heh, (etc) can have a progressively disparaging meaning. Hello can communicate shock or celebration, or can be utilized to demand redundancy or call for consideration. Hist flags the craving for quiet. Hm, reached out varying, recommends interest, disarray, horror, or incredulity. Hmph (likewise hrmph or humph) demonstrates disappointment or resentment. Ho-ho is expressive of merriment, or (alongside its variation gracious ho) can demonstrate triumph of revelation. Ho-murmur signals lack of concern or weariness. Hubba-hubba is what could be compared to a sneer. Huh (or hunh) is an indication of incredulity, disarray, or shock, or, with a question mark, is a solicitation for redundancy. Hup, from the sound-off a military rhythm serenade, signals starting an applying task. Hurrah (likewise hoorah, yippee, and yahoo, and even huzzah) is a shout of triumph or joy. Yuck signals sicken. Lah-de-dah means disregard or excusal, or mocking about claim. Mm-gee, differently spelled, is a confirmed or verifying reaction. Mmm, reached out varying, passes on satisfactory or discernable joy. Mwah is reminiscent of a kiss, regularly suggesting unctuous or misrepresented warmth. Neener-neener, regularly expressed in a progression of three redundancies, is an insult. Presently (regularly rehashed â€Å"Now, now†) is expressed as a caution. Goodness is among the most adaptable of additions. Use it to show perception or affirmation (or, with a question mark, a solicitation for check), to introduce direct location (â€Å"Oh, sir!†), as an indication of guess or model (â€Å"Oh, around three days†), or to communicate feeling or fills in as a reaction to an agony or joy. (Ooh is a variation helpful for the last two purposes.) Goodness gracious (or choices in which goodness is trailed by different words) is an admonition reaction to something that will have negative repercussions. Olã ©, with a highlight mark over the e, is obtained from Spanish and is a vocal prosper to praise a deft or dexterous move. Ooh, with o’s rehashed varying, passes on intrigue or esteem, or, on the other hand, scorn. Ooh-la-la is a reaction to an endeavor to intrigue or tenderly ridicules claim or luxury. Oh no (and the funny minute variety oopsie or whoops and the variation challenges) points out a mistake or flaw. Ouch (or ow, reached out varying) signals torment or is a reaction to an unforgiving word or activity. Oy, some portion of Yiddish articulations, for example, oy gevalt (comparable to â€Å"Uh-oh†), is a regret of dissatisfaction, concern, or self indulgence. Pff, stretched out varying, communicates dissatisfaction, scorn, or disturbance. Pfft, or phfft, conveys sudden closure or takeoff or is a cynical excusal similar to pff. Phew, or seat, conveys disturb, weariness, or help. (Phooey, likewise spelled pfui, is a sign for nauseate, as well, and can mean excusal too. PU and P.U. are additionally variations.) Poof is imitative of an unexpected vanishing, as though by enchantment. Pooh is a disdainful outcry. Pshaw indicates incredulity, dissatisfaction, or bothering or, then again, imparts wry hesitance. Psst calls for calm. Rah, maybe rehashed, signals triumph. Shh (stretched out as important) is a basic for quietness. Sister blast bah is an obsolete empowering cry, well on the way to be utilized jokingly now. Tchah imparts inconvenience. Oh goodness and its significantly snootier variation tut-tut are judgments or scoldings; the related sound tch is the teeth-and-tongue snap of dissatisfaction. Ugh is a shout of appall. Uh is an outflow of distrust or a deferring strategy. Uh-huh demonstrates confirmation or understanding. Oh goodness signals concern or consternation. Uh-uh is the sound of nullification or refusal. Um is a placeholder for a respite yet in addition indicates wariness. Va-boom is a good old outcry indicating adoration of physical engaging quality. Whee is a shout of fervor or pleasure. Whew is a variation of phew yet can likewise communicate astonishment. Hold up is a call to stop or an outcry of shock or help. Challenge de-doo and its numerous variations pass on deriding response to something intended to dazzle. Charm and charm hoo (and varieties like hurray, yee-haw, and yahoo) show fervor. (Woot, likewise spelled w00t among an online in-swarm, is a presumably vaporous variation.) Wow communicates shock. Yahoo is a salutary outcry. (Not to be mistaken for better believe it, a variation of yes.) Yowser is a declaration of dread or concern, frequently utilized wryly. Yo-ho-ho is the customary pirates’ hold back. Yoo-hoo stands out. Yow, or yowza, is an outcry of shock or passes on being dazzled. Yuck (likewise spelled yech or yecch) signals appall. (Not to be mistaken for yuk, a chuckle.) Yum, or yummy, is a reaction to the flavor of something delightful and, by augmentation, seeing an alluring individual. Zoinks is a declaration of shock or awe promoted by the animation character Shaggy, of Scooby Doo popularity. Zowie, regularly in blend following wowie, a variation of goodness, communicates profound respect or amazement. Need to improve your English quickly a day? Get a membership and begin getting our composing tips and activities day by day! Continue learning! Peruse the Vocabulary class, check our famous posts, or pick a related post below:Definitely use the or a15 Great Word GamesWhat the hell are learnings?

Motivations and Benefits in the Workplace

Question: Talk about the inspirations and advantages in the work environment. Answer: The goal of this article is to examine the drivers of inspiration at work environment and the advantages of inspiration for association. In this period of globalization, associations have extended in various pieces of the world. Today, associations have understood that representatives are their greatest resources. Today, associations have understood that inspiration level of workers is straightforwardly connected to efficiency of representatives. Along these lines, focal point of HR Managers and associations is to concentrate on worker inspiration. The primary four thoughts for this exposition can be examined as: Inspiration is an inborn and inside thing for representatives. In an authoritative setting, various representatives can have diverse persuasive level. It is significant for associations to comprehend the inspiration trigger for its representatives. The inspiration would assist representatives with working hard and it would assist association with reaching its objectives and destinations. Along these lines inspiration can straightforwardly profit associations and work environment. Workers can likewise self rouse them. The representatives would need to self rouse them when they can see the prizes related with their presentation. It is significant that associations should center to overcome any barrier between workers desires and the executives view of representatives desires. It would likewise assist with expanding the inspiration level of workers. Theory Statement: To talk about the drivers of inspiration at working environment and the advantages of inspiration for association. Misinterpretation of Opposition Point: Many individuals would have misguided judgment that associations or administrators can't control the inspiration level of workers, as inspiration is absolutely inward and individual thing for representatives. In any case, it has been demonstrated that associations can make the way of life and set up the stage that can build the inspiration level of representatives.

Managing organizations and people Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Overseeing associations and individuals - Essay Example The outer condition is antagonistic and it involves endurance from the very first moment. Powers closest to an organization, which influence its capacity of serving its clients are miniaturized scale ecological elements. For instance, clients, contenders, providers, advertising groups are whatever factors (Kotler, et al, 2004, p.164). In flawless rivalry, there is no restriction to the quantity of these various players and balance is kept up as sensible benefits and piece of the pie for every provider. In this serious condition, â€Å"Price changes go about as the system whereby request and gracefully are adjusted (Sloman et al., 2006, Ch.4)†, and a success win circumstance is made for the merchant and the purchaser. In any case, such a harmony can be upset by any number of components, At the point when he began his vocation, Mr. Will Chase, the advertiser of Tyrrells Crisps was delivering potatoes which, as a product with no additional worth and no separation from different providers, was giving him skinny edges. Terms could be directed by the purchasers, who play one provider against the other to thump the costs or set unjustified conditions. Pursue chose to counter this circumstance by expanding his business, changing over the potatoes into a marked item in particular Tyrrells Crisps and in this manner enhancing his produce. It was a correct advance, with the edges on chips being better than those on potatoes since he was delivering the crude materials himself. His creative adjustments of the hand-fryer brought about a drastically fruitful item †hand singed crisps, produced using potatoes from own homesteads. He proceeded with his inventive endeavors including new flavors and more up to date vegetables to his line of items. Spreading out from nearby homestead shops and shops, he tapped the large stores like Harrods, Selfridges and Villandry (Hirchkorn, Telegraph, 2004) with their promoting quality and

Ideological Understandings of Social Relations - 1375 Words

Ideological Understandings of Social Relations (Research Paper Sample) Content: CRITIQUE-BASED ANALYSIS OF IDEOLOGICAL UNDERSTANDINGS OF SOCIAL RELATIONS BASED ON PROVIDED TEXT EXAMPLEName:Course name/number:Date of submissionIntroductionSocial interactions are the processes through which relationships are formed between two or more people. The objectives of these relationships vary based on the collective or individual intentions of the people interacting. However, the most common reasons that also form the basis for categorizing social interactions are competitive, accommodative, conflict-bases, reward-based, and cooperation. Therefore, all forms of human social interaction fall under these five distinct categories. A better understanding of the dynamics of social interactions comes from, among other things, criticizing the common-sense understanding of the issue by the society. Therefore, as part of that endeavor, this paper seeks to provide a critique of common sense considerations on social interactions among the society based on rape.Rape is non-consensual sex between two or more individuals usually perpetrated by a rapist on their victim(s).Based the fundamentals of social interaction introduced earlier, the rapists objective behind his choosing to interact with the victim in such a violent manner could be conflict-based, or reward based. The efforts of all stakeholders on the rape issue continue to advocate for measures aimed at reducing the occurrence among the vulnerable members of society. Through both conventional and non-conventional methods, the issue continues to take the center stage in many parts of the world, especially in urban parts where social interaction pits people of different origin and mindset together. However, the government and other stakeholders have resulted in using some avenues in the fight against this form of assault. One standard method that these people continue to use is posters and banners, such as the one provided.Critique analysis based on the text providedOn seeing the text on the poster, my first reaction was developing feelings of empathy for the millions of people who suffer rape each year. The texts color and format is arranged in such a way that the message comes across in a bold manner. Perhaps the boldness is meant to communicate the urgency with which the reader is supposed to treat the matter being communicated. However, the text also instigated criticism within my conscience based on the reality that not only the female gender suffers the unfortunate incidents of rape. Current statistics shows that even the male members of society face the same sad vice making the text and message communicated by the banner slightly but distinctly biased. Therefore, the text demonstrates a valid point on the frequent occurrence of rape and the need to curb it. Unfortunately, the perspective that the text argues, alongside many others, continues to assume a biased standpoint. There is no contesting the fact that most victims of rape are women and children. Incidenta lly, men too are falling victim to the vice, in as much as the poster fails to account for the same.The critique appears to assume a more playful style in putting across its message as depicted by the bluntness in its message. It implies a parody-like critique since the messages do not assume the readers ignorance of the issue at hand and proceed straight to the message by stating that ladies should not be raped-whatever the circumstances. Interestingly, some of the scenarios used in the message where rape might occur do not seem like the most conventional scenes of the crime. However, rape happens even in the most unlikely places. In addition, the critique also exhibits some aspects of conceptual art. The woman depicted on the poster shouting the words stop rape expands the scope of the posters textual message using art that supports the concept. Therefore, the critique appears to assume not only the playful style but also a strategic form of conceptual art that complements the tex tual aspects of the poster. The critique challenges the stereotypical assumption that rape occurs only in premeditated, planned scenes. Research and actual observations from reported cases show that rape assumes many non-conventional forms ranging from spiked drinks in social gatherings to lifts in office and residential blocks. Therefore, the critique challenges the rigidity with which most people approach the rape issue, which appears to happen usually in the dark alleys at the hands of serial rapists and murderers. However, the poster challenges that mindset and demonstrates the occurrence of the vice in less dark and less criminal circumstances using a parody-like presentation. The critique offers an example of the woman whose car is broken down as a rape scenario. The fact that the message portrays such an unconventional scenario shows that many people take for granted the numerous rape cases that occur in scenes that depict women in distress.In addition, the text also challeng es the notion that rapists or would-be rapists are dishonest people who rely on their victims vulnerability or ignorance to assault them. By providing advice based on honesty in the last bit about communicating one's intention early on during social and romantic scenarios, the critique challenges the perception regarding rapists. It challenges the notion that rapists depend on upon dishonesty to acquire and attack their victims. The impact of such messages would instill new knowledge on the circumstances that rapists could exploit thus empowering potential victims against their would-be attackers. Therefore, by so stating, the text provides the second challenge to widely acknowledged perceptions once more proving itself as an excellent critique.The evaluation presents examples of less-likely, but real-life scenarios where rape has occurred to try to loosen the publics perception of the circumstances surrounding rape. By exemplifying rape using examples such as lifts, and roadside s cenarios depicting women in distressing situations, the poster frees the typical persons ideologies relating to rape. In addition, the critique complements various processes aimed at ending the vice thus creating an increased awareness of the need to embrace measures to curb rape. Using strict command-like statements, the poster instills an appreciation with the reader of the need to accommodate more scenarios that might lead to rape. By so doing, the text embraces less conventional methods of communicating this sensitive issue that are more likely to be read as opposed to the mainstream traditional forms of messages that people are used to. Research shows that using less-common methods of communication in a social setting is more likely to get the message across since the method relies on first capturing the readers attention before communicating the intended message. One alternative viewpoint that the poster&...

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., A Political Icon Essay

There are a select few individuals who have come variously to be called great or brilliant because they and their accomplishments have forever changed society and the world. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of those individuals. Martin Luther Kings contributions to history place him in this inimitable position. One of the great figures in the march of human history, Martin Luther King Jr., like Gandhi before him, lived by a heroic credo of non-violence. More than two decades since his death, Martin Luther King ideas; his call for racial equality, his faith in the ultimate triumph of justice, and his insistence on the power of nonviolent struggle to bring about a major transformation of American society- are as vital and timely as†¦show more content†¦King, quickly realized that the best strategy to liberate African-Americans and gain them rights was to use nonviolent forms of protest. He recognized that nonviolence was strategically the only realistic option for oppressed African-Americans to achieve justice as well as the fact that violence would simply polarize the races and make true justice and reconciliation impossible (King, 1983). This gave King, like Mohandas Gandhi, the stature of being both a great moral leader and a brilliant political strategist (Cone, 1969). King organized marches, speeches, and much more to motivate the Africans of America to fight for their rights. His political philosophy and strong beliefs helped lead a nation to the racial justice it has today. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a great speaker, a role-model, and a man who wasnt afraid to dream. Black Americans needed a Martin Luther King, but above all the world needed him. The significant qualities of this special man cannot be underestimated nor taken for granted. Within a span of thirteen years from 1955 to his death in 1968 he was able to expound, expose, and extricate America from many wrongs (Cone, 1969). Martin Luther King was such an inspirational leader because he appealed to not only the black population, but he appealed to all people who believed in equality and freedom. King, not only spoke withShow MoreRelatedThe Idea of the Secular Saint in Ambrosios Work1738 Words   |  7 PagesSecular Saint Question 1: What elements in the life and work of Simone Weil, Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa, and some of the characters portrayed in the movies Dr. Ambrosio mentions speak to you most effectively about the qualities of the secular saint? There are many types of people in the world. Specifically, there are those who live to make their own existences happier and then there are those who work to preserve and protect the rights and needs of their fellow human beings. 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Quaker Meeting free essay sample

My earliest encounter with religion came in a noisy preschool in Texas. There was a picture book with vivid images of Jesus Christ helping poor children, guiding a sick old woman, leading a flock of lambs. Later I associated this gentle bearded man with the Nativity scenes that decorated our neighbors yards at Christmas. I did not understand the significance of this figure, but admired the soft, benign look on his face while also pitying him for his scraggly robes and emaciated frame. I remember believing that Santa Claus was in fact Jesus, just plumper and jollier in old age, spreading his cheer through presents and hearty ho-ho-hos. Never attending church in my early childhood, I thought Christianity was some sort of glamorous club Santa Claus A-List that met weekly in secretive conventions. I was not exposed to Christian doctrine or ritual, but saw only big shiny crosses, exotic Christmas ornaments and white-robed men. I desperately wanted to be part of it all. When my family moved to New Jersey around my fifth birthday, my mother decided to attend a Quaker church. From the beginning, I dreaded Sunday mornings and the long drive to the small, modest meeting house when I would have to sit on hard wood benches surrounded by strange people in awkward silence. I would grow painfully bored, stifled by the thick quiet that permeated the stale room and pass the time counting ceiling tiles or observing these strange people. There were old men and women, eyes closed, wearing dull cardigans; a little boy with long hair; a petite woman with eyes that darted around the room like insects; couples holding hands without speaking. Here was a collection of some of the most liberal, open-minded and accepting individuals, but to me they were strange, odd, different. There was no priest handing out cookies and grape juice, no flamboyant hats and bright sequined dresses on fashionable women, there was not the slightest lingering scent of pricey cologne, or the doleful sound of organ music. There was only stillness broken by the occasional rustle of clothing, a muffled cough, a baby crying. After 20 minutes, the children would be dismissed to another room. Sometimes we would discuss our morals or our understanding of God; sometimes we would take nature walks and collect objects of significance to us; sometimes we would meditate and speak to that elusive voice within. I would participate, but always as an outsider watching the bizarre rituals of a primitive culture. As I reached adolescence, this detachment at Meeting hardened into angry bitterness: the kids were typical middle-school rejects who didnt dress right or act cool, and the adults seemed to be encouraging these crippled nonconformists. I, already struggling with my own insecurities, did not want to be associated with such an eccentric group. When the topic of religion would come up at school, I would cringe, waiting for the inevitable Youre Quaker? Whats that? My teacher, jumping at the chance to exploit diversity, would inevitably ask me to explain Quakers beliefs. I, face growing red and hands clammy, would reply with my re-hearsed, monotone response: Quakers believe in peace. Peace. At the time the word evoked little more than images of white doves in flight, hippies in flowing peasant tops or the two-fingered symbol that the kids would make in group photos. Peace is good; make peace, not war; let the world unite in peace I had been bombarded with cliches, but the actual concept of peace, like the institution of Quakerism, was foreign to me. Not to mention that it was never a satisfactory answer for my class: But do Quakers believe in Jesus? they would ask. Do you churn your own butter? Are you allowed to use electricity? Why arent you wearing a bonnet? And always the smart-aleck from the back of the room, arms crossed, smirking, Dont you worship the Quaker Oats guy? In a small, upper-crust suburb, a hotbed for conventionality and conservatism, I knew that I had been raised in an unorthodox manner and instilled with values that contrasted starkly with my peers. Thus, my religion became increasingly difficult as I found myself isolated because of my singularity of mind, principles and conduct. Frustrated by my differences, I began to believe that somehow associating with the Quaker folk had caused me to contract a horribly contagious disease that frightened others away. Every Sunday though, despite my violent tantrums, I always ended up in the backseat, having been given an ultimatum. Yet curiously, once I was at the Meeting House sitting among these strange people, I was instantly accepted. Even though I was a defiant, rebellious adolescent, here the adults would not tsk-tsk at my low-cut jeans or shake their heads at my attitude. As much as I hated to admit it, this was a safe haven, free from the judgmental and critical mindsets I encountered a t school. Although a difficult, turbulent time in my life, I grew stronger and more confident as a result of the adversity I encountered in school. As I entered high school, I made friends, branched out, widened my social circle. I discovered interests and passions, and began that pivotal journey of self-discovery. Who was I? I found more and more that as I attempted to answer that question the response included Quakerism. I was a Quaker. I began to explore my religious roots, discovering how the Quaker community had encountered persecution for their beliefs, had been mocked for their conscientious objection to war, and had faced oppression throughout their existence. Yet despite immense hardship, Quakers had never attempted to fight fire with fire, instead conquering hate through their persistent love, caring and compassion. These were tenets that I held dear, especially since they were so applicable to my life. I could not attempt to avenge the taunters during middle school with a retaliation of name-calling and dirty looks, but instead I passively resisted, and looked inside for strength. I had finally accepted Quakerism. I believed in peace, the power of forgiveness and the importance of kindness. I became active in peace marches as the war in Iraq wrought bloodshed, and arranged candlelight vigils for the many sacrificed lives. I discovered my empowering ability to make a difference in the world, and for this I am immensely proud of my Quakerism, my avowed pacifism. Quakerism has taught me the value of love, the power of inner strength, but most importantly, it has taught me that sometimes it isnt the fist or the noisy protests that can really effect change; sometimes just being silent is enough.

The Greek Financial Crisis free essay sample

Ever since the end of 2009, Greece has been involved in a financial and economic crisis that has been record breaking and shattered world records in terms of its severity and worldwide effects. The Greek government, since the beginning of the crisis, has attempted to take several governmental measures to try and â€Å"stop the bleeding,† including economy policy changes, dramatic government spending and budget cuts and the implementation of new taxes for citizens. In addition to this, the government has tried to alter the perceptions of Greek government and economy by the rest of the world in an effort to appear both more liberal and more democratic. Greece has also been working to privatize many previous state-owned corporations in a desperate effort to stabilize the currency and the economy. This paper will address the various actions taken to date by the Greek government to pull the country out of this terrible crisis, and will explore the specific factors that were causation for this horrible financial crisis. We will write a custom essay sample on The Greek Financial Crisis or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page It is important to note that certain policies and government actions and their success is merely subject to personal opinion, but financial data and statistics is absolute and cannot be disputed regardless of personal or political beliefs. In May of 2010, Greece was awarded a 110 billion euro bailout from both the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. This bailout was effective only in the sense that it prevented Greece from defaulting on country debts and loans, which would have had catastrophic ripple effects on not only the Greek and European markets, but on the global markets including the United States and Asian economies. Soon after this bailout was executed, it became evidently clear to both the EU and the IMF that more money would be needed in order for Greece’s survival and for their long road to economic recovery. With that being said, a second bailout worth 109 billion Euro was given to Greece again by the EU and the IMF in late July of 2011. Of course, these bailouts have been the subject of a tremendous volume of worldwide media attention. These bailouts, along with the privatization of corporations, policy changes, capital injections and governmental changes have been implemented in hope that positive progress will be achieved. The media has successfully painted these reforms as containment methods for this huge mess, and as means of ensuring that this infected economy does as little damage as possible to other economies in the world. Some country-specific economies that are particularly unstable and thus at risk of damage from the Greek crisis are Italy, Ireland, Portugal and Spain. Although the Greek economy has received, by far, the most media attention for economic difficulties, these other four nations are experiencing serious economic problems of their own. It appears that this was a major motivating factor behind the two bailouts, that it is vitally important to contain the damage before it spreads to these other vulnerable nations, something that the European Union simply cannot afford to have happen. In the words of economic experts, â€Å"Greece is just the tip of the iceberg,† and that the economies of EU nations are more intertwined and interdependent than we would have hoped. Given that EU countries share the same currency, the Euro, continuously trade with one another, and hold massive debts for one another, this opens the EU as a whole up to tremendous vulnerability. Essentially, if Greece or any other EU nation defaults on debts, this could send the entire EU into a recession and put the banking system as a whole at risk, much like what happened in the United States in 2008. The goal of these capital injections and bailouts is for Greece to remain financially liquid for enough time to pay their outstanding debts as much has possible to neighbor countries, thus reducing the amount of government debts owed and the interconnected pressure on the entire EU to continue to bail out Greece. If Greece is able to pay back a significant enough portion of their debts, in the event that they do default on some of them, it may still be able to be contained and not infect the rest of Europe with a recession. As far as Greece’s role in creating this crisis in the first place, it can be said that Greece is at fault for a variety of reasons. The media has been focusing on the corrupt political system and infrastructure, the lack of competition in the private sector, the wastefulness and inefficiency of the public sector and a flawed tax system as causation for this mess. When the public sector was expanded in the 1980’s, Andreas Papandreou was given various agricultural subsidies and grants to do with what he pleased. This enabled the funding of certain post-World War II groups to heal political wounds and fund unions and other special interest groups to aid his political capital and strength. The policies enacted in this decade allowed for the increase in power and funding of the middle class by creating a vast amount of inefficient public sector government jobs for citizens. This resulted in an increase in the levels of inefficiency, bureaucracy, corruption and wasteful spending coupled with the increase in wages, pensions and benefits. This proceeded to drain through government money and resources, and did not breed a culture of highly motivated, efficient and effective government employees. A high amount of debts accumulated as the nation continued to proceed in this way, using state money to subsidize failing businesses and to finance the continued expansion of the public sector. Papandreou is continuously criticized for the creation of such a wasteful and inefficient public sector, and this is a primary reason for the economic struggles that Greece is facing today. Debt continued to build, and inefficiency continued to increase rapidly. Another important factor to discuss is the massive amounts of de-industrialization that occurred in Greece during the 1980s. This means that labor was outsourced to different countries outside of the European Union where labor costs were significant cheaper, in an attempt to reduce expense margins. Instead of investing in a strong public sector, Papandreou poured money into the private sector that was clearly diminishing in relation to other countries. As a result of this, the public sector continued to expand as a compensation method for the failing private sector. This resulted in the creation of a socialist culture in Greece, causing more and more debt to buildup to an alarming level. This wastefulness and inefficiency in the extremely large public was simply adding fuel to the fire that would come back to hurt the nation several years later, as we can see. As the level of national debt and borrowing was increasing, it can be said that the bubble began to burst in the early 2000s when the Euro was adopted in Greece. This provided Greece with an opportunity to capitalize on very low interest rates, declining from roughly 20% in the early 1990s to roughly 3. 2% in 2005. This fueled the fire in the sense of the borrowing culture that had already been in place in the Greek government for decades, as they continued to accrue an alarming amount of national debt, a terrible liability for any nation to carry. These billions of euros of debt continued to rise, and can be considered a very important factor in the current economic crisis that is occurring as a result of decades of wasteful spending and ineffective currency control by the government. Another important factor to consider when analyzing the specific reasons for Greek’s current financial crisis is the highly corrupt political system that exists in the country. Corruption and bribery play a role in Greece’s outstanding level of national debt. According to statistics, the Greek government has lost roughly 8% of GDP each year as a direct result to these unethical practices. According to the Brookings Institute, â€Å"if Greece had better control of their government corruption, it would have had a smaller budget deficit by 4% of GDP. † This fascinating data shows that the practices of this corrupt government actually contributed to Greek’s staggering amount of debt coupled with their incremental declines in GDP levels. On the topic of governmental corruption, there are two key scandals worthy of mention that clearly have contributed to the current economic turmoil Greece is currently facing. The first scandal is the Koskotas Affair, and occurred during the Papandreou administration. Mr. Koskotas was the owner of the Bank of Crete. In this scandal, he was convicted and charged with the embezzlement of $200 million dollars. In the following coverage of the scandal, it was revealed that Papandreou’s’ administration had asked for large deposits to be transferred from other banks into the Bank of Crete at a lower-than-legal interest rate. The profits from these transfers were given to the government and political parties. Although Papandreou was indicted for involvement, he was acquitted and justice was never served. This hurt both the economy and the morale of Greek citizens. The second scandal worthy of mention is the Siemens case. The executive team of Siemens paid out several million Euros in the form of bribes to several Greek politicians from the late 1990s to the early 2000s. These bribes were paid in return for the securing of government contracts in wide variety industries. The politicians involved into offshore accounts laundered the money. The two major political parties in Greece were both involved, and Siemens was fined over $1 billion dollars by the US government for its involvement in these crimes. These two massive scandals successfully illustrate the level of corruption in the Greek government, and the unethical practices that were adopted by both parties in order to remain in power. Unfortunately, in Greece it is very difficult to prosecute and charge corrupt political figures. Many politicians simply get away with the crimes they commit because their peers are not interested in prosecuting them given the immunity they are given as per the Greek Constitution. According to statistical data, no Greek minister has gone to jail since the 1970s showing Greece’s unwillingness to sentence and prosecute corrupt politicians. Obviously, this poses problems related to national accountability and furthers the distrust of the Greek government by both the citizens of Greece and by other nations in the EU and worldwide. The culture and nature of the Greek government seems to be very conducive to the acceptance of bribes, and the funding of certain special interest groups that are likely to benefit the government in some questionable way. It has been said that Andreas Papandreou created certain government jobs for the sole purpose of his own personal gains. Politicians who are running for office make all sorts of outlandish promises to different groups in order to receive support, with no intentions of actually carrying out the promises. Also, the immunity from prosecution clauses in Greek law has increased politician’s levels of recklessness. This immunity prevents politicians and executive-level government officials from prosecution for any crimes committed. This is an extremely dangerous provision in the law, because there are virtually no accountability standards and has shown to lead to aggressive and self-serving policy decisions that have had drastically negative impacts on the country and the economy. To reflect on the government style and roots of Greece, the country has been described as having â€Å"one foot in the West, and another in the East. † The country has been a synthesizing point for democracy, but ironically does not seem to display the necessary integrity and self-correction methods that are essential for the functionality of a democracy. In the words of Manolopoulous, the country â€Å"has never had a Western-style reformation, nor the development of a large middle class, nor the emergence of conservative and liberal philanthropy that developed in Western and Northern Europe and also North America. † This goes to show that while Greece has been perceived and thought of by others as a Westernized nation, it is not that simple. The inefficiency of the public sector is a recurring problem in this discussion because of its severity and enormous impact on the financial crisis that Greece is currently facing. The public sector has been characterized and defined as being â€Å"statist. † This essentially describes an environment in the country where public sector jobs are preferred as opposed to private or other types of jobs. This belief that is held by a majority of Greek citizens has been a key contributor to the inefficient and unproductive bureaucracy of government jobs and positions. This mindset also prevents Greece’s private sector from reaching its potential, and does nothing to reduce unemployment. This mindset is held partly because public sector jobs offer the things that private sector jobs cannot, including a generous pension, a pre-determined retirement age and incremental pay increases as time goes by. This creates a sense of job security, which is desired by all as part of human nature. Job security is not a bad thing, but problems clearly arise when an entire country has become dependent on the continued influx of meaningless government jobs. Individuals who work in the public sector statistically make more, on average, than those who work in the private sector. There is currently no statistical data that supports a link between worker productivity, job satisfaction and overall motivation to pay grade. This lack of an incentivized program that encourages employees to work hard is perhaps one of the biggest roots of the problem. The increases in public sector wages and pensions reached almost 9% in 2008. Even as the country’s economy continues to sink farther and farther into historic territory, jobs are not being cut and employees are continuing to receive excellent pay and benefits for their relatively meaningless low-end government positions. Another problem with Greek’s public sector is the early retirement age of 58. When an employee retires at this age, they are given a full pension and in most cases, continuing benefits for a generous period of time. To put this in perspective, the average retirement rate in the rest of the European Union is 63. This over-generous system is a major drainer of government funds. According to statistics, the pensions given to an average public-sector employee can reach up to 98% of their original salary right before retirement. The final point presented is the nearly complete level of job security within the public sector. Due to a high amount of policies and regulations about termination, it is extremely difficult for one to lose their job unless a major mistake has been made. That being said, it seems as if an overly comfortable work force has been created. There must be some degree of threat of job loss in order to motivate employees to put forth their best effort each and every day. According to Manolopoulos, there are numerous sources that display the extremely low competitiveness of the Greek economy. This is the next factor that can be discussed to illustrate the problems responsible for the current economic meltdown. According to this data, â€Å"the burden of administration in Greece is abnormally high, the degree of regulation is excessive, and the amount of competition is severely limited due to tremendous government intervention. † Also, it is shown that Greece rarely is a center of foreign investment, in relation to other nations in the European Union. It does not take an expert to determine that the Greek government and economic environment is not desirable enough for foreign nations to engage with. Since 2009, there have been more than 1,400 companies formerly with headquarters in Greece who have relocated to other nations. Currently, 20% of Greece businesses are failing or will fail at some point in the coming months. These staggering statistics go to show that these philosophies are more than conceptual, and there are actual statistics to illustrate the severity of the problems. With regard to taxation, the Greek tax system is highly progressive. A progressive tax system is a system where the smallest proportion of the population, the wealthiest individuals, pays the highest taxes. In Greece, this is the case, and in fact the average and below-average households pay virtually no taxes at all. Although this progressive system can be effective, as seen in other countries, the problem is that there are so few high earners that very little tax revenue is actually being raised. The line for which a household can declare themselves exempt is higher than most families earn, leaving very few candidates who are qualified to pay these high amounts of taxes. This threshold is 12,000 Euro per year, and has created a culture where many Greeks are understating their income in order to remain under this threshold and avoid paying taxes. The disinterest in paying taxes is inevitable in all countries, but in this situation, citizens are actually able to get away with tax evasion, adding to the problem. This goes back to the corruption of Greek politicians, and the culture deeply rooted in cheating and dishonest practices. Politicians are wise enough to know that if they crack down on tax evasions among Greek citizens, they will not be re-elected and will lose their political power, influence and immunity. For this reason, most politicians look the other way on massive amounts of tax evasions, and citizens are not forced to pay their taxes, adding to the already discussed lack of accountability. This is why the threshold for tax-exempt families is currently at such an alarming level. In the words of Manolopoulos, â€Å"the authorities proceed to hound the honest few, and let the thousands of dishonest high income individuals escape with impunity. Tax avoidance is a national pastime in Greece. It has become a cultural trait. The Greek people never learned to pay their taxes, because no one is punished. † This mindset described by Manolopoulos is at the heart of the problem, and clearly shows the unwillingness of typical Greek citizens to do their part and contribute to the overall welfare of the country. As far as reforms to try and aid the recovery of this failing economy, little has been done. The Economic Adjustment Program is essentially a program that has planned out 5-year economy strategy for the country, called the Medium-Term Fiscal Strategy. This was created in 2011 and sought to increase the efficiency of public spending, eliminate wasteful spending that drains government resources, reduce the size of the public sector, broaden the base of tax payers, and eliminate the amount of individuals who are evading taxes by imposing meaningful penalties and consequences. The plan for this strategy is to increase efficiency, and further incentivize the labor force to increase how hard people work and their inclinations to give back for the greater good. This seeks to decrease the tax-free threshold from 12,000 to 8,000 euro per year. A luxury tax will be imposed on very wealthy individuals to bring in further revenue. 200 new companies have been created to bring business back to Greece. There will be an increase in the amount of audits and increased sentences for tax evaders. Although this does not fully address the power imbalance issues that are a central issue in the crisis, many are hopeful that this plan, over time will increase the output of the economy and reduce the massive deficit the country currently faces. In conclusion, these structural measures being taken have not been overly successful, but the country will benefit in the long run from them. The only reason this failing countries economy is still relatively in tact is because of the continuous capital injections from the EU and the IMF. In an effort to keep the economy relatively liquid, Greece has remained above water. It seems that the true problem at the root of this crisis is the imbalance of power, which must be addressed if full recovery is ever to be achieved. In other words, there is a long way to go for this former superpower.

Sim Venture Business Planning and Developement Essay Example

Sim Venture Business Planning and Developement Essay Example Sim Venture Business Planning and Developement Essay Sim Venture Business Planning and Developement Essay In hypothetical terms, the firm was bound to go into losses in the first few months of establishment. The objective we had prioritised was to establish the company quickly with minimal losses, which then could be easily recovered over a short time period. We firstly did the essential market research. This would give us a market audit, allowing us to precisely plan both short-term and long-term strategies, ensuring that we don’t have any confusion and see exactly what our goal is. Along with the research, we decided to build a premium website. This was our first step into advertising, organising and brought up a channel of communication between stakeholders and us. Our next step was competition research. This should us what we were up against and how to establish our own USP, accordingly, we set our product specifications and price as well as an introductory promotional discount to attract customers if they enquired. We then did negotiations with distributors to establish channels of distribution. The reason for this is that a company needs revenue, but more importantly, profit to survive, which can only be established with sales. By the third month, we had successfully established a channel of distribution, which was in our budget and produced good profits. We mistakenly forgot about the 30-day credit. We had consumed a majority of our capital, leaving us in money being owed to the bank. We therefore decided to apply for an overdraft to allow us a margin for error. Also as a reassurance as well as necessity, we needed to raise capital, so we borrowed surplus from friends and family. Customers continued not to pay money owed to us, leading in Microvault going in to debts of thousands of pounds. This was not acceptable so we set up credit control to regain money owed to us. We had to take drastic measures to ensure the company’s survival. We were left with no choice but to take out a ? 10,000 loan from the bank to sustain our losses and maintain a working capital for production as we had contracted new distributors as well. This meant production line quantity increased as well as surplus to maintain production and overheads. Eventually, the debtors paid up and business was stable. Enquires were slowly increasing as well as individual orders. We then decided to hold expansion for a while and focus on saving profits. This was to ensure that once research had been done and we did decide to expand, we would have the capital to sustain it. Meanwhile, we published a trade magazine advert. This was the first real promotion we had done. It helped the company’s reputation and status quite a bit. Enquires increased and sales were at an all time high. Eventually, we completed the formal setup of MicroVault Ltd. This reduced the risk of liquidisation and redundancy as well as improved the company status and reputation. We then created an employment contract and made the individual full-time. Lastly, we relocated to a business park, as the demand was higher than the storage capacity. This saved us hours of labour put in, resulting in more time to focus on other things such as recruitment. Activity 2 MICROVAULT LTD COMPANY. Report to: Bank Manager Date: 4th February 2009-03-04 Report for: Bank Loan Title: Obtaining a loan for MICROVAUL LTD COMPANY to help finance expansion. Executive Summary This is an end-of-year trading report of MICROVAULT LTD COMPANY. I am writing this report to show the success of the company so far, and explain its performance. The main point of this report is to obtain a loan from the bank to help finance expansion. Introduction We are a small limited company called MICROVAULT. MICROVAULT was established in 2009. We specialise in producing Computers. Our company is in a market for 14 months and we are looking forward to make it much more successful with some financial support form the bank. So far our company have a high reputation with its stakeholders and local community, we are looking forward to be better and stronger against our competitors. By looking at our report you will see that MICROVAULT is extremely credit-worthy and have low debts. Main body In a past year our business came thru very hard time. At the beginning our company was reaching some losses in the first few months of establishment. By that time we knew that if we don’t come up with some good ideas our business will go bankrupt. In March 2009 our profit and loss account achieved minus 445 pounds. Our goal was to establish MICROVAULT as quickly as possible with minimal losses. We did a lot of market research, we build a premium website to communicate with stakeholders and other companies. We also came up with some discount for a short period. Step by step our company profit was going up and as we sign contract with distributors, we got orders for reasonable price. When the company was in a good ‘shape’ we forgot about 30-day credit. We have spent most of our capital therefore we owned bank quite a lot of money. Leaving us no choice we decide to apply for an overdraft, and also borrow money from friends and family. After a month our company came back on race and starts to make very big profit. Our Enquires increased and sales were at all time high. At the end of a year our profit and loss account look very promising as it reached 10615 pounds, and sales turnover reached 35404 pounds. At the end of the year where our company made some profits we did our very first promotion by publishing a trade magazine advert. It helped MICROVAULT reputation. One of the most important things we have done is we created an employment contact, and improves the company rank and reputation. By making it happened we signed more contracts with large distributors and orders from customers has gone up. MICROVAULT is only a half way to be a successful limited company. We already make profits and grow our reputation. Our current profit margin is 33% and we will try to increase it by 10-15%, which make it go up to about 40-45%. Every month we are getting new orders and enquire therefore we need to focus on recruiting new employees. Our company will buy products in large quantities, which will gave us a bulk discount, and we will be able to save money. Recruiting new workers might be a quite expensive investment as it takes time, and money to recruit and train new workers. We will need a bookkeeper to keep us up to date with our losses and profits and also if we owe someone money. Our company will put more effort on competition research, product specifications and price. In the future we will try to offer more discounts, and reasonable prices. We might think of better advertisement such as calling customers or by mailing them. Conclusion In conclusion, I believe MICOVAULT is at the right position to become a successful business. Our Company need more time and money to research and recruit new workers, which leads to extra costs. We already completed the ormal set up for MICROVAULT and we are ready for new opportunities. The company has many prospects for the future such as expansion of the business in many areas. Recommendations The reason why I am asking for a loan is that MICROVALT Company might not be able to afford recruitment process which is expensive and time consuming. As I mentioned above we need new workers in order to success. Without recrui ting new employees MICROVAULT wont be able to meet customers demand, orders wont be on time therefore people will stop using our services which might leads to closing down the Company. We will allocated loan money in advertising such as magazines, websites, news papers, weekly mails in order to increase the customer information about our company. We hope this report will provide you with a clearer view of MICROVAUL. Activity 3 In this report I am going to discuss the trade-offs my team come across in developing our small business called MICROVAULT. A trade- off is when we loose one quality or feature of something in return for gaining another quality or aspect. The SimVenture task took my team a little bit of time as we re-run the business few times. It was three of us me (Ngan Nguyen), Raxit and Nitesh. All three of us had some good, and bad ideas, which not always make our Company making profits, and orders from customers. At a very beginning when we start our business we ware making losses, and we decide to recover them over a short-term period. We had to do a market research, which gave us clear market review. By doing that we had time to plan short-term and long-term strategies and prepare our goals. As a group we decide to put more efforts on profit rather than growth. Our goal was to make as much profit as possible within 12 moths. We had successfully established a channel of distribution, this gave us a good profit. Our company income starts to go up after May 2009 we had gone up to 3160 pounds. Our business paid private consultant to find information’s about our competitors in the market in order to produce better products. In my opinion in order to succeed in a real small business you have to dedicate you time, your money, and yourself. You need set up a goals of the company, what you want to achieve, and be committed to the business, know how to recruit workers for right jobs and positions. Pay attention to every progress your business is making from finance, orders, advertising to researches, complaints, and enquires. To run the business successfully you should know how to purchase the products and services, and also how to negotiate with your suppliers. You should be able to manage your finances. In other words experience is the key to success, we need to learn how to run the business and where to start it. In the SimVenture you can try at start all over again until you get some profits but in real life when you start you company, there is no coming back. Ether you will succeed or you will go bankrupt. Another key to success is to have a fresh idea for a product and determination, the willingness and energy to make it succeed

Report Summary Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Report Summary - Essay Example There are so many things at stake with regards to the effect of the internet on people. Among others, a person’s social, psychological and intellectual behavior may be affected by the use of the internet. One of the questions asked by intellectuals and social critic is whether the internet makes people smarter (Greenblatt 777). Thompson agrees that the internet makes information accessible but is concerned about how this information is being filtered by Google (Greenblatt 777). On the other hand, Levy is worried that the information overload of the internet no longer gives people time to think and process the data that they learn (Greenblatt 778). The second question raised by the critics regarding the internet is whether it shortens the attention span. Some people have observed that they cannot read long documents anymore because they are distracted by different graphics, hyperlinks, email alerts and audios or videos that pop out while reading documents (Greenblatt 778). Lehrer meanwhile states that the internet helps develop the skill of paying attention to different things at the same time (Greenblatt 780). He goes on further to say that the internet â€Å"allows all sorts of new connections† (Greenblatt 780). For Thompson, it is not an addiction to the internet; rather, it is more of a need to communicate any time (Greenblatt 781). Staudenmaier states that excessive use of the internet cannot be considered an addiction because it does not involve drugs and alcohol use (Greenblatt 781). On the other Cash argues that internet use can be an addiction which can result in health, relationships and work problems. (Greenblatt 780). She goes on further to say that in China and Korea internet addiction is already a primary health concern. When logging off becomes an extreme difficulty with individuals, it can be considered an addiction already. A significant statistic that strikes one is that which showed that

Laurell K. Hamilton Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Laurell K. Hamilton - Essay Example In all of Hamilton’s novels one can come across a number of contemporary themes that goes well in tune with the contemporary American socio-cultural milieu. For instance, her works deal with such contemporary themes in American literature such as gender, sex, identity, oppression, and morality. The paper seeks to explore what makes Hamilton a contemporary writer who deals with contemporary themes in literature and in doing so the paper focuses on the dominant themes in her writings. The themes of gender and sex are dominant in Hamilton’s writings and it is these themes that attribute her works a contemporary nature even though her plot and characters stem out of mere fantasy. One can clearly see that her women protagonists challenge the very notion of the stereotyped gender and sex roles played by women in a male dominated society. Nick Mamatas is right when the author remarks that Hamilton accomplished something quite impossible by creating â€Å"a new subgenre, urban fantasy-adventure with a female lead, and build a new audience for it† (Hamilton & Wilson, 2009, p. 5). In fact, Hamilton created her female protagonists in such a way that the female readers could easily identify with the central characters and her female protagonists undertake such actions which females thought to be impossible in the real life. In all her novels and short stories, one can find that the male characters are forced to follow the female lead. For instance, in the Anita Blake series, Anita Blake assumes a tough personality who always triumphs over men. Thus, one can see that Hamilton challenged the conventions of a standard fantasy novel where the heroine always played a submissive role to the heroes. Her heroines do not end up their lives in the hero’s bed for domestic-sexual bliss. Usually, in popular fiction, â€Å"even if a woman triumphed over a man intellectually, economically, or rhetorically in a scene or two, by the end of the book the female l ead would be humbled and ready to submit to the male lead† and â€Å"Hamilton changed that† (Hamilton & Wilson, 2009, p. 9). Thus, it can be concluded that Hamilton’s writings depict the changing gender roles played by women and such a theme is very much contemporary in literature. No doubt, the themes related to literature derive the real or imaginary life of man and a theme in literature is said to be contemporary when it represents the existing socio-cultural milieu. The readers feel that the writer is giving vent to their own emotions, feelings, grievances, frustrations and experiences. A close reading of Hamilton convinces one that her treatment of sex and female sexuality was very much bold and unconventional. When one finds Anita Blake at the beginning of Hamilton’s series, she is a 27 year old celibate Christian who keeps strict moral codes in her life. However, one finds her supporting premarital sex and engaging in extra marital relations as the story progresses. However, Hamilton gives Anita a reason to go hog wild with sex, and in doing so she unbridged the gap between humans and monsters. In Cerulean Sin, Anita herself states, â€Å"one of my favourite things about hanging out with the monsters is the healing. Straight humans seemed to get killed on me a lot. Monsters survived. Let’s hear it for the monsters.† It is thus evident that Hamilton’s treatment of the theme of sex and sexuality assumes contemporary relevance. Nathan Brazil, reviewing Laurel K. Hamiilton’

A Streetcar Named Desire Film Analysis Essay Example for Free

A Streetcar Named Desire Film Analysis Essay These actors take on the difficult task of bringing two complex, emotional characters onto the silver screen. With spot-on reactions to each others theatrical advances, the pair create an experience that is both enjoyable and expressively coherant. Vivian Leigh was cast for the role of Blanch DuBois for various reasons. She was white, slender, beautiful and had already acted in several other films. Tennessee Williams, the author of the original play, saw Leighs performances in plays such as â€Å"The School for Scandal† and â€Å"Antigone†, and decided that she was perfect for the role. All that Leigh needed to change was the color of her hair, which was originally black. Leigh does a splendid job of portraying Blanches ascending insanity by seamlessly transitioning from melodramatic anguish into her signature faux semblants, or pretense. An example of this is the scene where Blanche sits alone in Stellas apartment crying until a delivery man comes to the door. Blanche is then quickly transformed into a mysterious temptress who seduces the young man into kissing her. Leighs uncommon ability to switch from such extreme emotions brings a refreshing distinction to the film. Blanches eccentric and offbeat personality requires a talented actress to be be fully realized. Leighs acting style works well with the other actors, and expresses a coherence so profound that one might often forget that she is acting. The role of Harold Mitchell was one that needed to be fulfilled in order for the script to make sense. Mitch is described as being two hundred and seven pounds, six foot one and having â€Å"a massive bone structure†. His physique is an important aspect of his character, thus making it imperative for the actor to meet these conditions to be casted for the role. Karl Malden is tall and bulky, with a large nose and a receding hairline. These traits accenuate Mitchs awkward demeanor and informs the audience of how lonely he is without him having to say it. Malden also shares Leighs ability to transition between emotional extremes. For instance, in the beginning of the scene where Mitch confronts Blanche about her lies, he is silent. Though after hearing more of her absurd grip on reality, he snaps into an aggressive brute who pins Blanche to the wall. Maldens on-screen chemistry with Leigh is apparent throughout the film, and is believable the entire time. Vivian Leigh and Karl Maldens performances perfectly depicted the tragic twosome that is Blanche and Mitch. With Leighs seamless transitions of polar-opposite emotions and Maldens angry yet passsionate fits of rage, the two give what are easily the best performances of the film. From their intriguing introductionto their dreadful departure, no purer chemistry has been captured so passionately.

art upsets science reassures :: essays papers

art upsets science reassures ‘Art upsets, science reassures’ (Braque) Analyse and evaluate this claim. The difference between; reality and fantasy, an accurate representation of what is, and a brilliant orchestration of the mind, can often become blurred with the paintbrush of an artist. Yet, as Braque would surely agree, there are certain areas knowledge that only serve to reify our reality, saving us from delving into the fantastic chasm of questions arising from art. This specific area is of course science. One can often become lost in art, in a never ending series of inquiries as to how such a sculpture or painting could be physically possible. Although, science will reassure us as to what is possible and what will remain limited to a picture, or expression of thought or questioning. To evaluate Braque’s claim one must look to art, and the aspects thereof, that defy and upset nature and natural science. Next, the process by which science can reassure ‘what is’, as opposed to a representation of the artistic. And last, what the reassurance of science, as w ell as, the nature of art entail in their representational and informative nature. Art itself has proven throughout time to confuse many, all of the thoughts by the creators seem to be in the slightest way manipulative of that which every person would think scientifically so. Dance and the Theater, a place where art has flourished, is an example of how deceit and manipulation have manifested themselves in an art form that is revered, and held to be a distinguishing skill; acting. Seeing the ghost of Oedipus come back to haunt his children, is something that is far beyond what anyone has experienced in reality, and instills in individuals a mystical image of what could be. Or, the people indigenous to North America performing dances in attempt to cause rain, and perhaps an occasional rainfall to follow, only serves to upset the theories of natural science. These are both examples of what art has done to upset the view that one has on the way things work. Not everyone sees their dead father return in a pale, luminescent mist to speak to them, yet, Shakespearean a ctors would make us think otherwise. It may be thought that this form of art would only serve as a method of human expression, and would actually be pure and true in revealing something about human nature, but this is not necessarily the case.

A Case Study on Cost Estimation and Profitability Analysis

ISSUES IN ACCOUNTING EDUCATION Vol. 26, No. 1 2011 pp. 181–200 American Accounting Association DOI: 10. 2308/iace. 2011. 26. 1. 181 A Case Study on Cost Estimation and Pro? tability Analysis at Continental Airlines Francisco J. Roman ABSTRACT: This case exposes students to the application of regression analyses to be used as a tool pursuant to understanding cost behavior and forecasting future costs using publicly available data from Continental Airlines. Speci? cally, the case focuses on the harsh ? nancial situation faced by Continental as a result of the recent ? ancial crisis and the challenges it faces to remain pro? table. It then highlights the importance of reducing and controlling costs as a viable strategy to restore pro? tability and how regression analysis can assist in this pursuit. Students are next presented with quarterly data for various categories of costs and several potential cost drivers, which they must use to perform regressions on operating costs using a variety of cost drivers. They must then use their regression results to forecast operating costs and conduct a pro? tability analysis to project quarterly pro? ts for the upcoming ? scal year.Finally, students must summarize the main results of their analysis in a memorandum addressed to Continental’s management, providing recommendations to restore pro? ts. In particular, the concept of mixed cost functions is reinforced, as is the understanding of the steps required to perform regression analysis in Excel, interpreting the regression output, and the underlying standard assumptions in regression analysis. The case has been tested and well received in an intermediate cost accounting course and it is suitable for both undergraduate and graduate students. Keywords: cost estimation; pro? ability analysis; cost behavior; regression analyses; cost functions. Data Availability: All data are from public sources and are available in hard copy inside the case. Data are also availabl e in electronic form by the author upon request. INTRODUCTION n 2008, the senior management team at Continental Airlines, commanded by Lawrence Kellner, the Chairman and Chief Executive Of? cer, convened a special meeting to discuss the ? rm’s latest quarterly ? nancial results. A bleak situation lay before them. Continental had incurred an operating loss of $71 million dollars—its second consecutive quarterly earnings de-I Francisco J. Roman is an Assistant Professor at Texas Tech University. I thank Kent St. Pierre editor , Michael Costa, and two anonymous referees for their suggestions on previous versions of the case. Editor’s note: Accepted by Kent St. Pierre Published Online: February 2011 181 182 Roman cline that year. Likewise, passenger volume was signi? cantly down, dropping by nearly 5 percent from the prior year’s quarter. Continental’s senior management needed to act swiftly to reverse this trend and return to pro? tability. Being the fourth largest airline in the U.S. and eighth largest in the world, Continental was perceived as one of the most ef? ciently run companies in the airline industry. Nonetheless, 2008 brought unprecedented challenges for Continental and the entire industry as the United States and much of the world was heading into a severe economic recession. Companies cutting deeply into their budgets for business travel, the highest yielding component of Continental’s total revenue, together with a similar downward trend from the leisure and casual sector, combined to sharply reduce total revenue.Concurrent with this revenue decline, the price of jet fuel soared to record levels during 2008. 1 Thus, while revenue was decreasing, Continental was paying almost twice as much in fuel costs. Interestingly, fuel costs surpassed the ? rm’s salaries and wages as the highest cost in Continental’s cost structure. This obviously had a negative impact on the bottom line, squeezing even fur ther the already strained pro? t margins. The outlook for a quick recovery in the U. S. economy and, consequently, an upturn in the demand for air travel in the short term did not seem likely.Continental’s internal forecasts indicated that a further decline in passenger volume should be anticipated throughout 2009, with a recovery in travel possibly occurring by the middle of 2010. To summarize, adverse economic conditions in the U. S. , coupled with the rise in fuel costs, were dragging down Continental’s pro? ts and relief was unlikely through the foreseeable future. THE DECISION TO REDUCE FLYING CAPACITY AND THE IMPACT ON OPERATING COSTS Given the situation described above, management needed to act swiftly to restore pro? tability. Several strategic options were evaluated.Since the U. S. and much of the world was facing a severe recession, the prospect for growing revenues by either raising airfares or passenger volume seemed futile. Contrary to raising revenue, Con tinental’s managers believed that raising fares could potentially erode future revenues beyond the present level. Discounting fares did not seem a plausible solution either, because given the severity of the economic situation a fare cut could fall short in stimulating additional passenger demand and lead to lowering revenues. Thus, because management anticipated that revenues would remain ? t for most of the year, the only viable short-term solution to restoring pro? ts was a substantial and swift reduction in operating costs. This could most effectively be accomplished in two ways. First, through a reduction in ? ying capacity adjusted to match projected passenger demand. With this in mind, Continental’s management agreed to reduce ? ying capacity by 11 percent on domestic and international routes. 2 As a result of this action, Continental would eliminate the least pro? table or unpro? table ? ights and, accordingly, would ground several planes in the ? eet.Managemen t anticipated that this decision would reduce several of the ? rm’s operating costs. Apart from this, Continental could achieve further reductions in costs by implementing several cost-cutting initiatives and through operational ef? ciencies. For example, management pro- 1 2 To illustrate, jet fuel is tied to the price of oil and, over the past year, oil prices surged from about $70 to $135 per barrel. Consequently, the price of jet fuel increased markedly, from an average of $1. 77 per gallon to $4. 20 by the mid-summer of 2008. Speci? cally, on June 13, 2008, Continental Airlines announced that it planned to reduce its ? ght capacity by 11 percent. By shrinking capacity, Continental expected to reduce the number of domestic and international ? ights from its three major hubs in Houston, Cleveland, and Newark Maynard 2008 . Issues in Accounting Education American Accounting Association Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 A Case Study on Cost Estimation and Pro? tability Analysis at Conti nental Airlines 183 jected that it could achieve reductions in Passenger Services expenses by consolidating several tasks during passenger check-in and by reducing food and beverage waste served during ? ights. Additionally, the ? m could reduce various miscellaneous expenses through targeted cuts in discretionary spending. In sum, to close the gap in pro? tability, Continental’s strategy was geared toward slashing operating costs by cutting capacity and through aggressive identi? cation and implementation of cost-cutting initiatives. The next step would be for management to know precisely how their decision to downsize capacity would impact the ? rm’s future operating costs, and also identify speci? c areas in which the ? rm could achieve additional cost reductions. Additionally, the cost analysis would help forecast the ? m’s operating costs and projected pro? ts or losses for the upcoming ? scal year. However, before we can proceed with such analysis, an exam ination of how the various categories of Continental’s costs behave is in order. Before we begin, let us prepare with an overview of the airline industry and its competitive landscape, and an understanding of why cost behavior bears particular relevance in this case. Relative to other industries, airlines are a very dif? cult business to manage. In particular, they are exposed to tremendous risks brought by volatility inherent in their business model, as they deal with high ? ed costs, labor unions, instability in fuel prices, weather and natural disasters, passenger safety, and security regulations. These aspects bring a large burden to airlines’ cost structures. Moreover, competition within the industry is ? erce; the proliferation of discount carriers, such as Southwest Airlines and, most recently, Jet Blue, and the end of fare regulation in 1978, has hindered airlines’ pricing power and their ability to spur revenues. For these reasons, cost containment is a critically important aspect of pro? tability in this industry.In order for Continental to restore pro? tability in this harsh environment of weak demand for air travel, it must be able to contain its operating costs, especially its massive ? xed costs, which are visible in several ways. For example, salaries for pilots, ? ight attendants, and mechanics, as well as aircraft leasing costs, are typically ? xed, varying little with shifts in passenger volume. Because ? xed costs typically embody the amount of operating capacity of a ? rm, they are commonly referred as â€Å"capacity† costs. Since ? xed costs do not self-adjust to ? ctuations in passenger volume, the only way in which they can be decreased or increased is if management adjusts them in accordance to the level of operating capacity. In contrast, other costs, such as passenger services and reservation and distribution costs, behave as variable and would self-adjust with variations in volume or operating activity. He nce, to assess the impact of this strategic decision to alter Continental’s cost structure, and identify the areas that could achieve the greatest reduction in costs, we must resolve how Continental’s operating costs behave and what drives them.In what follows, we learn how to apply regression analyses to examine cost behavior and forecast future costs, and then use that knowledge to assess how the reduction in ? ying capacity would affect Continental’s operating costs and pro? tability in the near term. ESTIMATING COSTS USING REGRESSION ANALYSES The previous discussion highlighted the importance of examining the behavior of Continental’s operating costs to pave the way for a cost and pro? tability analysis using regression analysis. Regression analysis is a powerful statistical tool that is frequently used by ? ms to examine cost behavior and predict future costs. The idea behind regression analysis is straightforward: historical data for costs, and the various activities that could potentially drive operating costs, are inserted into a mathematical calculation which yields the average amount of change in that particular cost that has occurred over time. Average values provided by regression calculations may then be applied to estimate future change that will occur in that cost given a one-unit change in one or Issues in Accounting Education Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 American Accounting Association 184 Roman ore of the business activities which drive that cost. 3 More precisely, in a regression model, cost is a function of one or more business activities or factors underlying a business operation. Simply put, the business activities are the drivers of operating costs. Therefore, since activities drive costs, our ? rst step in the estimation of a cost function is to identify the underlying activities or other potential factors that drive the cost in question—the cost drivers. This requires extensive knowledge of the business ope ration. In the case of Continental Airlines, the potential drivers of operating costs vary greatly.For instance, as previously noted, the number of passengers that Continental ? ies may drive the costs related to Passenger Services. Likewise, Aircraft Maintenance and Repairs costs could be driven by the number of aircraft in the ? eet and by the level of ? ying capacity set by Continental i. e. , available seat miles . In synthesis, to predict how Continental’s operating costs would be affected by the decision to reduce capacity, and to identify those areas in which additional room is available for cost cutting, we need to identify which costs in this ? rm’s cost structure behave as variable, ? ed, or mixed in which elements of both variable and ? xed are observable . Equally important, we should also identify the speci? c drivers if any of each cost. Your job is to assist management in their quest to restore pro? tability at Continental Airlines. Speci? cally, you mus t conduct regression analyses to examine cost behavior and then use this information to forecast operating costs and pro? tability for the upcoming year. As part of your cost analysis, you should investigate how the decision to cut ? ying capacity would impact the ? rm’s future operating costs and, equally important, identify those speci? expense categories or operating areas in which this ? rm could attain additional costs saving by implementing cost-cutting initiatives. Your conclusions should be outlined in a memorandum directed to Continental’s Executive management team. You are provided next with a description of Continental’s operating costs and the potential drivers of costs so you can conduct regression analysis to estimate the corresponding cost functions. To help you in estimating the regressions, a comprehensive set of instructions for performing regression analysis using Microsoft Excel is provided in the Appendix.Immediately following the descriptio n of costs, a series of questions is provided that should help guide your analysis. Additionally, to help you estimate your regressions, Exhibit 1 presents past quarterly data for all of the above expenditures for the period of January 2000 through December 2008, while Exhibit 2 provides quarterly operations data for the same period of time. CONTINENTAL’S OPERATING COSTS AND POTENTIAL COST DRIVERS As shown in Exhibit 1, there are ten categories of operating costs.These include salaries and wages, aircraft fuel and related taxes, aircraft rentals, airport fees, aircraft maintenance and repairs, depreciation and amortization, distribution costs, passenger services, regional capacity purchases, and other expenses. Of these, some represent a single expense item. For example, the cost of aircraft rentals and airport fees together comprise a single cost item. Other costs represent cost pools comprising several cost items. Such is the case of passenger services and other expenses. T he following provides a detailed description of each cost, along with the potential cost drivers. 3 4 For ease in exposition, cost functions and regression analyses are discussed brie? y here. For further insight on cost functions and on the mechanics of regression analyses, I refer the reader to the Appendix. A cost driver represents a particular business activity, which usually tends to have a cause-and-effect relationship with a given cost. For example, for airlines, a typical cost driver for landing fees is the number of daily ? ights carried by the airline, as well as the number of passengers ? own. An increase decrease in the number of ? ights or passengers ? own would increase decrease landing fees.Issues in Accounting Education American Accounting Association Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 A Case Study on Cost Estimation and Pro? tability Analysis at Continental Airlines 185 EXHIBIT 1 REVENUES AND OPERATING COSTS DATA Obs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 Obs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Period 1Q-2000 2Q-2000 3Q-2000 4Q-2000 1Q-2001 2Q-2001 3Q-2001 4Q-2001 1Q-2002 2Q-2002 3Q-2002 4Q-2002 1Q-2003 2Q-2003 3Q-2003 4Q-2003 1Q-2004 2Q-2004 3Q-2004 4Q-2004 1Q-2005 2Q-2005 3Q-2005 4Q-2005 1Q-2006 2Q-2006 3Q-2006 4Q-2006 1Q-2007 2Q-2007 3Q-2007 4Q-2007 1Q-2008 2Q-2008 3Q-2008 Q-2008 Revenues Fuel Salaries and Wages Capacity Purchases Aircraft Rentals Landing Fees 2,277,000,000 334,000,000 672,000,000 — 206,000,000 2,571,000,000 313,000,000 719,000,000 — 210,000,000 2,622,000,000 354,000,000 748,000,000 — 215,000,000 2,429,000,000 392,000,000 736,000,000 — 213,000,000 2,451,000,000 345,000,000 758,000,000 — 214,000,000 2,556,000,000 349,000,000 800,000,000 — 223,000,000 2,223,000,000 322,000,000 779,000,000 — 230,000,000 1,739,000,000 213,000,000 684,000,000 — 236,000,000 1,993,000,000 208,000,000 732,000,000 — 228,000,000 2,192,000,000 254,000,000 746,000, 000 — 231,000,000 2,178,000,000 76,000,000 743,000,000 — 227,000,000 2,039,000,000 285,000,000 738,000,000 — 216,000,000 2,042,000,000 347,000,000 778,000,000 — 223,000,000 2,216,000,000 302,000,000 762,000,000 — 224,000,000 2,365,000,000 316,000,000 778,000,000 — 225,000,000 2,247,000,000 290,000,000 738,000,000 158,000,000 224,000,000 2,307,000,000 333,000,000 688,000,000 317,000,000 220,000,000 2,553,000,000 387,000,000 711,000,000 328,000,000 222,000,000 2,602,000,000 414,000,000 703,000,000 347,000,000 224,000,000 2,437,000,000 453,000,000 717,000,000 359,000,000 225,000,000 2,505,000,000 470,000,000 715,000,000 353,000,000 227,000,000 2,857,000,000 75,000,000 649,000,000 382,000,000 229,000,000 3,001,000,000 684,000,000 646,000,000 406,000,000 234,000,000 2,845,000,000 714,000,000 639,000,000 431,000,000 238,000,000 2,947,000,000 672,000,000 661,000,000 415,000,000 245,000,000 3,507,000,000 744,000,000 791,000,000 454,000,000 248,000,0 00 3,518,000,000 858,000,000 743,000,000 475,000,000 249,000,000 3,156,000,000 760,000,000 680,000,000 447,000,000 248,000,000 3,179,000,000 684,000,000 726,000,000 430,000,000 248,000,000 3,710,000,000 842,000,000 821,000,000 444,000,000 248,000,000 3,820,000,000 895,000,000 836,000,000 446,000,000 249,000,000 3,523,000,000 33,000,000 744,000,000 473,000,000 249,000,000 3,570,000,000 1,048,000,000 729,000,000 506,000,000 247,000,000 4,044,000,000 1,363,000,000 704,000,000 589,000,000 246,000,000 4,072,000,000 1,501,000,000 765,000,000 553,000,000 244,000,000 3,471,000,000 993,000,000 760,000,000 425,000,000 240,000,000 129,000,000 138,000,000 133,000,000 132,000,000 141,000,000 153,000,000 139,000,000 148,000,000 161,000,000 160,000,000 163,000,000 149,000,000 152,000,000 152,000,000 165,000,000 151,000,000 160,000,000 163,000,000 171,000,000 160,000,000 171,000,000 181,000,000 182,000,000 174,000,000 185,000,000 198,000,000 195,000,000 86,000,000 193,000,000 190,000,000 209,000,00 0 198,000,000 207,000,000 210,000,000 225,000,000 210,000,000 Period Distribution Costs Aircraft Maintenance Depreciation Passenger Services Other Expenses 1Q-2000 2Q-2000 3Q-2000 4Q-2000 1Q-2001 2Q-2001 248,000,000 261,000,000 255,000,000 217,000,000 243,000,000 230,000,000 159,000,000 171,000,000 167,000,000 149,000,000 160,000,000 162,000,000 95,000,000 98,000,000 102,000,000 107,000,000 105,000,000 111,000,000 85,000,000 91,000,000 97,000,000 89,000,000 91,000,000 96,000,000 286,000,000 284,000,000 288,000,000 277,000,000 318,000,000 295,000,000 (continued on next page)Issues in Accounting Education Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 American Accounting Association 186 Obs. 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 Obs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Roman Period Distribution Costs Aircraft Maintenance Depreciation Passenger Services Other Expenses 3Q-2001 4Q-2001 1Q-2002 2Q-2002 3Q-2002 4Q-2002 1Q-2003 2Q-2003 3Q-2003 4Q-2003 1Q-2004 2Q-2004 3 Q-2004 4Q-2004 1Q-2005 2Q-2005 3Q-2005 4Q-2005 1Q-2006 2Q-2006 3Q-2006 4Q-2006 1Q-2007 2Q-2007 3Q-2007 4Q-2007 1Q-2008 2Q-2008 3Q-2008 4Q-2008 194,000,000 142,000,000 172,000,000 158,000,000 138,000,000 124,000,000 27,000,000 138,000,000 131,000,000 135,000,000 137,000,000 140,000,000 139,000,000 136,000,000 138,000,000 154,000,000 154,000,000 142,000,000 160,000,000 178,000,000 157,000,000 155,000,000 161,000,000 176,000,000 171,000,000 174,000,000 182,000,000 194,000,000 182,000,000 159,000,000 142,000,000 104,000,000 114,000,000 119,000,000 119,000,000 124,000,000 133,000,000 126,000,000 135,000,000 115,000,000 112,000,000 102,000,000 107,000,000 93,000,000 112,000,000 106,000,000 116,000,000 121,000,000 127,000,000 140,000,000 140,000,000 140,000,000 144,000,000 169,000,000 166,000,000 142,000,000 159,000,000 167,000,000 52,000,000 135,000,000 120,000,000 131,000,000 106,000,000 112,000,000 112,000,000 114,000,000 116,000,000 110,000,000 110,000,000 108,000,000 104,000,000 105,0 00,000 104,000,000 102,000,000 99,000,000 98,000,000 97,000,000 95,000,000 96,000,000 97,000,000 99,000,000 99,000,000 99,000,000 101,000,000 106,000,000 107,000,000 106,000,000 108,000,000 112,000,000 111,000,000 89,000,000 71,000,000 77,000,000 73,000,000 78,000,000 68,000,000 70,000,000 73,000,000 81,000,000 73,000,000 69,000,000 76,000,000 84,000,000 77,000,000 77,000,000 84,000,000 91,000,000 80,000,000 82,000,000 90,000,000 97,000,000 87,000,000 90,000,000 9,000,000 105,000,000 95,000,000 96,000,000 107,000,000 113,000,000 91,000,000 121,000,000 166,000,000 382,000,000 454,000,000 276,000,000 277,000,000 320,000,000 91,000,000 250,000,000 455,000,000 304,000,000 279,000,000 287,000,000 278,000,000 316,000,000 280,000,000 282,000,000 305,000,000 293,000,000 323,000,000 313,000,000 333,000,000 340,000,000 357,000,000 357,000,000 328,000,000 356,000,000 427,000,000 461,000,000 372,000,000 Period Total Aircraft 1Q-2000 2Q-2000 3Q-2000 4Q-2000 1Q-2001 2Q-2001 3Q-2001 4Q-2001 1Q-200 2 2Q-2002 3Q-2002 4Q-2002 1Q-2003 2Q-2003 514 522 535 522 548 557 501 522 538 570 570 554 562 70 OPERATIONS AND COST DRIVER DATA Leased Aircraft Flights Passengers Available Seat Miles 403 410 414 398 406 416 377 393 400 404 401 410 419 428 98,820 97,871 97,967 98,378 98,590 99,018 98,564 81,109 81,883 82,815 81,737 78,809 75,178 75,617 11,201,000 12,084,000 12,155,000 11,456,000 11,220,000 12,256,000 11,254,000 9,508,000 12,062,000 13,099,000 13,006,000 12,874,000 11,518,000 13,044,000 20,951,000,000 21,384,000,000 22,356,000,000 21,409,000,000 21,459,000,000 22,813,000,000 21,994,000,000 18,219,000,000 20,375,000,000 22,286,000,000 22,626,000,000 21,054,000,000 20,843,000,000 21,241,000,000 Available SeatMiles Regional — — — — — — — — — — — — 1,767,000,000 2,073,000,000 (continued on next page) Issues in Accounting Education American Accounting Association Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 A Case Study on Cos t Estimation and Pro? tability Analysis at Continental Airlines Obs. 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 Obs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Period Total Aircraft 3Q-2003 4Q-2003 1Q-2004 2Q-2004 3Q-2004 4Q-2004 1Q-2005 2Q-2005 3Q-2005 4Q-2005 1Q-2006 2Q-2006 3Q-2006 4Q-2006 1Q-2007 2Q-2007 3Q-2007 4Q-2007 1Q-2008 2Q-2008 3Q-2008 4Q-2008 187 OPERATIONS AND COST DRIVER DATALeased Aircraft Flights Passengers Available Seat Miles 570 579 586 587 592 594 598 604 611 622 630 634 648 648 630 625 631 628 641 630 653 632 428 434 437 440 445 448 453 459 466 477 483 484 482 480 446 418 415 415 414 390 412 397 76,297 75,650 74,859 75,816 74,211 74,443 71,494 74,651 74,630 75,886 74,962 77,729 77,468 79,030 78,601 82,582 81,118 80,850 76,719 76,096 78,599 76,000 Available Seat Miles Regional 13,727,000 13,769,000 12,810,000 14,558,000 14,862,000 14,252,000 14,122,000 15,540,000 15,905,000 15,448,000 15,594,000 17,596,000 17,328,000 16,601,0 00 16,176,000 18,120,000 17,901,000 16,733,000 16,440,000 7,108,000 17,962,000 15,183,000 22,819,000,000 21,907,000,000 22,670,000,000 24,150,000,000 24,674,000,000 23,588,000,000 23,585,000,000 25,482,000,000 26,833,000,000 25,720,000,000 26,117,000,000 28,259,000,000 29,262,000,000 27,280,000,000 27,250,000,000 29,592,000,000 30,346,000,000 28,550,000,000 28,376,000,000 30,304,000,000 30,383,000,000 26,448,000,000 1,605,000,000 2,980,000,000 2,400,000,000 2,603,000,000 1,999,000,000 3,408,000,000 2,740,000,000 3,026,000,000 3,112,000,000 3,095,000,000 3,082,000,000 3,374,000,000 3,503,000,000 3,292,000,000 3,126,000,000 3,177,000,000 3,193,000,000 3,104,000,000 3,098,000,000 ,450,000,000 3,390,000,000 3,046,000,000 Period Passenger Miles Flown Employees Fuel Price Fuel Consumed 1Q-2000 2Q-2000 3Q-2000 4Q-2000 1Q-2001 2Q-2001 3Q-2001 4Q-2001 1Q-2002 2Q-2002 3Q-2002 4Q-2002 1Q-2003 2Q-2003 3Q-2003 4Q-2003 1Q-2004 2Q-2004 3Q-2004 4Q-2004 1Q-2005 2Q-2005 15,005,000,000 16,491,000,000 17,325,000,000 15,340,000,000 15,114,000,000 17,053,000,000 16,206,000,000 12,767,000,000 14,867,000,000 16,489,000,000 16,960,000,000 17,252,000,000 14,352,000,000 16,129,000,000 18,041,000,000 16,412,000,000 16,255,000,000 18,735,000,000 19,922,000,000 18,239,000,000 18,112,000,000 20,292,000,000 45,000 45,500 46,000 5,944 38,396 39,000 39,500 39,461 40,229 41,011 41,809 40,244 38,960 39,000 39,500 39,000 38,240 37,496 36,766 38,255 41,831 45,742 $0. 829 $0. 797 $0. 865 $0. 885 $0. 856 $0. 815 $0. 824 $0. 826 $0. 644 $0. 723 $0. 760 $0. 740 $1. 029 $0. 881 $0. 857 $0. 872 $1. 041 $1. 787 $1. 199 $1. 190 $1. 453 $1. 670 377,000,000 386,000,000 398,000,000 372,000,000 369,000,000 391,000,000 373,000,000 369,000,000 308,000,000 332,000,000 340,000,000 316,000,000 305,000,000 308,000,000 330,000,000 314,000,000 320,000,000 347,000,000 345,000,000 321,000,000 324,000,000 344,000,000 (continued on next page) Issues in Accounting EducationVolume 26, No. 1, 2011 American Accounting Associ ation 188 Roman Period 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 Passenger Miles Flown Employees Fuel Price Fuel Consumed 3Q-2005 4Q-2005 1Q-2006 2Q-2006 3Q-2006 4Q-2006 1Q-2007 2Q-2007 3Q-2007 4Q-2007 1Q-2008 2Q-2008 3Q-2008 4Q-2008 Obs. 21,762,000,000 20,033,000,000 20,336,000,000 23,367,000,000 24,042,000,000 21,772,000,000 21,450,000,000 24,623,000,000 25,422,000,000 22,670,000,000 22,280,000,000 24,836,000,000 24,746,000,000 20,825,000,000 50,018 42,200 42,600 43,450 41,500 38,033 41,800 43,300 41,400 39,640 43,000 40,100 43,500 42,490 $1. 880 $1. 776 $1. 904 $2. 10 $2. 215 $2. 064 $1. 895 $2. 079 $2. 206 $2. 499 $2. 797 $3. 856 $3. 450 $2. 925 364,000,000 344,000,000 347,000,000 375,000,000 387,000,000 362,000,000 361,000,000 395,000,000 406,000,000 380,000,000 375,000,000 389,000,000 395,000,000 339,000,000 EXHIBIT 2 PROJECTIONS OF REVENUES AND OPERATING ACTIVITY FOR YEAR 2009 Variable Revenues Available seat miles Available regional seat miles Number of passengers Number of planes Number leased planes Price of fuel per gallon Gallons of fuel consumed Quarter 1 Quarter 2 Quarter 3 Quarter 4 $2,962,000,000 26,323,000,000 2,971,000,000 14,408,000 634 398 $1. 82 403,000,000 2,767,000,000 28,007,000,000 3,044,000,000 16,348,000 617 394 $2. 07 430,000,000 $2,947,000,000 28,933,000,000 3,130,000,000 16,795,000 604 380 $1. 99 369,000,000 $2,462,000,000 26,291,000,000 3,002,000,000 15,258,000 601 379 $1. 98 479,000,000 All ? nancial and operational data represent quarterly data for the quarter beginning January 2000 Observation 1 through December 2008. Data have been compiled from Continental’s 8-K and10-K reports, submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission. De? nitions of Operations Variables: Available seat miles the number of seats available multiplied by the number of miles ? wn; Available regional seat miles available seat miles on regional routes; Number of passengers number of paying passengers ? own; Number of planes number of planes in the ? eet, including regional routes aircraft; Number of leased planes number of leased planes; Price of jet fuel average price per gallon of jet fuel in the respective quarter; and Gallons of fuel consumed number of gallons of fuel consumed in the respective quarter. Salaries and Wages This account represents costs related to salaries and wages, as well as fringe bene? ts, of Continental’s workers. These include salaries for pilots and wages for ? ght attendants and ground crew, as well as wages for Continental’s mechanics. Additionally, a signi? cant portion of this salary pool represents wages of reservation specialists, customer service representatives at airports, and the salaries for administrative and support personnel e. g. , ? ight schedulers, technology Issues in Accounting Education American Accounting Association Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 A Case Study on Cost Estimation and Pro? tability Analysis at Continental Airlines 189 personnel, accountants, and division managers . A possible cost driver of salaries is the available seat miles. Aircraft Fuel and Related Taxes This represents the cost of jet fuel and related fuel taxes. Jet fuel cost tends to be driven by the current price of jet fuel and gallons of jet fuel consumed. Aircraft Rentals These are expenses for capital leases of aircraft. The main driver is the number of leased planes in Continental’s ? eet, including regional jets operated on behalf of Continental by four regional airlines under various capacity purchase agreements. Airport Fees Represents landing fees and passenger security fees paid to the various domestic and international airports where Continental ? ies.Landing fees are driven by the number of passengers. Aircraft Maintenance and Repairs These are expenses associated with the service and maintenance of planes. These include expenses related to scheduled maintenance, spare parts and materials, and airframe and engine overhauls. The main drivers of these cost s are the number of planes in the ? eet and the number of miles ? own. Depreciation and Amortization This represents depreciation and amortization expenses of aircraft, ground equipment, buildings, and other property. It must be emphasized that the largest portion of depreciation expense relates to the depreciation of aircraft.Although depreciation expenses are driven by the acquisition cost of Continental’s capital assets, depreciation is greatly in? uenced by both company policy and accounting principles, such as the depreciation method, that a ? rm adopts. Distribution Costs These expenses represent credit card discount fees, booking fees, and travel agency commissions, all of which are affected by passenger revenue. Therefore, the driver of these costs is total revenue. Passenger Services This is also a cost pool that includes expenses related to processing and servicing passengers prior to take-off, during ? ight, and after arrival at their destination.A signi? cant port ion of these costs is generated by Continental’s Field Services Division, the main function of which is to provide service to planes prior to take-off. Some of these expenses relate to checking in passengers, handling luggage on and off planes, cleaning planes, stocking planes with beverage and food, and refueling the aircraft prior to take-off. The potential cost driver of these costs is the number of passengers. Regional Capacity Purchases These are costs related to the purchase of regional routes served by several regional airlines on behalf of Continental ExpressJet, Chautauqua, CommutAir, and Cogan .These costs are 5 Available seat miles is calculated as the number of seats available for passengers multiplied by the number of scheduled miles those seats are ? own. Issues in Accounting Education Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 American Accounting Association 190 Roman driven by the combined ? ying capacity of the four airlines: available regional seat miles. Other Expenses This is a cost pool that comprises many ancillary and discretionary expenditures, including technology expenses, security and outside services, general supplies, and advertising and promotional expenses.Further, this cost pool contains various special charges for gains and losses from the sale of retired aircraft and costs of future leases. Given the large variety of miscellaneous items, there is no clear driver of these expenses; however, a large portion of them, such as advertising and promotional expenses, are driven by total revenue. DISCUSSION QUESTIONS 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6 Using the quarterly data for operating costs and the various cost drivers of costs provided by Exhibits 1 and 2, estimate regression for cost category of costs.Then, write the appropriate cost function for each category of cost and then interpret your regression results. Based on your regression results, where do you see the largest reductions in costs if ? ying capacity is lowered by 11 percent? Also, in which areas d o you see opportunities to achieve further cost reductions and why? Exhibit 2 provides a quarterly forecast of revenues, jet fuel prices,6 and the projected operating activity for 2009. Using the information from your regressions and the forecast information provided in Exhibit 2, estimate Continental’s operating costs and expected pro? for the upcoming ? scal year. Based on the results of your pro? tability analysis, what can you say about the ? rm’s ? nancial outlook? Would Continental be earning an operating pro? t in 2009? If not, what should Continental’s management do to restore pro? tability in 2009? Summarize your conclusions in a memorandum addressed to Continental’s CEO. In the memo, you must clearly communicate your main ? ndings, emphasizing speci? c areas in which you see the greatest potential to achieve further reductions in costs and, based on your pro? tability analysis, sum up the ? nancial outlook for 2009.You should note that Continent al has entered into several future contracts to hedge the exposed risks of rising fuel prices. The projected costs for jet fuel on exhibit re? ects the value of the various future contracts which guarantee Continental a ? xed price for jet fuel at various maturity dates in 2009, as well the estimated gallons of fuel that Continental plans to use during the year. Issues in Accounting Education American Accounting Association Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 A Case Study on Cost Estimation and Pro? tability Analysis at Continental Airlines 191 CASE LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND IMPLEMENTATION GUIDANCECost estimation is a fundamental aspect of managerial/cost accounting Datar et al. 2008; Eldenburg and Wolcott 2005 . For example, cost estimation is critical for developing budgets, setting up cost standards, inventory valuation, product costing, and many other applications. Ultimately, ? rms’ ability to accurately predict production and operating costs has a profound impact on decision-making. A dditionally, given the frequency with which ? rms downsize or expand their operations in response to economic or market-wide conditions, knowing how this strategic decision of scaling output impacts ? ms’ future operating costs, and which tools can facilitate this task, has become increasingly relevant for ? rms. Nonetheless, despite its importance, cost estimation is a topic that merits further discussion in accounting textbooks. Although several managerial/cost accounting textbooks provide rich theoretical discussions of cost estimation, including cost behavior, cost functions, and, to some extent, regression analyses, the examples that are typically used to illustrate such an important concept often lack a sense of realism. Either ? titious data are commonly used in cost estimation, or the examples covered fail to capture realistic situations faced by ? rms in a â€Å"real world† context. Accordingly, this case aims to close this gap. The objective is to support stu dents in learning how to apply regression analyses to understand cost behavior and forecast future costs using real data from ? rms. The case focuses on the harsh ? nancial situation faced by Continental Airlines as a result of the recent ? nancial crisis and the challenges it faces to remain pro? table.It then highlights the importance of reducing and controlling costs as a viable strategy to restore pro? tability, and how regression analysis can assist in this pursuit. Students are next presented with quarterly data for various categories of costs and several potential cost drivers, which they must analyze and then perform regressions on operating costs using a variety of cost drivers. Based on these results, students have to examine how costs behave and then use the regression output to forecast the ? rm’s operating costs for year 2009. As part of the cost analysis, students must also identify speci? areas in which Continental could achieve the largest cost savings as a re sult of cutting capacity and implementing other cost-cutting measures. Apart from this, they must conduct a pro? tability analysis to project quarterly pro? ts for the upcoming ? scal year. The learning objectives of the case are as follows: 1. 2. 3. Students learn to conduct regression analysis in Excel and use this technique to study cost behavior and forecast future costs. Students also learn how to use actual ? rm-level data from public sources for estimating costs, and apply cost estimation in a â€Å"real world† context that involves a widespread decision among ? ms: downsizing capacity. Moreover, learning to use public ? nancial information in cost estimation could have implications that reach beyond accounting; learning to access public ? nancial information exposes students to the possibilities of applying regression analysis for business analysis in general, including cost and pro? tability analyses. The case requires students to synthesize their ? ndings in a memor andum addressed to Continental’s CEO; thus, students are also exposed to re? ning their writing skills in a business setting. Implementation GuidanceThis case is primarily designed for use in an intermediate managerial/cost accounting undergraduate class; however, it could also work well in a graduate-level managerial accounting course, at either the master’s level or M. B. A. Issues in Accounting Education Volume 26, No. 1, 2011 American Accounting Association 192 Roman The realistic nature of the setting everyone can easily identify with the business model of airlines makes a particularly appealing environment for students to learn how regression analyses can be applied in cost estimation in a real-world context.The questions presented in the case include both practical and theoretical questions. As an augmentation of the principles contained in the application of this case, instructors could enhance the student experience by devoting time to reviewing the concepts o f cost functions and cost estimation, as well as discussing the fundamentals of regression analyses, so students can be exposed to these concepts prior to receiving the case. Alternatively, students can review these concepts on their own.The Appendix provides a detailed explanation of cost functions and regression analysis and describes the steps to perform regression analysis in Excel. Additionally, it provides students with broad guidelines to write an effective memorandum. Student Feedback The case was administered to two sections of an upper-level intermediate undergraduate cost accounting class at a major U. S. university. Seventy-seven students responded to an evaluation survey to assess whether they improved their understanding of the concepts illustrated in the case, as well as to whether the case illustrated a â€Å"real world† application in predicting operating costs.As shown in Table 1, students agreed that the case enhanced their understanding of the use of regre ssion analyses in predicting future costs mean of 4. 17, based on a ? ve-point scale , the case encouraged them to think critically about the behavior of operating costs in a â€Å"real world† context mean of 4. 03, based on a ? ve-point scale ; plus, they found the case interesting and recommended it for use in teaching cost estimation via regression analyses mean of 4. 07, based on a ? ve-point scale; see also Table 2 . Similar positive responses are shown in Table 2. For example, Table 2 reports students’ knowledge on the use of regression