Saturday, August 31, 2019

Is Money the root of Evil

In our world today there is one item that controls us and influences us all, money; the thing that makes us who we are or who we want to be. However, money is not necessarily the root of all evil. If money is used appropriately, money has the influence of benefiting those around us, yet at the same time it can bring out the worst in many people. Money also controls society where it can cause substantial problems in politics, the government as well corrupt cities. Lastly, although money is indeed the root of everything, we cannot live with money because of our economic society. Everything has its pros and cons and whatever it may be there is always an outcome. Money however, is not necessarily the root of all evil. Money can definitely help many people. Through my experiences, I've learned that money can make a huge impact for those around us. For instance, every year I stock a shoebox with toys and goods for the yearly event of Operation Christmas Child. Knowing that a child from around the world is receiving my shoebox, I can understand that a little money can bring happiness for those who are in need. However, anyone can use money, even well off citizens; it doesn't matter if you are poor, wealthy or rich. You can spend money on whatever you like; whether its computer games, food, entertainment, or even gambling. The problem with money is that everyone would like an abundance of it, but not everyone has the opportunity to have it at their disposal. When too many people are longing for the same thing and there is not enough to go around, people start creating their own ways on how to get their own share. Soon enough, crime becomes a factor and humans lose their morality and start stealing from one another. When I was in grade 10, my parents bought me a brand new IPod; nevertheless, it was stolen because someone wanted it as well. Money also can cause significant damage to once a stable political society to become spiteful and greedy. The United States is the perfect example. President Bush has always had a strong desire to lead his country. However, the decisions that he made only benefited what he believed was best and not what the country believed. In 2001, President Bush made the decision of declaring war in Afghanistan. The main purpose of the war was to capture Bin Laden as well as to destroy Al-Queda. Nevertheless, the mission became into trying to control Afghanistan itself. Over 20,000 troops were sent to insure control. In order to pay for the enormous project and mission, cuts were made and state entities had to be closed; many workers lost their jobs. President Bush Mayor found that the war was more important than the country itself. In turn, the country has to find its own ways to pay for its own necessities; which only will result in depreciation. We also see on a regular basis of other federal government cases that centre on embezzlement with government funds when all the while more important issues can be solved with the money being cheated by our leaders and superiors. Eventually, the focal point becomes on money and not the important issues such as the homeless and crime. People in general love money; we love to own nice things and are excited when we are able to purchase that item we once dreamed about having one day. There are some, though, that have problems using it in the proper way. Instead of saving money, I purchase useless items that are not necessary. Last March break, I went snowboarding with my friends in Banff with my brand new fast snowboard rather than paying off the debt I owed to my parents. In reality, we place money at the top of everything; it is the first and foremost on the minds of people. We dream constantly of what would make our lives better; if we need the money desperately, if we need to satisfy our desires, or even to try and fulfill our dreams. A Homeless man on the street needs money to buy food, a mother needs money to take care of her child, and a father needs money to pay his home mortgage payment. We would all like to â€Å"have it all. † I dream of living in the perfect world; where I live in the perfect community, drive the fastest car and owning the newest entertainment systems. It all comes down to how we place the importance of our wants and needs. I always desire what my friends have, but by what means will I go to get it? Will I get another job? Or ultimately even choosing the negative outcome by stealing? Money is surely the root of everything, good and evil. Money controls the world that we live in. It's something that we need to survive with and it's one of the most manipulative objects that can control us. Money is the root of everything, good and evil. In our society today, we cannot walk out the door without seeing something that involves money. It is up to us on how we manipulate it and how we use it in our daily lives. I've learned that with money comes discernment. What type of discernment will I use when I want to have something? The Parable of the lost son in the bible tells the story of a young man who wants his share of his father's inheritance. Not long after that, the young son took off to a distant country and squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, he had nothing, and continued by living by working on a farm and eating what the pigs ate. The lesson of the story is that we need to use money wisely and to have the right discernment. So ask yourself, how do you spend money? Do you use it wisely? Or spend it foolishly?

Friday, August 30, 2019

Mckinstry Advertising Agency Essay

You are the president of the McKinstry Advertising Agency, a medium sized firm that specializes in preparing the marketing strategies, performing the market research studies, arranging the distribution channels, and designing the advertising and promotional materials for industrial companies that have developed †off-shoot† consumer products. You obviously serve a very specific niche. Your clients are industrial companies- that is, they sell primarily to other manufacturing firms and government agencies- that have developed- as unintended outcomes of their R&D programs- products for the retail trade. Dow Chemical Company, while not a client of your agency, is an almost ideal example of this type of firm. They have developed and currently produce and market such consumer products as Dow Bathroom Cleaner and Ziploc Bags that in total amount to only 5.8% of Dow’s total sales. You clients tend not to be as large as Dow Chemical Company nor as well established in consume r marketing. Most have had very little experience in retail sales, and they generally are not very sophisticated in advertising methods. They tend, therefore, to rely heavily upon the advice of the account executives and advertising experts at your agency, and to develop relationships with those people that are far more permanent and personal than is common in the â€Å" what have you done for me lately† culture of the consumer products advertising industry. The â€Å"permanent and personal† relationships that are typical of your company but not of industry in general seem to be the cause of a major problem that you have recently encountered. One of your large clients developed a new type of radar detector. Radar detectors, also known as â€Å"fuzzbusters† are simple but extremely sensitive radio receivers that are tuned to the wave length of the police radar. When a car equipped with a enabling the driver to slow down, if necessary, before the speed of the car can be calculated by the police equipment. The use of radar detectors, thus enables drivers to avoid being stopped and fined for speeding. Speeding is alleged to be responsible for many traffic accidents. There were 27.7 million traffic accidents involving passenger car in 2000, and 6.1 million traffic accidents involving trucks. These 33.8 million traffic accidents resulted in 46400 deaths, 1.8 million sever injuries that required  hospitalization, 7.8 million moderate injuries that required attention by medical personnel, extensive slight injuries, uncounted personal traumas, and huge financial losses. Speeding was said to be a factor in 65 % of all traffic accidents and 87% of those that caused deaths and serve injuries due to the greater impacts that come from the higher speeds, but it has to be admitted that neither statistic is totally reliable. Police estimate speed based upon the length of skid marks and the extent of physical damage, but those estimates obviously are inexact. Further, â€Å"speeding â€Å" is defined as any vehicle velocity above the posted limit, and it is claimed that the posted limit is considerably below the safe capability of modern car and high way in many instances. Vehicle speed, moreover, is only one of the factor that cause traffic accidents. Alcohol intoxication is believe to be associated with 28% of all accidents and 48% of all accidents that result in death and severe injury. Often speed and intoxication together are held to be the cause. Again, though, there is a problem in measuring intoxication. The percentage of alcohol in bloodstream that impairs physical response time and personal judgment varies with the body weight, physical conditioning, and drinking history of the individual. Police and medical attendants use a test that takes into account only body weight and, further, it is said by representatives of the licensed beverage( that is, beer, wine, and liquor) industry that the legal threshold for intoxication has been set much too low. Most drivers would be considered to be â€Å"driving under the influence† of they consumed two to three glasses of beer or wine within 30 minutes of and accident. In summary, it cannot be sai d that exact cause of most severe traffic accidents are known with certainty but it is believed that speeding and drinking, jointly or separately, play some role in the events that lead up to those accidents. Also to blame, in many instances, are the design of the highway, the condition of the weather, the maintenance of the vehicle, the time of the day (many severe accidents occur at dusk, with poor lighting and tired drivers), and the presence of radar detectors. A study by the Ohio State Police found that radar detectors were present in at least one of the vehicles involved in 69% of all severe traffic accidents on the highways of that state in 2005. Studies in other states have confirmed that finding, with some estimates of the relationship running as high as 75%. The use of radar detectors is illegal in many if not most states, but neither the  manufacturing nor the marketing of the units has ever been banned by the federal government which, of course, is the sole authority which could regulate their interstate trade. The U.S. constitution forbids any state from restricting† imports† from any other state. Currently, therefore, there often occur an unusual situation in w hich the use if the radar detector sets may be illegal within a given state, but the sale of those sets is not illegal and cannot be prohibited within that state. The manufacture and marketing of radar detectors was expanding industry, with total sales revenues reaching $67 million in 1991, until the police in a number of states began to uses lasers rather than radar to apprehend speeders. Lasers project focused beams of light waves rather than focused beams of radio waves, and consequently they cannot be â€Å"picked up† by most radar detectors. Your client, as an offshoot of contract research for the defense industry, has developed a new technology that does â€Å"pick up† the light waves far enough away from the source so that drivers can slow down. A full explanation of the technology is not needed; it is probably sufficient to say that the device works on the principle that the light waves from a police laser interfere with a certain spectrum of exceedingly short-range radio signals broadcast from the detector set in the owner’s car is out of sight, perhaps 1/4 mile ahead in the highway, and the police laser is not ta rgeted on this particular car. The proposed design also picks up the interference from a police radar device equally well. The electronics firm that developed the new radar/laser detection came to the account executive at your agency and requested a marketing plan supported by market research. The marketing plan was developed; it had a heavy emphasis upon direct distribution supported by extensive advertising. The market research was completed; it showed that the first entrant into this field with a new technology could rapidly build market share. The client requested that a young associated who had prepared a very successful advertising program for one of their earlier products be assigned to design the promotional materials for this new one. The associate, Marilynn Schaefer, refused, saying privately that she felt that it was not â€Å"right† to market radar and/or laser detectors that led to more numerous and more severe highway accidents and to greater incidents of death, suffering, and injury. The program director proposed other employees at the associate level within the  creative segment of the firm, but the client’s representative wanted Marilynn Schaefer to do the work. She continued to refuse, though expressing her reasons only to the account executive, George Sarbo. Eventually the conflict between these two people reached the stage at which George said to Marilynn, â€Å"either work on this account for me or don’t work at this agency for anyone† and fired her. Marilynn Schaefer immediately came to you, as president of the agency, saying that it was not right to fire a person because of her moral beliefs. George Sarbo quickly followed, saying that for 20 years he had followed the stated agency policy of providing clients with personalized service, and that if Marilynn did not want to so she could not work for him and she should not work for company. He also said that if Marilynn were retained at the agency he would leave. You realize that George Sarbo is one of only three account executives at your firm, that he has a very loyal following of clients with him if he indeed did decide to leave. Further conversations with both of the participants in the dispute and with the industrial client on the following day showed no change in their positions. The client’s representative clearly felt that the delay in assigning Ms. Schaefer to work on the needed advertising was due only to the press of other accounts upon her time; he stated that he felt that he was â€Å"owned† her assistance on this project.

Thursday, August 29, 2019

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. in 2008 Managements Initiatives to Transform the Case Study

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. in 2008 Managements Initiatives to Transform the Company and Curtail Wal-Mart Bashing - Case Study Example Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. in 2008 Management’s Initiatives to Transform the Company and Curtail Wal-Mart Bashing Whereas, the vision statement is â€Å"If we work together, we’ll lower the cost of living for everyone†¦we’ll give the world an opportunity to see what it’s like to save and have a better life.† (Forfan, â€Å"Wal-Mart Stores Mission Statement - People, Saving Money, Living a Better Live†; 2Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., â€Å"10 Rules for Building a Business†) Strategy, leadership, or execution contribute towards Wal-Mart’s success but, the single biggest factor that accounts for Wal-Mart’s success was its strategies for prioritizing low-cost/ differentiation strategy (Zimmerman, â€Å"To Boost Sales, Wal-Mart Drops One-Size-Fits-All Approach†). Wal-Mart values include service towards the customers, respect individual, strive for quality and perform with integrity. The proposed working environment values of the company were focused on stakeholder requirements, respects towards workers, quality towards shareholder as well as brand value and performance with cooperation (3Wal-Mart Inc., â€Å"Culture†). Wal-Mart corporate culture emphasizes conservative, religious, and family-oriented business. (Hayden, Lee, McMahon and Pereira, â€Å"A Case Study on Wal-Mart Stores Inc.†). Wal-Mart business practice in present scenario focuses on the culture of working together in order to fulfill the purpose of helping people to save money and live the life in better way in accordance to its business strategy (3Wal-Mart Inc., â€Å"Culture†).

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Contemporary middle east history project 5 Research Proposal

Contemporary middle east history project 5 - Research Proposal Example The split led to antagonism between the Muslim communities and in the modern Islam it has adverse effects including Muslims attacking Muslims. In chapter 5 of Devani’s book, he states that, â€Å"The newly established Iranian Empire lacked the resources that had been available to the Islamic Caliphs of Baghdad in order to consolidate their power over the Islamic authority† this leads me to believe that it was lack of access to resources by the empire that that led to the end of military patronage states. After the exit of Asia and Transoxania, the increase in marine business in the West was unpromising to Iran whose prosperity was dependent on its location on significant East to West overland trade ways like the Silk Road which was well-known. This led to the rise of the Ottomans who seized back Iranian advances to the West. Safavids on the other hand rose and established command of over both the Caucasus and Mesopotamia. The Ottoman and Safavid Empires were the outcome of many years of Islamic state construction and expansion. In their development, they covered virtually the whole Islamic population. They present the connection between the prehistoric and contemporary periods of Islamic history. Both ultimately declined, and were engrossed by the extension of the British Empire. They were different from the military patronage states because they began as religious sects. The Safavid Empire differed from the Ottoman Empire because it was an authoritatively Shiite empire. The Ottoman Empire declined, as a consequence of both in-house ineffectiveness and pressure from its outside antagonists in Europe and Asia while the Safavid Empire collapsed due to invasion by Afghans in 1722. The two great empires were characterized by pronounced religious opposition to critical thinking. This made it difficult for the people to acquire important and helpful information. There existed economic problems such as; competition

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

Abandoning or Keeping Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Abandoning or Keeping - Essay Example Upon reaching the new destinations, immigrants experience many problems such as the new culture adaption and keeping up with different local customs. The imminent question from the experiences then is reason behind abandoning own native culture and people and facing challenges in new environments. The realization of blood is thicker than water becomes evident from the experience of immigrants in new regions. According to Gary Shteyngart’s memoir; â€Å"Little Failure† and a movie named â€Å"Everything Is Illuminated†, immigration is not only a population movement and change. On a more important note, there are implications based on the political, cultural and economical aspects of a population migration. An appreciative perspective is on the cultural angles where multicultural consequences results from migrations. From the Shteyngart’ memoir; â€Å"Little Failure†, Shteyngart articulates his story and experiences through a sickly Soviet childhood, middle-school bullying, and own insecurities prior to his success. Shteynagart’s background was that of a typical Russian-Jewish immigrant based family. Shteyngart tried to join the American life but his parents were Russian traditionalists. This reciprocated to Shteyngart experiencing many problems while he lived in America as an immigrant. After he graduated from the university, he tried working as a paralegal for a civil rights law firm but was unsuccessful. However, it was his parent’s dream to achieve the American dream. His parents pushed him towards attaining the American Dream in multiple occasions. Shteyngart tried establishing himself within a new environment in order to get rid of the immigrant geared mentality (Shteyngart 4). Shteyngart embraced the an old proverb that postulates that ‘When in Rome do as the Romans do†. He recalls reminding himself and internalizing inwardly â€Å"Where am I? I am in Manhattan, the chielborought of New York City, the biggest city in America. Where am I not? I am

Monday, August 26, 2019

Performance Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 3

Performance Management - Essay Example The script shows that whether or not an employee manages to attain the assigned goals also depends upon the extent to which he/she has been facilitated in doing so by the top management. This is the aspect of performance management that is often underemphasized. Achieving company’s goals is not only a horizontal team effort on the part of the employees, but also a vertical team effort wherein top management and everybody done the line forms part of a team. This is a very interesting script. The fact that there are just two characters in it that conduct the dialogue with each other makes the scenario easier to comprehend. The script also provides an example of how peers can educate each other on important concepts like performance management and performance appraisal in a hardly 5-minute talk in the office environment. This not only improves their social connectivity and increases their knowledge, but also helps them develop rapport with each other so as to work productively in the form of

Sunday, August 25, 2019

Roots of conflic, viol and peace Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Roots of conflic, viol and peace - Essay Example In the effort to bridge this gap, peace paradigms such as power politics and world order were developed. The power politics paradigm, which is dominant in matters of international relations, stipulates that there is an absence of universally acceptable values that would serve all international actors. Power politics in characterized the use of threats by one nation to the other, be it military, political and/or economic (Wight, Bull and Holbraad, 2002). It is as a result of the absence of prevailing international government that renders international politics unpredictable and volatile, with nations perpetually changing alliances. The end result is an exposure to violence, insecurity and power imbalance. According to the power politics peace paradigm, it is imperative for states to engage in the implementation of policies that would effectively serve their national objectives construed as the acquisition of military strength and material power with the aim of deterring and compelling other nations. A nation that is known to possess material and military power is less likely to be expos ed though the acquisition of such rises serious moral and ethical issues. This means that states have no alternative but to attempt to steer away from international humanistic values that are pegged on the trust and good will of nations. The lack of a common and unified moral standard that can be used as the guiding point for international cooperation means that states are left with no alternative but to strive and compete against each other in the quest to attain the perceived security providers (Gandhi Marg Magazine, 2002). The basic idea, therefore behind power politics is that for peace to prevail, people must be prepared for war. The implicit being that the human competitive aspect predisposes the world to violence and it is through the forceful implementation of order, peace is attained. While power politics is not entirely indifferent to issues such as environmental degradation and poverty, it has been criticized for advocating for a moral minimalism approach, meaning that the world has been condemned to a self help attitude, with the stronger nations overpowering less empowered nations (Wight, Bull and Holbraad, 2002). On the hand, the world order paradigm stipulates that peace can be attained through the power of law. It calls for the development of sustainable cooperation among states, inter governmental organization and non governmental organizations. The proponents of world order consider the power politics approach as a recipe of inevitable disorder. They future insist that human have both the potential to be selfish and otherwise and if they so choose, human can cooperate for the sake of the greater good. According to the proponents of the world order, international cooperation is critical in the decentralization state centered international relations models that have completely failed to secure the general interests of human beings. The fact is the world is basically a global village due to immense technological advancements. Issues such as peace, poverty, disease, human rights violations, environmental degradation, disease and weapons of mass destruction, are a major concern to people across the divide. It is for this reason that the world order stresses the on the possibility of humans to choose to cooperate. It also

Saturday, August 24, 2019

Strategic HRM Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Strategic HRM - Essay Example Entertainment products include the sale of compact discs and videos. Additionally, ASDA is engaged in property investment and development through its Gazeley division. In this paper we will evaluate the companies Strategic Human Resource Management policies. The Human Resource Management or personnel function of ASDA covers a variety of activities. The term Human Resource Management has largely replaced the old-fashioned word personnel, which was used in the past. (Arthur, 2003, 670-687) The effectiveness with which ASDA runs its Human Resources policies can be measured by the level of employee satisfaction, and this is where stability indexes and wastage rates are so important. If employees are content with their work, they are most likely to turn up for work. Levels of stress and stress-related absenteeism increase when there is a poor Human relations atmosphere. (Boxall, 2002, 51-7) ASDA will have a range of employees who have worked for different lengths of time and who have different levels of skills and training. The Human Resource planner will seek to have a balance of new people entering ASDA in order to cover those who are leaving. The Human Resource Planner will also want to make sure that skill levels are raising within ASDA, and that training programmes are devised to make sure people have the skills to meet ASDAs jobs requirements. If all ASDAs skilled employees are just about to retire, ASDA will have to spend a lot of money on training to build up a new pool of expertise. Succession is the way in which one person follows another person into a particular job or role within ASDA. ASDA need to make sure it is grooming people to take on the responsibility required. If ASDA do not do this, it will suddenly find itself with a vacuum where it has not developed the people to move into the appropriate position of responsibility, and ASDA will be missing the right people in key

Rules and Legal System Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Rules and Legal System - Essay Example This will also ignore rules set down by extra-systems and will not come up with a definition of law. Every legal philosopher agrees on and presumes the presence and necessity of rules in every legal system. They only bicker on the manner of their validity and normativity. Rules are inherent in the very definition of law and of legal system and are very significant in legal process. Analytic Jurisprudence views the legal system as constitutive of norms and differentiates and severes it from other non-legal systems extant in every possible society. According to Austin (1995)1, analytic jurisprudence seeks to put a handle upon "the essence or nature which is common to all laws that are properly so called." (p. 11) The existing works of analytic jurisprudence exist in a continuum which on one end stands theories of natural law and on the opposite, that of legal positivism with strains of both theories in between. More modern theories diverge from both theories forming classifications of their own. This law of nature, being co-eval with mankind and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all times: no human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this; and such of them as are valid derive all their force, and all their authority, mediately or immediately from this original. (p.41) Neo-classical natural law theory use the said thesis to provide the basis for justification of legal obligatoriness and consequent state coercion. For John Finnis (1980)3, "the principles of natural law explain the obligatory force (in the full sense of 'obligation') of positive laws, even when those laws cannot be deduced from those principles" (p.23-24) Fuller4, on the other hand, lists eight (8) principles of procedural morality requirements, all concurring, which every law should satisfy. According to him (1964), these features serve "the enterprise of subjecting human conduct to the governance of rules." (p.106) On the opposite, legal positivists proffer criteria for validity of law other than morality. Legal Positivism asserts that "it is in no sense a necessary truth that laws reproduce or satisfy certain demands of morality, though, in fact they have often done so. (Hart, p.181-2)5 Legal Positivism. For all positivists, the law is a social construct. The Conventionality thesis insists that social convention serves as the rule of recognition of the authoritativeness of a law. The Social Fact thesis require particular facts such as the presence of a sovereign or of primary and secondary rules as rules of recognition that provide legal validity. The Separability thesis denies any overlap between

Friday, August 23, 2019

The question of diversity and evolution Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

The question of diversity and evolution - Essay Example During the process of natural selection, the offspring obtain their biological traits from the parent organism. This process of inheritance is usually geared towards developing an organism that is best suited to survive in the eternal environment in which it is being born into (Söll, Nishimura and Moore). This is accomplished through inheritance. However, inheritance encourages and increases competition. This is because the natural selection and inheritance process provides only the best genetically material for the offspring. This creates a situation where the offspring competes with the parent organism for the available resources. However, the offspring is favored to best survive in this environment owing to the fact that the new organism ideally has the best possible genetic make-up available from the parent organism to best survive in their environment. Therefore, inheritance increase and encourages competition within a given ecosystem. This concept is generally true. This is because history has shown that the next generation is usually far much improved and more efficient in survival within their environment compared to the parent organism (Gibson). A good example is the history and evolution of man. Previous species of human beings were apes. Through the process of natural selection and inheritance, modern day Homo sapiens have the ability to best survive in the changing environment as compared to previous species from which human beings originated. These previous species have become extinct due to their inability to adapt and survive and the competition that they received from their more advanced and evolved counterparts. This argument can however be challenged. This can be achieved by looking at the fact that there are numerous cases where natural selection does not improve the species that originates from the parent organism. Again, human provide the best example to this. While the natural selection

Thursday, August 22, 2019

The Theme of Poverty in Cannery Row Essay Example for Free

The Theme of Poverty in Cannery Row Essay Poverty is an important theme in John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row.   Set in the 1920s during the Great Depression, poverty is an overarching aspect of life in the down-and-out community of Cannery Row.   A backdrop for the book, Cannery Row is a place where poverty affects everyone and everything.   In spite of ever-present poverty, the people of Cannery Row make do with what little they have.   This brief essay will discuss the role that poverty plays in Cannery Row and conclude with important lessons John Steinbeck offers regarding poverty and human nature. Cannery Row is a rundown coastal community in California, beset by poverty and decay.   Accordingly â€Å"its inhabitants are, as the man once said, ‘whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches’, by which he meant Everybody.† (Steinbeck 1)   Described as a foul-smelling strip of land opposite the sardine fishery, the inhabitants of Cannery Row make do with what little they have and work together, despite their impoverished existence. Although the characters of Cannery Row may not have material possessions, they work together and live in relative harmony.   The neighborhood grocer, Lee Chong, is relatively wealthy when compared to the other characters in Cannery Row, and he extends credit to the people of this rundown community, understanding that they do not always have the means to always pay for their purchases. Although not obvious at first sight, Lee Chong is a generous man and â€Å"over the course of the years everyone†¦owed him money. He never pressed his clients.† (Steinbeck 3)   Despite the poverty of Cannery Row, Lee extends credit to all.  Ã‚   Accordingly, â€Å"No one is really sure whether Lee ever receives any of the money he is owed or if his wealth consisted entirely of unpaid debts, but he lives comfortably and does legitimate business in the Row (Steinbeck 43).   He doesn’t hassle his debtors and is content to sit back and wait for payment.   His generosity even extends to helping Mack and the boys fund a home. Mack and the boys are â€Å"bums†: homeless men without wives, families or jobs.   Despite their position as outcasts and social undesirables, Mack and his boys are content with their social situation and are not angry about their impoverished lives.  Ã‚   In fact, their total lack of financial resources does not inhibit their ability to plan something nice for their friend Doc or enthusiastically set up shop in Lee Chong’s storage shed, ironically renamed The Palace Flophouse and Grill. Mack is a good man at heart and his intentions are generally good but he also prone to lying, stealing and deceiving.   An important example of this is when Mack and the boys discover that their new car does not have a proper license plate, they hung a rag permanently and accidentally on the rear plate to hide its vintage and also dabbed the front plate with good, thick mud in an effort to deceive the unsuspecting police (J.C.R. 526) Vice and poverty also seem to go hand-in-hand in Cannery Row.   Prostitution is presented in the novel as being situated around the Bear Flag, the neighborhood brothel where prostitution reigns supreme.   Dora’s girls, as they are affectionately called, work in a business which is universally described as sinful and where they would generally be perceived as social outcasts.   Despite their current position in life, they, along with Dora, are important members of the Cannery Row community and step into to act as nursemaids and feed members of the neighborhood when sickness strikes.   The people of Cannery Row work together when the going gets tough, as shown when Phyllis Mae and Dora’s other prostitutes band together during the influenza epidemic. Steinbeck leaves us with some important lessons, particularly with regards to wealth and human nature.   Despite the fact that the characters are unrefined, perceived of as outcasts and they exist in desperate poverty, the people of Cannery Row work to help one another. Camaraderie is an important theme established by Steinbeck.   Even if their plans do not actually materialize and they do not have all the money in the world to carry out their grandiose projects, the people of Cannery Row try to help each other and are motivated by goodness and not greed.   They may not have a lot but they make do with what they have.   Although materially quite poor, the residents of Cannery Row share a common humanity and a richness which cannot be bought. Works Cited Camp, C. L. â€Å"Reviewed work: Cannery Row by John Steinbeck†.   California Folklore Quarterly. 4: 2 (Apr., 1945): 203-204. C. R. â€Å"Review.† The Kenyon Review. 7:3 (Summer, 1945): 526-527. Levant, Howard. Tortilla Flat: The Shape of John Steinbecks Career†.   PMLA, 85:5 (Oct., 1970): 1087-1095. Steinbeck, John.   Cannery   Row.   New York: Penguin, 1993.

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Promoting Tourism in Tanzania

Promoting Tourism in Tanzania Tanzania is situated just south of the equator in East Africa. The mainland lies between the areas of the great lakes: Victoria, Tanganyika and Malawi, with the Indian Ocean on its coastline to the east (Africa Guide Online 1). Tanzania has frontiers with the following countries; to the North; Kenya and Uganda, to the West: Rwanda, Burundi and Democratic Republic of Congo, to the South: Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique, to the East: Indian Ocean (Tanzanian Government Online1). The country is also the home to the Kilimanjaro which is with its 19,340ft, the highest mountain in Africa (Africa Guide Online 1). Dodoma is the political capital with a population of 300,000, while Dares Salaam is the countries commercial capital (Tanzanian GovernmentOnline 1). Tanzania has three main climatic areas; the coastal area and immediate hinterland, with tropical conditions and an average of 26.6 °C(80 °) and which is high in humidity; the central plateau, which is hotand dry and the third region is the semi-temperate highland areas, witha healthy and cool climate (Africa Guide Online 2). The hot periods arebetween November and February and the coldest areas between May andAugust (Tanzanian Government Online 1). In regards to when the bestseason for tourists to visit is, writers seem not to have found aconsensus; some suggest the standard tourist season is January andFebruary, as the hot dry weather at this time of the year is generallyconsidered to be the most pleasant (Lonely Planet Online). While othersargue that the best times to travel is between July through to Marchfor the Northern and Southern parts of Tanzania as well as Zanzibar.And for the Western area the months from May through to March are mostsuitable for tourist activities (Tan zania Online). Tanzania belongs to the poorest countries in the world. In 2005 thecountry has a population of 36,766,356 and a population growth rate of1.83% (2005 est.), while 36% (in 2002 est.) of the population is belowpoverty line (CIA Online). However, there are various numbers inregards to this subject, and some of them even claim that it is 50% ofthe population which lives below the poverty line (Tanzanian GovernmentOnline 1). And although the numbers are still shocking, there seems tohave been some improvement in terms of the poverty in Tanzania in thepast 20 or so years. Since in 1988, according to IFDA, there werenearly 12 million rural Tanzanians, or 60 per cent of the ruralpopulation, living below the poverty line (IFDA, 1992, Cooksey, citedin Bierman and Moshi, 1997:77). The population in the mainland consist of 99% native Africans (of which95% are Bantu consisting of more than 130 tribes). And the other 1%consists of Asians, Europeans and Arabs. However, in Zanzibar the mixof populations differs, there are much more Arabs, some native African,and then mixes between the two (CIA Online).   This again is mirrored in the religion represented, in the mainland its30% Christians, 35% Muslims and 35% indigenous beliefs, where as inZanzibar it’s more than 99% Muslim (CIA Online). The official language is Kiswahili or Swahili (called Kiunguja inZanzibar). English is the official primary language of commerce,administration and higher education. But Arabic is naturally widelyspoken in Zanzibar, and on top there are various further locallanguages all over Tanzania, naturally with more than 130 differenttribes (CIA Online). The GDP composition by sector looks as followed: agriculture: 43.2%, industry: 17.2%, services: 39.6% (2004 est.). The economy heavily depends on agriculture(coffee, sisal, tea, cotton, pyrethrum, cashew nuts, tobacco, cloves,corn, wheat, cassava (tapioca), bananas, fruits, vegetables; cattle,sheep and goats), accounting for almost half of GDP (85% of exports,employing 80% of work force). The official aid flow in 2000 was1,044.6million USD, which was 11.6% share of GDP in the year 2000.(Ellis and Freeman, 2005) Tanzania seems stable under the Mkapa president leadership, however,political paralysis and deep rifts between minorities seem to havemanifested themselves and are unlikely to disappear within the nearfuture. Also is the support of the opposition (against Mkapa) growing,leading in 2001 to massive rallies and sometimes even violence. The economy received massive boosts in 2001 with the opening of theBulyanuhu gold mine and in 2004 with the opening of the Songosongonatural gas field. Tanzania was also one of the countries affected by the recent December2004 Tsunami. However, thankfully the government had enough time toreact to the warnings, and thus evacuate most of the area, leavingâ€Å"only† 13 killed (Lonely Planet Online). Please see Appendix I on page 3233 for a brief outline of the earlier history of Tanzania. The following dissertation will begin by looking at the current statusand issues in Tanzania’s tourism industry. The second chapter will lookat the very timely issue of sustainability in tourism and in regards toTanzania and the also the UK consumers attitude towards it. The thirdchapter will examine the role of governments in the tourism process. Inthe fourth chapter the marketing tools for a tourism destination willbe analysed. This is then followed by the methodology, which willexplain the methods and methodology used for this dissertation. Thenthe findings are presented, and interpreted. Finally a conclusion willbring to a close the dissertation. Furthermore, naturally, there arethe references, bibliography and some appendices. The dissertation will by no means be exhaustive, due to the time, word,monetary and access restraints. It is merely designed to give someideas towards a possible way of a better promotion of Tanzania inregards to the UK market.  Ã‚   Literature Review Chapter 1: Tanzania and Tourism Before looking at what the means for promoting tourism are, firstly ananalysis of the current state of tourism and its problems in Tanzaniais necessary. Wangwe et al. (1998:67) write on tourism possibilities: â€Å"Tanzania isblessed with many attractions for tourism including wildlife, MountKilimanjaro, and beautiful beaches. There are also many cultural andhistorical attractions as well, such as traditional ngomas, andZanzibar and other coastal towns whose sights show the interaction ofEast Africa with many ancient civilizations including the Romans, theIndians and the Middle East†. Tourism in Tanzania is a fairly new development. In fact â€Å"for nearlythree decades after Tanzania’s independence, tourism kept a very lowprofile. However, the National Tourism Policy, which was put in placein 1991, and the government policy of trade and economic liberalizationhave had a positive impact on the acceleration of tourism development†.And â€Å"As of 1994, the National Park system had expanded to eleven,namely, Serengeti, Ruaha, Ngorongoro, Mikumi, Tarangire, Katavi,Kilimanjaro, Rubondo, Manyara, Arusha and Gombe Stream†. Also â€Å" In 1994about 262,000 tourists visited Tanzania† (Wangwe et al. 1998:67)†. In fact, tourism is Tanzania’s fastest growing sector, however stillcounting for less than 10% of GDP (Author Unknown, Nov.2002). Andtourism is also Tanzania’s second largest foreign exchange earner(Author Unknown, 01/02/1998). Pollock (cited in Fennell, 2003) writesthat tourism has started to be an important part in the economy ofTanzania. However, the importance of game conservations has beenrecognized nationally as well as internationally, standing in directcontrast to tourism development. And also although tourism may help tofund conservation and development, the reliance on it can beproblematic due to the fickle nature of the market (Smith and Duffy,2003). However, the tourism industries mission statement which forms the basisof the tourism planning policy is to: â€Å"†¦.develop quality tourism thatis ecologically friendly to the conservation and restoration of theenvironment and its people’s culture† (Author Unknown, TanzaniaGovernment Online 2). Nevertheless, National Parks are already often overcrowded, and this isdeveloping into a serious problem (Hein, 1997). The Sopa Lodges inTanzania are fully booked throughout the summer, and Agent NinaWennersten of Woodcliff Lake says that Tanzania’s tourism has doubledin each of the last two years (Ruggia, 2004). Also the Africa SafariCo’s chief executive Susie Potter said that the year 2005 was shapingup to be a great year for them (Travel trade, 17/11/2004). Smulian(2005) writes that â€Å"agents should advise visitors hoping to see thestunning wildlife of Tanzania’s national parks to book early this year,after the countries best-ever season saw overbooking at lodges lastsummer†. All in all it seems that Tanzanians tourism market is booming.The UK is in fact the largest tourism market for Tanzania, saysdirector of the Tanzania Tourist Board, Peter Mwenguo. He also notes in2004 that the tourism industry in Tanzania is booming now (Ruggia,2004). And although environmental efforts seem to be taken seriously, such asthe Serena Hotel Chain in Tanzania, which operates to environmentalstandards that are among the world’s best (Middleton and Hawkins,1998). Nevertheless, the country is lacking in adequate infrastructureand there seems to be no multi-sectoral approach, nor has thedevelopment of tourism been very coordinated (Wangwe et al. 1998:68). This then leaves the government with various difficulties in developinga sustainable tourism policy, and writers such as Schmale (1993) giveexamples of Tanzania in regards to the socio-political and economicalenvironment and the challenges local organizations face. For examplethere is the problem of the socio-cultural impact on the Maasai peoplewhose traditional territory includes the National Parks. â€Å"Employmentfor the Maasai living around these parks was limited to posing forphotographs and selling craft souvenirs (Bachman, 1988, cite in Halland Lew 1998:63)†.   Tanzania targets high-spending tourists and the steep rise in touristnumbers have increased the pressure on services (Author Unknown,Nov.2002). The country is thus opening up opportunities along theIndian Ocean shoreline (Author Unknown, Nov.2002) namely the CC Africalodges on less-visited parts of Tanzania (Dunford, 2004). However, Vesely (2000) comments that there are also plenty ofpossibilities for not so wealthy visitors to go to Tanzania, and thatthere are well developed camp-sites, tented camps and motel stylefacilities. However, in the past eight years, there also has been some negativenews on Tanzania. Just recently there were two British students shot ina violent ambush on the Island of Pemba in Tanzania (Dennis, 2004). TheForeign and the Commonwealth Office immediately updated the traveladvice, since last month there was already a fatal shooting of aBritish tourist and a fatal shooting of a British businessman inTanzania. And tour operators do believe that this will hit touristnumbers in a negative way (Dennis, 2004). Unfortunately, theseincidents have not been the first once, and there have been eventsalready in earlier years. In 1998, US embassies in Kenya and Tanzaniawere bombed by terrorists, naturally resulting in heavy cancellationsfrom US tourists at the time (Berger, 1998). Furthermore were theresome political violence incidents in Zanzibar in 2001, which spoiledthe reputation of Tanzania as a stable and progressive democracy(Vesely, 2001). One could expect and argue that all of these in cidentshad negative impacts on the tourism in Tanzania, and thus a specialpart in Chapter 4: Tourism and Marketing will be allocated toward themarketing of a destination in crisis.   The above chapter has outlined that Tanzania’s tourism industry isperforming very well, and that indeed the UK tourists are their primemarket. In fact, there were even overbooking last year, due to suchhigh demand. Consequently, there are new resorts opening up and it isquestionable to whether one should further exploit the tourismopportunities, in the light of sustainable development and tourism.  Ã‚   Although modern mass tourism only appeared post war 1950’s (Weaver andOppermann, 2000 and Winpenny, 1991), the results that uncontrolledexploitation of tourism opportunities has shown is catastrophic, as canbe seen on examples such as the Spanish coast (Richards and Hall,2000). Thus unsurprisingly, sustainability is arguably the new fad wordin the tourism industry, since many destinations now faceenvironmental, socio-cultural and even economical damages caused by thechaotic growth of (mass) tourism. In fact; â€Å"There are examples fromalmost every country in the world, where tourism development has beenidentified as being the main cause of environmental degradation†(Lickorish and Jenkins, 1999:85).   Therefore, the practice of sustainable development is of crucialimportance. The definition offered at the Globe ’90 Conference inVancouver for sustainable tourism and development was as followed;â€Å"Sustainable tourism development is envisaged as leading to managementof all resources in such a way that we can fulfil economic, social andaesthetic needs while maintaining cultural integrity, essentialecological processes, biological diversity and life support systems†(Tourism Stream Action Committee 1990, Ledbury cited in Hein, 1997:30). Tourism’s impacts can be divided into three elements; economical,environmental and socio-cultural (Coltman, 1989). Thus, those are thethree headings that not only the sustainable debate, but also otheroutcomes should be measured at. Therefore, according to sustainabletourism, three points have to be achieved through tourism development: 1.  Ã‚  Ã‚   Increasing economic value of tourism 2.  Ã‚  Ã‚   An improvement in the life quality of people 3.  Ã‚  Ã‚   Protection and responsible use of natural resources (Keyser, 2002)    And also consumers are responding to this new sustainability â€Å"trend.In fact, mainstream consumer preferences are being influenced by thismovement for responsible forms of tourism (Goodwin cited in Jenkins etal. 2002).   And Butcher (2003) notes on an important shift to a growthin ethical consumption. Thus, sustainability also indirectly influencesthe economic impact, in terms of consumer choices for sustainability.   Especially our target market, the UK, seems to show an interest incriticism of tourism development and â€Å"bad tourism and tourists† (Allenand Brennan, 2005). Therefore, sustainability development and tourismshould be practiced by the Tanzania government and tourism industry.Not only because it will help to ensure that the environment will notget too spoi led and thus leave good prospects for future tourismbusiness, but also because it might arguably be seen as favourable bythe UK target market.   The involvement of governments in the process of tourism promotionarguably varies in levels depending on the country. And thus thequestion arises whether and when governments should be involved, notonly in the marketing, but in the business of tourism. Jeffries (2001) argues that due to the cooperation and coordinationrequired, due to the complexity of the industry and its products,debatably only the government has the authority and apparatus toorganize such successfully. Furthermore does he outline that â€Å"in verypoor developing countries (such as Tanzania) governments are encouragedby aid programmes to use tourism not only as a tool to combat povertybut as a means for encouraging and financing biodiversity and natureconservation, a matter of considerable interest in donor communities†(Jeffries, 2001:106). Therefore, it could be suggested that the governments involvement seemsof crucial importance to the success of Tanzania’s tourism future, butalso to the country in itself in terms of sustainability on theeconomic, environmental and socio-cultural aspect. In fact, the Tanzanian government seems to have recognized such, andis highly concerned with improving the infrastructure quality anddiversity, ease of destination entry formalities, revision ofapplicable taxes and maintenance of peace, stability and security,regulation of foreign exchange regulations and controls (TanzaniaGovernment Online 2). â€Å"†¦. marketing is a strategic process that aims to fit the resources ofa destination to the opportunities existing in the market† (Godfrey andClarke, 2000:125). Following the thought of this quote, one couldpostulate that marketing is finding a way to identify the market whichwill be interested in the resources available. Before the promotion of the destination starts, a marketing plan should be established. The marketing process which results in a marketing plan should focus on answering four questions: †¢Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Where are we now? [situation analysis; PEST and Porter’s 5forces and SWOT]; †¢Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Where do we want to be? [marketing objectives]; †¢Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   How do we get there? [strategies and tactics]; †¢Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   How do we know if we’ve got there? [monitoring; before-and-afterresearch, marketing productivity ratios, evaluation and control]. (Godfrey and Clarke, 2000) This should then lead to 2 different marketing plans, a 3-5 yearstrategic marketing plan, setting the outlines for the activities andthe directions for the annual plans. And the annual or the tacticalmarketing plan which should have detailed actions and methods formonitoring achievement (Godfrey and Clarke, 2000). Then it is important to look at the consumer behaviour. The consumerbuying process can be broken down into five steps: Problem Recognition,Information Search, Evaluation of Alternatives, Purchase, Post-PurchaseEvaluation or behaviour (Dibb et al., 2001 and Kotler et al. 1993:47).It is debatably of crucial importance to understand the behaviour ofthe consumers, as especially during the information search and theevaluation of alternatives stages they are faced with so many possibletourism destinations. Pike (2004) argues that consumers nowadays havemore product choices but less decision making time than ever before.Therefore underlining that the means in which the consumer comes incontact with the marketing effort of Tanzania, arguably needs to bememorable and favourable. Pike (2004) further outlines this by arguingthat the size of a consumer’s decision set of destinations will belimited to approximately four, and destinations not included in thatset, are much less likely to be chosen.   Next the market segment for Tanzania needs to be identified. â€Å"A marketsegment can be defined as ‘a subgroup of the total consumer marketwhose members share common characteristics relevant to the purchase oruse of the product’† (Holloway, 2004: 116). There are different types of segmentation; geographic segmentation,demographic segmentation, psychographic segmentation and behaviouralsegmentation (Kotler et al. 1999). Due to the given constraints, it isimpossible to undertake serious market segmentation in thisdissertation. After the segmentation has been decided upon, the destination needspositioning. The successful implementation needs to follow these sevensteps. 1. Identify the target market in travel context 2. Identify the competitive set of destinations in the target market and travel context. 3. Identify the motivation/benefits sought by previous visitors and non-visitors. 4. Identify perception of the strengths and weaknesses of each of the competitive set of destinations. 5. Identify opportunities for differentiated positioning. 6. Select and implement the position. 7. Monitor the performance of the positioning strategy over time.   Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚   (Pike, 2004:117) The positioning elements consist of the destination name, a symbol anda slogan (Pike, 2004). The name, in a case for a tourist destination isnaturally already given, However, the Tanzanian government should thinkof a creative symbol that will stay in people’s mind. Also (accordingto Pike, 2004) does Tanzania not have a slogan yet, therefore a catchyslogan such as â€Å"I  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   New York† should be developed. All of those efforts will help in creating a brand image. A brand ismore than a symbol; it’s a promise to the consumer, and thus representsmore than a logo (Pike, 2004). And since holidays are a high-riskpurchase, due to the fact that the tourist can neither directly observewhat is being bought nor try it out (Goodall and Ashworth, 1988), itseems of vital importance that a strong brand image is developed. Andbrand loyalty can be easily measured by repeat and referral customers(Pike, 2004). There are three marketing strategies that lead to commercial success;low cost leadership, differentiation (high added value) and focus(specialization to uniqueness) (Holloway, 2004). From the aboveanalysis it could be argued that Tanzania does not rely on low costleadership, but rather on a differentiation strategy. In fact;â€Å"Differentiation is the path chosen by most brand leaders in anyindustry† (Holloway, 2004:270). The next step should be to communicate information and messages to thepublic, which can be done through four different ways; advertising,personal selling, sales promotion and publicity (Holloway, 2004). The advertising can take numerous forms and can vary from persuasive toreminder advertising, variations from high to low budget, from a moodor image to a fantasy or a lifestyle message, from newspaper totelevision, direct mail to radio and magazines to the timing of themedia (and many more) (Kotler et al., 1999). The success can be measured in the communication effect through copytesting. The pre-testing through the direct rating should naturally bedone prior to the release of the advertising. And for post-testing anadvertisement, recall tests or recognition tests can be used (ibid.).The sales effect should be measured, which however proves a ratherdifficult task. Although there often is a relationship betweenpromotional spend on sales, the exact correlation is almost impossibleto establish, due to so many other influences (Holloway, 2004). The RETOSA (Regional Tourism Organization of Southern Africa) marketingresearch and promotions manager Francis Mfune says that they need totarget the trade, especially wholesalers if they want to promote theirtourist destinations well (Ruggia, 2004, II). Therefore, it could beadvised that the government tries and establish good relations withwholesalers in the UK.   The public relation is another promotional tool for the government ofTanzania. However, arguably not always are the public relationscontrollable. As can be demonstrated on the case were some tourismofficials of Tanzania, Kenya and Ethiopia blaming the negative mediapublicity which portrays Africa as a terrorist continent, for thebusiness loss in their tourism industries (Verde, 2003). The PR activities vary from press relations to product publicity,corporate communication, lobbying and counselling (Kotler et al. 1999).The Tanzanian government could use PR promotion in the form ofpublications, special events, news, and speeches (ibid.) And as for promoting Tanzania under the current problems with crime andterrorism, there are some steps to marketing of a destination in crisis: Step 1: Identify the event/problem as either a crisis or a hazard Step 2: Establish a crisis management team (Media and PR, relationswith the travel industry in source markets, destination responsecoordination with the local tourism industry, liaison with local andregional tourism authorities and foreign governments, governmentsadvisories and travel insurance and alliances with tour operators,airlines and hospitality industry representatives servicing thedestination in source markets) Step 3: Promoting the destination during and after a crisis Step 4: Monitoring recovery and analysing the crisis experience (Beirman, 2003).    In the methodology, it will be outlined how theresearch was conducted, which designs and methods were used as well ashow the data was collected and an explanation of why the particularmethods were used. The research process onion (please see Appendix IIon page 34) developed by Saunders et al. (2003; 83) was used asguidance and hopefully helps elucidate resea rch method and methodologyused to the reader.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   1. Research philosophy The research philosophy is represented by two different corners ofthought; the realist (objectivist) and the relativist (subjectivist)(Saunders et al., 2003). Realist: positivistic, a stance of a natural scientist, believes inquantitative data and external realities. Relativist: interpretivism,believes in qualitative research and the social construction of reality(Saunders et al., 2003). It places a rather difficult task to identify which philosophy theresearch was based on, as there are parts of both corners apparent.However, the realist corner arguably was more present. To furtherexamine the different philosophies, it would be advisable to look atrealism and relativism in the view of ontology and epistemology.Ontology is described as the â€Å"assumptions we make about the nature ofreality† (Easterby-Smith et al. 2002: 31), while epistemology is theâ€Å"general set of assumptions about the best ways of inquiring into thenature of the world† (Easterby-Smith et al. 2002: 31). 1.1 How do we know what is valid During the first part of the dissertation, the research was focused onsecondary research, including some quantitative data. The disparitybetween some of the research makes it difficult to depict a clearpicture. The realist perspective sees validity in whether the researchprocedures can supply an accurate illustration of reality(Easterby-Smith, 2002). Arguably this proves almost impossible in the country of Tanzania, dueto the differences between Tribes, as well as due to the lack offormally conducted research, and the disparity of locations andconditions of living standards of people. However, for the secondaryresearch conducted about the theories of tourism, sustainability andmarketing, a reliable picture should have been depicted on the varioustheories and concepts. All the secondary data was gathered from books,academic journals, online databases such as Ebscohost.com, newspaperarticles and online resources. As for the primary research, only a small sample of research wasconducted, making the reliability of this preposterous. However, theprimary research was mainly used to tests some of the marketingtheories, to elucidate which efforts would be worth furtherconsidering. The reliability of the research is arguably more positive,as it is unlikely that the respondents would have given differentanswers to a different person. The generalizability of the research islimited however, although it might give insights into countries with asimilar tourism package, the research was made solely with Tanzania inmind.   2. Research Approach There are two different research approaches, one is theory testing,namely the deductive approach, and one is theory building, namely theinductive approach (Saunders et al., 2003). Again, it is most difficultto apply one approach only to the research. In the first part, thetheory is outlined, and in the primary research, it is tested. However,by no means can it be claimed that this dissertation has build atheory, and thus it is arguably more of a deductive research approach. 3. Research Strategies â€Å"By a research strategy, we simply mean a general orientation to theconduct of business research† (Bryman and Bell, 2003:25). Bryman andBell however focused the research strategy on the distinction betweenresearches being conducted through quantitative or qualitative data.Whereas Saunders et al. (2003) see the research strategy more as ageneral plan of how one goes about answering the research question. 3.1 Case Study Daymon and Holloway (2002) describe the case study research as arigorous examination which uses multiple sources of evidence of asingle entity, which is fixed by time and place. It is best used wheninvestigations into the how and why are done. Saunders et al. (2003)see case studies as investigations into a timely topic, using numeroussources of evidence and collection methods including; questionnaires,observations, interviews and documentary analysis. In the first part of the dissertation, the focus was on giving aclearer picture of the product to be marketed. Because arguably, if onedoes not know what it is that has to be marketed, one can not identifythe means required to market the destination successfully. Therefore, firstly the country Tanzania was introduced, then the stateof tourism in Tanzania, followed by a brief outline of the timely issueof sustainability in tourism. Furthermore there is the chapter abouttourism and the government. Then the marketing means were identified,which could possibly yield a good result in attracting UK customers toTanzania, however, to tests whether those means had any ground to standon, the questionnaires were conducted, to analyse the peoples responseto the suggested means. Therefore, the how is attempted to be answered,and sometimes also the why.   4. Time horizons Again there was a mixed approach. For the first part of thedissertation, there was a longitudinal time horizon in some aspects, asthere were some historical facts. However, the main focus of timehorizon for this dissertation will be the cross-sectional, as it isfocused on what are the means nowadays, to attract UK tourists toTanzania (Saunders et al. 2003). 5. Data collection methods 5.1 Sampling Non-probability sampling was used in line with the case study approach(Saunders et al., 2003). Only 20 face to face interviews wereundertaken, which actually represents a very small sample from thenumerous possible UK tourists. This was done using purposive samplingin a homogenous way (Saunders et al., 2003). People who came outside ofa travel agent were asked to complete the face-to-face interviews withquestionnaire which consisted of specific questions 5.2 Market Research Questionnaires The questionnaire was constructed for the use of face-to-facesemi-structured interviews (Birn, 2000). The questionnaire had somestructured questions, being fixed-choice and pre-coded, and somestructured questions without fixed-choice (ibid.). To capture the data,note taking on the inquirers side was undertaken. 5.3 Questionnaire design Following is a brief outline of the various issues considered when designing a questionnaire:    Wording; tiny changes in the wording can lead to completely different responses (Foddy, 1993).   Design; as well as layout is of vital importance to avoid confusion (Sanchez cited in Bulmer, 2004). Sequence; the answer the respondents gives to one question, mightaffect the answer to the next question, thus paying attention tosequencing is important (Foddy, 1993). Sensitivity; especially when formulating sensible questions (Foddy, 1993). Memory; unfortunately, there are limits to the human memory (Foddy, 1993). In order to avoid ambiguity in the interpretation of the questions, thequestionnaire was pre-tested to ensure only one possible interpretationof the questions was possible (Noelle-Neumann, cited in Bulmer, 2004).But one has to take into account, that even if the questions areclearly understood by the respondents, there may still be variations inwhat respondent’s say, as to what they actually mean or do (Lave et al.1977 Clement, 1982, cited in Machin, 2002). 6. Data Analysis The data from the face-to-face questionnaires was analyzed in a simplebasic way. Each question was analyzed by itself. The number of times acertain answer was given was counted and shown as findings. The answersin conjunction with the literature, mainly from chapter 4, were thenfurther interpreted in the interpretation of findings 7. Research Ethics The questionnaires were designed (hopefully) in a sensible way so thatpeople should not have felt uncomfortable answering the questions. 8. Politics of access There were no issues in regards to politi

Tuesday, August 20, 2019

How Perception Affects Tourism In Thailand Tourism Essay

How Perception Affects Tourism In Thailand Tourism Essay This chapter is aiming to give an overview of related theories and perceptions those affect to tourism industry. The review also includes the concept of beneficial image, the image of Thailand and heritage tourism and also provide concept which previously has been developed by different researchers who undertaking the research study in similar approach. How Perception Affect Tourism The term perception of the tourism industry is, generally, can be viewed in two aspects. The first one is the mental image created by marketing and media. Another aspect of image can be developed by the consumers. In general, the destination will market itself as much as possible in order to persuade the traveller to buy a trip there (Tuohino, 2002 cited from Henkel et al, 2006). Travellers go to the destination in order to consume the products, services and experiencing to those offering at the destination. Travellers will form their perceptions related to their expectation which are based on their former experience, friends, the internet, marketing and travel agent information (Kotkew, Bowen Markens, 2006). Thus, if products or services in particular destination exceed traveller expectation, which means they are satisfied. On the other hand, travellers are dissatisfied when their expectations are not met (Mcdowall, 2010). According to Crompton (1979), people travel for four different reasons: personal business travel; corporate business travel; visiting relatives and friends; and for pleasure vacation. Therefore, tourists have stereotypical image of different perception and travel locations, so it is important for tourism marketers to promote the destination image to increase the number of tourists (Sirgy Su, 2000). Moreover, the individuals cultural belonging and heritage does not only affect the way people experience and interpret the products and services supplied to them, but it also influence their decision making in regard to choices of vacations and destinations. Furthermore, customers have different perception and individual needs, which hold different values to a destination. The collection of customer information is a way to discover the customer needs and their values. Thus, customers benefit the destination in the way of customers tastes and preferences which can directly contribute to ma rketing new product and services in tourism industry (Reportforu, 2010). Fakeye and Crompton (1991), has outlined the tourists image formation process (see Figure 1). It can be explained from this Figure that the consumers organic images and the induced image of tourist destination can be obtained from elsewhere, i.e. literature, friends or relatives. These messages play a significant role and influence the evaluation of alternative travel destinations and finally in making a decision about the destination they will visit (cited from Henkel et al, 2006). Hu Ritchi (1993) stated that the more tourists think that the destination will satisfy their vacation desires, the more likely the visitors will choose the destinations. Figure 1: Faye and Cromptons Tourists Image Formation Process (Tuohino,2002). Conceptualisation of beneficial image It was described by the previous study on destination image that a destinations image could contribute to the destination-making process. During this process, travelers build a destination image based on the informative and persuasive information such as friends, news and travel agency (Rittichainuwat, 2001). Thus, an effective destination image strategy will be very important in order to make the particular destination differentiation from other countries. Cromton (1979) states that not all images can be influenced to traveler decision making process. The research examines the relationships between the attribute of a destination and decision-making process of tourists. Therefore, understanding the evaluative of destination characteristic image related to destination choice is needed in tourism marketing. Moreover, Kotler and Barich (1991) states that consumer will form an image based on benefit or value that they expect to get from those products or services. Sheth, Newman, and Gross (1991) suggested that marketing choice behavior is a multidimensional phenomenon involving multiple values: functional, social, emotional, epistemic, and conditional (see Appendix 1). The study also states that these seven important factors are influencing market choice behaviour. Based on the theory and marketing image concept, the beneficial image model was developed by Tappachai and Waryszak is shown as below. Figure 2: Beneficial image model (Tapachai Waryszak, 2000) Figure 2 shows traveller consumption values which are in the beneficial image model. These five consumption values including functional characteristic of the destinations, Social perception about the destination, emotional of traveller through the destination, epistemic of the destination which traveller can gain new experience from the destination and conditional such as accessibility to other countries that will help visitor to decide about their destinations. (Tapachai Waryzak, 2000, cited from Henkel et al, 2006). By using Thailand as an example to describe the model above, Thailands functional values are fascinating bargain shopping, variety of food and beautiful scenery site. The social consumption will be a destination that suitable for all ages of people. The emotional value is about a place of to relax and calm. An epistemic value is a beautiful culture in Thailand and finally the conditional value is mainly about the location which traveller can easily access to other coun tries. According to Echtner Ritchie (1993), the destination image refers to attributes base or holistic (imagery), with each component containing functional (tangible) or psychological (intangible or abstract) characteristic ( Echtner Ritchie, 1993). The attributes perspectives are including tourists perceptions through the characteristics of the vacation destination such as beautiful architecture and buildings, numerous cultural, historical attractions and psychological characteristic like safe place to visit and also friendly people. Moreover, the holistic perspective of the destination relates to destination image in terms of physical characteristic such as beaches, mountain, likewise the psychological are the destinations atmosphere or mood (Echtner Ritchie, 1993 cited from Henkel et al). Rod Davies (2003) explained that every destination have its own brand image. Also, the factors like cost and convenience play an important role in decision-making of the destination. However, the strongest influence and motivator is the image of the tourism destination (Davies, 2003). Therefore, images are the brand identity which tourist can be perceived. In addition, images can be both increase and decrease the selection of the destination by traveller (Henkel et al). However, Bigne et al. (2001) argued that image is not only influences the destination choice, but also has an influence on the evaluation of the destination after the vacation. It can be explained that whether or not traveller will return to the destination (Bigne et al, 2001 cited from Henkel et al). Moreover, a high positive image of particular destination is more likely to be chosen by tourist in the process of decision-making (Echtner Ritchie, 1993). In conclusion, image play an important role for tourist satisfa ction and the preconceive image of destination will influence tourist decision on their vacation destination. The image of Thailand Destination image can be both positive and negative image, if two destinations have almost offering the same characteristics for traveller perception. Therefore, the more positive image of a destination place, the more likely that traveler will go there (Rittichainuwat, 2001). Thailand is not only positioning as a land of smile as a result of friendly people and a safe place destination, but also considerable as cultural, natural and historical attractions. Due to the study of Yau and Chan on the image of Southeast Asian, Thailand has been perceived as a reasonable price, beautiful beaches and various attractions (Rittichainuwat, 2001). In addition, Tapachai Waryszak conduct a study about benefit image characteristic of Thailand and grouped the results of research showed that the functional attributes of cheap shopping, variety of food, friendly people and historical sites as well as the epistemic attribute of experiencing rich culture in Thailand (Henkel et al, 2006). Furthermore, the research between Tourism Authority in Thailand (TAT) and Siam University showed the result that there was a positive image as a natural and historical travel destination (Henkel et al., 2006). This positive image can be reflected by the award winning destination from differ ent countries, for example, International Tourisms Bourse Berlin (ITB), awarded the four go Asia Awards honouring best service provides for travel to Asia in 2010, the Swedish grand travel award has ranked Thailand as the World Best Tourist Country However, Thailand has also suffered from a negative image because of prostitution, pollution which led to the decline of tourist attractions (Rittichainuwat et al., 2001). Prideaux et al. (2004) has also stated that the image of Thailand is an erotic destination. In addition, the image of Thailand also related to international news coverage by saying that Thailand is a place of prostitution. These negative images can, obviously, affect visitors and might make them do not want to visit Thailand. This also leads to the cause of some health and moral issues in Thailand (Henkel et al., 2001). However, the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) never promotes Thailand as a sex tourism destination (Prideaux et al., 2004). Suwanmolis study about international media coverage of prostitution in Thailand, the result found that foreign reporters usually report the negative side such AIDS and prostitution because this kind of news very easily get attention from publics. Moreover, Suwanmoli explaine d that there are a high number of as many as 2.8 million prostitutes working in Thailand (Rittichainuwat, 2001). Therefore, the government should be concerned of this issue in order to minimize the pandemic deceases and prostitution. Alternatively, Thai government must actively seek to reduce the images of negative such as sex tourism through positive image marketing of other tourism products and trying to decrease the illegal activities such as prostitution within the country (Henkel et al, 2006). Finally, Thailands image has suffered from a declination of tourist attractions, pollution, traffic jam, lack of new tourist attractions and the image of sex tourism. Additionally, Ahmed states that once a negative image is established in the minds of potential travelers, even a full range of marketing activities cannot entirely reverse it. Thus, Marketers only able to do little to eliminate the negative image. In contrast, marketer can offset the negative perception by creating positive images through promotional strategies, including advertising, arranging the events, and hosting international conventions and exhibitions (Rittichainuwat, 2001). Heritage Tourism The vast majority of literature on heritage, apart from the philosophical and intellectual, has concerned itself with heritage tourism, a sector that has grown globally and also created the revenue and employment for undeveloped countries (Misiura, 2006). According to The World Tourism Organisation (1992) defines heritage tourism as an immersion in the natural history, human heritage, arts, philosophy and intuitions of another region or country (Laws Pan, 2004). Moreover, Rowan and Baram (2004) describe heritage tourism as a consumerist phenomenon and hence marketing of this phenomenon is bound to be driven by capitalist tendencies. (cited from Chabra, 2009). Thus, the core of heritage marketing is to find out what the customer want and deliver it. Particularly, in relation to built environment, i.e., the marketing activity should be design to stimulate demand and satisfy the customer but not to the detriment of that which needs to preserves for future generation (Misiura, 2006, p.2 ). Yale (1991), explains that the heritage tourism is a centred on what we inherited from historic buildings, to art works, to beautiful scenery. Ashworths (2000) defined the comodification and the past in heritage tourism which is based on the commoditized, building, memories and experiences of the past (cited from Grace Yan et al). From the demand aspect, the heritage tourism is about finding something which is linking between the present and the past and traveller emotional experiences (Richards 1997 and Prentice 1993). However, Poria et al. (2001) argued that the relationship of heritage tourism should be based on the individual and the heritage presented rather than on specific site attributes. In addition, they described heritage tourism as a subgroup of tourism, in which the main motivation for visiting a site is based on the places heritage characteristics according to tourists perception of their own heritage (Poria et al., 2001, p. 1048). Also, in order to combined both supply and demand by explaining that heritage tourism relies on the strength of both the push and pull factors of the resources located in area in order to appeal to the potential tourists (Apostolakis (2003, p. 800) Cited from Grace Yan et al). Heritage visitor, try to find the different benefits from trips.. Poria et al. (2004) pointed out that the reasons for visiting heritage sites for travellers can be grouped places in to three categories which are under the headings of heritage experience, learning. These explain that there are people with a strong interest in emotionally involved with a sense of belonging to the site. In contrast, for some tourists, heritage tourism is more than an educational or recreational experience. This further suggested by Martin et al. (2004, p.131), determining the potential of heritage tourism and the possible impact and the marketing direction needed to attract these visitors will be less speculative if the nature of the tourist is better understood World Heritage is the programme administered by the UNESCO, the programme aims to catalogue, name, and conserve sites of outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common heritage of humanity and to raise awareness of how to maintain the sites to last for future generations of humanity (Thaiwh, 2010). In Thailand, there are World Heritage sites of Ayutthaya, Sukhothai, Si Satchanalai and Kamphaengphet provinces. There are rich heritage and magnificent architecture that make them as The World Heritage sites which are listed in 1991 by UNESCO (UNESCO, 1992). Therefore, the marketing of heritage, especially heritage tourism will contribute the benefit in order to serve the products and services to customers relate to those World heritage sites in Thailand. It can be seen that strategic planning has been used within many organizations. The successful travel and tourism must not only understand who the customers are but also know how to market them in order to satisfy the needs of their customers. In addition, tourism organisations should identify group of customers with homogeneous characteristics and behaviors and try to adapt their offer to the unique needs and desires of the segment members. Heritage marketing, therefore, is both management philosophy and as set of business techniques. It is very important to recognise that the management of tourism will be ineffective without an understanding of the way tourists consumers make decisions and act in relation to the consumption of tourism products. This research not only provides an oppor tunity for people to fulfill their individual needs, but exceeding their expectations and ensuring that it benefits greatly toward the World Heritage sites in Thailand (Reportforu, 2010). Conclusion The literature reviewed has provided general information about the perception of the tourists through the image of Thailand and Thailands image dimensions. However, the review has also identified both positive and negative image which affected to tourists destination choice. It is worth noting that the concepts described in previous articles, journals and text book, are pertaining and believed to have a direct effect on to the research model which is proposed in the current investigation. Therefore, the proposed research model and hypotheses formulation will be discussed in following chapter.

Monday, August 19, 2019

The Holocaust :: European Europe History

Holocaust Throughout the movie, "The Holocaust", the phrase, "I just do my job," was usually the only excuse most people who committed crimes against the Jews could come up with. For example, when Helena and Rudy Weiss were staying in Kiev, the city was bombed. During the bombing, one of the Nazi soldiers, who happened to be Heinz Muller, a friend of Inga's family, was hit by falling debris. Hesitant, Rudy helped Muller escape from the collapsing building, gave him some water, and asked him why he was taking part in the mistreatment of the Jews. "I obey orders," Muller replied, unrepentant about what he did. Also, when Bertha Weiss was sent to the gas chambers in Auschwitz, Dr. Joseph Weiss asked the Kapo what happened to her. The lady bluntly retorted, "Don't blame me, I just take orders." Whether to keep a job, remain loyal to their cause, or just because they had no other excuse, everyone used that phrase to justify what they did wrong against the Jews. Anti-Semitism and unfair grudges are two factors that can cause Genocide. During the movie, Eric Dorf claimed he did not feel bad about Kristallnacht or what happened to the Jews, because he said the Jews provoked it. Even though Kristallnacht was the first major pogrom, a government sponsored attack on the Jews, and was terribly destructive, Eric said that they killed Christ and they deserved what they got (The Holocaust). In addition, Heydrich believed that Germans and the Aryan race was superior to the Jewish race and they had to "isolate the germ carriers" (The Holocaust), so he decided to go through with the plan for Jewish ghettos. The ghettos were intended to hold the Jews in a temporary Jewish community until they could be efficiently exterminated. This demonstrates how Anti-Semitism and grudges can produce Genocide. In the video, "Conversations With Oprah: Elie Wiesel", Wiesel explains that the most important lesson to be learned from what happened during the Holocaust is to not be indifferent, but to still be human in spite of everything that happened. He said he believed that the opposite of love is not hate, but rather indifference, because indifference can not be fought (Conversations). Not being indifferent is important in preventing another Holocaust in the future. "When you have a choice to make and you don't make it, that in itself is a choice," William James once said.

Sunday, August 18, 2019

Distributed Denial of Service Attacks Essay -- DDoS Attacks, Cyber Ter

Within the last decade, the internet has proven to be the most efficient way to complete tasks in today’s society. Every major business in today’s society relies on the internet to conduct business. Though the internet is a useful tool, our reliability on it opens up the door for cyber-attacks that can be detrimental to business as a whole. One example of a cyber-attacks that have recently started becoming more prevalent are DDoS attacks. Recently, DDoS attacks have been a rising issue for businesses owners who run their own servers, such as video game companies and other high profile web servers, including banks and other credit card payment gateways. A DDoS attack, distributed denial of service attack, is when one or more individuals attempt to force a network offline and unavailable to its intended users. This process is typically performed by flooding a network with communication requests until the server cannot respond to the traffic, thus making the server go offline and become available. This process is relatively simple to perform to the average person through online programs. Since it is so easy perform, it has become a rising issue simply because anyone has the ability to hack into various servers. One example in recent news of DDoS attacks comes from Riot Games, developer of the popular online multiplayer video game League of Legends. After a month of inconsistency with their server stability and frequent shut downs, Riot Games reported that within the l... Distributed Denial of Service Attacks Essay -- DDoS Attacks, Cyber Ter Within the last decade, the internet has proven to be the most efficient way to complete tasks in today’s society. Every major business in today’s society relies on the internet to conduct business. Though the internet is a useful tool, our reliability on it opens up the door for cyber-attacks that can be detrimental to business as a whole. One example of a cyber-attacks that have recently started becoming more prevalent are DDoS attacks. Recently, DDoS attacks have been a rising issue for businesses owners who run their own servers, such as video game companies and other high profile web servers, including banks and other credit card payment gateways. A DDoS attack, distributed denial of service attack, is when one or more individuals attempt to force a network offline and unavailable to its intended users. This process is typically performed by flooding a network with communication requests until the server cannot respond to the traffic, thus making the server go offline and become available. This process is relatively simple to perform to the average person through online programs. Since it is so easy perform, it has become a rising issue simply because anyone has the ability to hack into various servers. One example in recent news of DDoS attacks comes from Riot Games, developer of the popular online multiplayer video game League of Legends. After a month of inconsistency with their server stability and frequent shut downs, Riot Games reported that within the l...

Essay --

Anti-Social Personality Disorder is a classified personality disorder in which a person, sometimes referred to as a â€Å"psychopath†, has a lack of empathy, an increased chance of acting violently towards others, and a complete disregard for authority and punishment. Prevalent features and symptoms include: shallow emotions, irresponsibility, mistrust of others, reckless thrill-seeking, disrespect for the law, prone to lash out with physical violence, harmful impulsiveness, arrogance, manipulative, greedy, lack of kindness or compassion, disrespect for others, and dishonesty (Psychology Today, n.d.). A main factor of this disorder is the inability to process, interpret, and display emotion, even fear. An example is that most criminals with this disorder respond drastically different to their sentencing than normal. They seem relaxed and unable to process it on an emotional level. They are also fully aware of what they are doing, and have no sense of distorted reality, or rem orse which classifies them as sane people. They also have neurotransmitter deficiencies in the brain, such as reduced serotonin and dopamine (Freedman & Verdun-Jones, 2010). The overall population of people having this disorder is a small amount, about 3% and higher in prisons and abuse clinics which is around 70%. Also, because of their constant involvement in violence, most people diagnosed with this disorder die by violent means such as suicide and homicide (Internet Mental Health, n.d.). People with Anti-Social Personality Disorder have also been found to have an impaired learning condition, notably a term called Response Reversal. This is defined as a change of behavior following a reversal of a previously established relationship between events and their re... ...mental disorder is not the same as a definition of that mental disorder, and even though PPD indeed synonymous with antisocial personality disorder, they are different terms for the same disorder (Hart & Cook, 2012). Another argument is that PPD could be caused by a combination of different personality disorders, and not just one, as well as many environmental patterns, not just genetic (Association for Psychological Science, n.d.). In conclusion, Anti-Social Personality disorder has immense effects on people concerning empathy, violence, and even learning. It is also a very resistant disorder to treat. However, much needs to be learned about this disorder in order to help patients live normal lives, and can even be useful in establishing a treatment context for addressing conditions such as substance abuse, impulsive aggression, and schizophrenia ( Pajerla, 2007).

Saturday, August 17, 2019

Comparison of Indirect Cost Multipliers for Vehicle Manufacturing Essay

Disclaimer This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor The University of Chicago, nor any of their employees or officers, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of document authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof, Argonne National Laboratory, or The University of Chicago. COMPARISON OF INDIRECT COST MULTIPLIERS FOR VEHICLE MANUFACTURING INTRODUCTION In the process of manufacturing and selling vehicles, a manufacturer incurs certain costs. Among these costs are those incurred directly as a part of manufacturing operations and those incurred indirectly in the processes of manufacturing and selling. The indirect costs may be productionrelated, such as R&D and engineering; business-related, such as corporate staff salaries and pensions; or retail-sales-related, such as dealer support and marketing. These indirect costs are recovered by allocating them to each vehicle. Under a stable, high-volume production process, the allocation of these indirect costs can be approximated as multipliers (or factors) applied to the direct cost of manufacturing. A manufacturer usually allocates indirect costs to finished vehicles according to a corporation-specific pricing strategy. Because the volumes of sales and production vary widely by model within a corporation, the internal corporate percent allocation of various accounting categories (such as profit or corporate overhead) can vary widely among individual models. Approaches also vary across corporations. For our purposes, an average value is constructed, by means of a generic representative method, for vehicle models produced at high volume. To accomplish this, staff at Argonne National Laboratory’s (ANL’s) Center for Transportation Research analyzed the conventional vehicle cost structure and developed indirect cost multipliers for passenger vehicles. This memorandum summarizes the results of an effort to compare and put on a common basis the cost multipliers used in ANL’s electric and hybrid electric vehicle cost estimation procedures with those resulting from two other methodologies. One of the two compared methodologies is derived from a 1996 presentation by Dr. Chris Borroni-Bird of Chrysler Corporation, the other is by Energy and Environmental Analysis, Inc. (EEA), as described in a 1995 report by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA), Congress of the United States. The cost multipliers are used for scaling the component costs to retail prices. ANL METHODOLOGY The ANL methodology described here is based on an analysis concerned with electric vehicle production and operating costs (Cuenca et al. 2000; Vyas et al. 1998). The analysis evaluated the cost structure for conventional vehicle manufacturing and retailing and assigned shares of the manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) to various cost contributors. Multipliers developed from the ANL methodology are applied to the manufacturing cost of an individual component in order to scale the component cost to the retail price. Several cost contributors are included in the methodology, as summarized in Table 1. Some of the vehicle components for electric and hybrid electric vehicles would be procured from outside suppliers. This assumption is applied to electric drive components, excluding the battery; the vehicle manufacturer would produce the rest. Thus, two cost multipliers, one for the components manufactured internally and the other for outsourced components, are necessary to estimate the price of electric and hybrid electric vehicles. Outside suppliers would incur some of the costs normally borne by the vehicle manufacturer. In the ANL methodology, we assume that the costs of â€Å"Warranty,† â€Å"R&D/Engineering,† and â€Å"Depreciation and Amortization† are borne by the Page 1 suppliers of outsourced components. The outside suppliers would include these costs in their prices. The following two cost multipliers are computed by using â€Å"Cost of Manufacture† as the base: Cost multiplier for components manufactured internally = 100/50 = 2. 00. Cost multiplier for outsourced components = 100/(50 + 6. 5 + 5. 5 + 5) = 1. 50. Table 1 Contributors to Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price in ANL Methodology Cost Category Cost Contributor Relative to Share of Cost of Vehicle MSRP Manufacturing (%) Vehicle Manufacturing Cost of Manufacture 1. 00 50. 0 Production Overhead Warranty 0. 10 5. 0 R&D/Engineering 0. 13 6. 5 Depreciation and Amortization 0. 11 5. 5 Corporate Overhead Corporate Overhead, Retirement and 0. 14 7. 0 Health Selling Distribution, Marketing, Dealer 0. 47 23. 5 Support, and Dealer Discount Sum of Costs 1. 95 97. 5 Profit Profit 0. 05 2. 5 Total Contribution to 2. 00 100. 0 MSRP METHODOLOGY DERIVED FROM BORRONI-BIRD PRESENTATION In his presentation, entitled â€Å"Automotive Fuel Cell Requirements,† at the 1996 Automotive Technology Development Customers’ Coordination Meeting, Borroni-Bird included charts on the â€Å"Typical American Automobile: Price/Cost Breakdown. † The charts provided a graphical breakdown of vehicle price, showing cost contributors and profit. We used the charts to arrive at percentage shares of vehicle price by various contributors. Table 2 shows the resulting allocation. Page 2 Table 2 Price/Cost Breakdown Based on Borroni-Bird Presentation Cost Category Cost Contributor a Vehicle Manufacturing Fixed Cost Selling Sum of Costs Profit MSRP a Material Cost Assembly Labor and Other Manufacturing a Costs Transportation/Warranty Amortization and Depreciation, Engineering R&D, Pension and Health Care, Advertising, and Overhead Price Discounts Dealer Markup Automobile Profit. Relative to Cost of Vehicle Manufacturing 0. 87 0. 13 0. 09 0. 44 Share of MSRP (%) 42. 5 6. 5 4. 5 21. 5 0. 10 0. 36 1. 99 0. 06 2. 05 5. 0 17. 5 97. 5 2. 5 100. 0 These two contributors are scaled to sum to 1 in the third column, as in Table 1. In his presentation, Borroni-Bird did not evaluate the treatment of in-house or outsourced components. His methodology does not lend itself to easy computation of cost multipliers comparable with those in the ANL methodology, unless we make a few assumptions. We have assumed that â€Å"Material Cost,† taken together with â€Å"Assembly Labor and Other Manufacturing Costs,† would form the â€Å"Vehicle Manufacturing† base for the in-house components. The costs of â€Å"Transportation/Warranty,† â€Å"Amortization and Depreciation,† and â€Å"Engineering R&D† would be borne by the suppliers of outsourced components. However, â€Å"Amortization and Depreciation† and â€Å"Engineering R&D† costs were merged with â€Å"Pension and Health Care,† â€Å"Advertising,† and â€Å"Overhead† costs by Borroni-Bird. We assumed that half of the costs under this category would be borne by the suppliers of outsourced components. Our assumptions led to the following cost multipliers: Cost multiplier for components manufactured internally = 100/(42. 5 + 6. 5) = 2. 05. Cost multiplier for outsourced components = 100/(42. 5 + 6. 5 + 4. 5 + 10. 75) = 1. 56. These cost multipliers are very similar to those computed with the ANL methodology. Comparison of ANL and Borroni-Bird Methodologies The information from Tables 1 and 2 is shown in terms of cost categories in Table 3. Both methodologies use vehicle manufacturing cost as the base and add other costs to it. The share of MSRP attributable to â€Å"Vehicle Manufacturing† is 50% in the ANL methodology, compared with 49% in the Borroni-Bird Methodology. Borroni-Bird combined several cost contributors under â€Å"Fixed Cost. † These contributors include (see Table 2) â€Å"Amortization and Depreciation,† â€Å"Engineering R&D,† â€Å"Pension and Health Care,† â€Å"Advertising,† and â€Å"Overhead. † Except for the inclusion of â€Å"Advertising,† â€Å"Production Overhead† and â€Å"Corporate Overhead† in the ANL methodology can be combined to form an equivalent category. ANL’s total of 24% by production Page 3 and corporate overheads is slightly lower than the total of 26% by Borroni-Bird. The ANL category of â€Å"Selling,† which includes â€Å"Distribution,† â€Å"Marketing,† â€Å"Dealer Support,† and â€Å"Dealer Discount,† is broader than that of â€Å"Price Discounts† and â€Å"Dealer Markup† specified by BorroniBird, and this category’s contribution is understandably slightly higher in the ANL methodology. The share of MSRP by â€Å"Profit† is the same in both methodologies. The absolute differences, computed as ANL value minus Borroni-Bird value, are 1% for â€Å"Vehicle Manufacturing,† –2% for â€Å"Fixed Cost,† and 1% for â€Å"Selling† cost. Table 3 Comparison of Vehicle Price/Cost Allocation by ANL and Borroni-Bird Methodologies ANL Methodology Cost Contributor or Category Vehicle Manufacturing Production Overhead Corporate Overhead Selling Sum of Costs Profit MSRP EEA METHODOLOGY The methodology of Energy and Environmental Analysis is summarized in the OTA report OTAETI-638, entitled Advanced Automotive Technology: Visions of a Super-Efficient Family Car, published in September 1995. The values of some cost contributors are not listed in the report. Moreover, depreciation, amortization, and tooling expenses are assumed to be case-specific and therefore must be computed for each case. In order to make the EEA and ANL methodologies comparable, some assumptions were necessary. These assumptions are described in the summary below. The EEA cost equations can be simplified as follows: Cost of Manufacture = Division Cost ? [1 + Division Overhead] Manufacturer Cost = [Cost of Manufacture + Assembly Labor + Assembly Overhead] ? [1 + Manufacturing Overhead + Manufacturing Profit] + Engineering Expense + Tooling Expense + Facilities Expense Retail Price Equivalent = Manufacturer Cost ? [1 + Dealer Margin] Borroni-Bird Methodology Share of Cost Contributor or Category Share of MSRP (%) MSRP (%) 50. 0 Vehicle Manufacturing 49. 0 17. 0 Fixed Cost 26. 0 7. 0 23. 5 Selling 22. 5 97. 5 Sum of Costs 97. 5 2. 5 Automobile Profit 2. 5 100. 0 MSRP 100. 0 Page 4 The report lists the following values for overhead, profit, and dealer margin: Division Overhead = Supplier Overhead = 0. 20 (We assume that division and supplier overheads are equal; only the supplier overhead is given in the report. ) Manufacturing Overhead = 0. 25 Manufacturing Profit = 0. 20 Dealer Margin = 0. 25 Because the documentation in the OTA report does not provide values for â€Å"Assembly Labor,† â€Å"Assembly Overhead,† â€Å"Engineering Expense,† â€Å"Tooling Expense,† and â€Å"Facilities Expense,† cost multipliers cannot be computed directly from these data. The â€Å"Assembly Labor† and â€Å"Assembly Overhead† share of MSRP is 6. 5% in Borroni-Bird’s presentation. The engineering, tooling, and facilities expenses can be taken as the sum of â€Å"R&D/Engineering† and â€Å"Depreciation and Amortization† from the ANL methodology, at 12% of the MSRP. In deriving the division cost and price relationship below, we use the term Retail Price Equivalent (RPE) from the OTA report instead of MSRP. The RPE can be computed as follows: RPE = = = {[Division Cost ? 1. 2 + 0. 065 RPE] ? 1. 45 + 0. 12 RPE} ? 1. 25 Division Cost ? 2. 175 + 0. 268 RPE Division Cost ? 2. 175/(1 – 0. 268) = Division Cost ? 2. 97 Putting ANL and EEA Methodologies on a Common Basis As it was described in the OTA report, the EEA methodology did not provide enough data to compute the cost multipliers. We assumed some cost shares to be the same between the EEA, Borroni-Bird, and ANL methodologies while developing the above relationship between Division Cost and RPE. The EEA methodology is based on the material and labor costs of a division of the vehicle manufacturer, with other costs added on. The ANL methodology evaluates an assembled vehicle, using the vehicle manufacturing cost as the base cost. The ANL methodology also assigns additional costs to the outsourced components, whereas the treatment of such components is not clear in the EEA methodology. We have attempted to develop a common basis for the ANL and EEA methodologies by assigning shares of the final vehicle price, RPE in the EEA methodology, to individual cost categories similar to those listed in Table 1. Table 4 presents such a summary for the EEA methodology. Three cost contributors, â€Å"Division Cost,† â€Å"Division Overhead,† and â€Å"Assembly Labor and Overhead,† are combined under the â€Å"Vehicle Manufacturing† category. Two cost contributors, â€Å"Manufacturing Overhead† and â€Å"Engineering, Tooling, and Facilities Expenses,† combine to form the â€Å"Overhead† category. The â€Å"Dealer Margin† in the EEA methodology represents a factor applied to all manufacturer costs and profit. We assumed that this factor represents all costs of selling the vehicle. Although the profit is computed at the manufacturing level by EEA, we moved the profit to the bottom of the table to be consistent with prior tables. The cost allocation in Table 4 allows us to compute the in-house components cost multiplier as follows: Cost multiplier for in-house components = 100/(33. 7 + 6. 7 + 6. 5) = 2. 14 Page 5 To compute the cost multiplier for an outsourced component, one more assumption is necessary. In the ANL methodology, we assumed that the supplier will bear the costs of â€Å"Warranty,† â€Å"R&D Engineering,† and â€Å"Depreciation and Amortization. † However, the EEA methodology does not identify the warranty cost separately. We assumed it to be half of â€Å"Manufacturing Overhead† at 5. 05%. This, with the earlier assumption related to â€Å"Engineering, Tooling, and Facilities Expenses,† led to the following computation: Cost multiplier for outsourced components = 100/(33. 7 + 6. 7 + 6. 5 + 5. 05 + 12) = 1. 56. These multipliers, adapted from our extension of theE EA information on vehicle costs, are very close to those derived from the ANL and Borroni-Bird methodologies. Table 4 Contributors to Retail Price Equivalent in EEA Methodology Cost Category Cost Contributor a Vehicle Manufacturing Overhead Selling Sum of Costs Profit Manufacturing Profit Total Contribution to RPE a Division Cost a Division Overhead Assembly Labor and a Overhead Manufacturing Overhead Engineering, Tooling, and Facilities Expenses Dealer Margin Relative to Cost of Vehicle Manufacturing 0. 72 0. 14 0. 14 0. 22 0. 26 0. 49 1. 97 0. 17 2. 14 Share of RPE (%) 33. 7 6. 7 6. 5 10. 1 12. 0 22. 9 91. 9 8. 1 100. 0 These three cost contributors are scaled to sum to 1 in the third column, as in Table 1. Comparison of ANL and EEA Methodologies The information from Tables 1 and 4 is presented in terms of cost categories in Table 5 for easy comparison. The â€Å"Vehicle Manufacturing† cost share is 46. 9% in the EEA methodology, compared with 50% in the ANL methodology. EEA’s RPE share of 22. 1% by overhead is lower than the ANL value of 24%. The cost of selling is 22. 9% in the EEA methodology, which is close to the ANL value of 23. 5%. The largest difference is in the RPE share by profit, which is 8. 1% in the EEA methodology, more than three times the ANL value of 2. 5%. According to Economic Indicators: The Motor Vehicle’s Role in the U. S. Economy (American Automobile Manufacturers Association 1998), the average net income before taxes for the three domestic manufacturers was 3. 9% during 1994-1997. Aside from vehicle sales, this value (3. 9%) includes income from spare parts sales and vehicle financing. Thus, the profit share appears very high in the EEA methodology. The absolute differences – computed as ANL value minus EEA value – are 3. 1% for component/material cost, 1. 9% for overhead, 0. 6% for selling, and –5. 6% for profit. Page 6 Table 5 Comparison of Price Allocation by ANL and EEA Methodologies ANL Methodology Cost Contributor or Category Vehicle Manufacturing Production Overhead Corporate Overhead Selling Sum of Costs Profit MSRP SUMMARY An attempt to put three methodologies for automobile cost allocation on a common basis is presented in this technical memorandum. This comparison was carried out to verify the reasonableness of the cost multipliers used in ANL’s cost models for electric vehicles and hybrid electric vehicles. When put into a common format, by means of certain assumptions, the three approaches yielded the cost multipliers provided in Table 6. Table 6 Summary of Cost Multipliers Computed on a Common Basis Multiplier for In-House Components Outsourced Components ACKNOWLEDGMENT Funding for the analysis presented here was provided by the Planning and Assessment function of the Office of Transportation Technologies of the U. S. Department of Energy, managed by Dr. Philip Patterson. This technical memorandum is produced under U. S. Government contract No. W-31-109-Eng-38. REFERENCES American Automobile Manufacturers Association, 1998, Economic Indicators: The Motor Vehicle’s Role in the U. S. Economy, Detroit, Mich. Borroni-Bird, C. , 1996, â€Å"Automotive Fuel Cell Requirements,† Proceedings of the 1996 Automotive Technology Development Customers’ Coordination Meeting, U. S. Department of Energy, Office of Transportation Technologies, Washington, D. C. ANL 2. 00 1. 50 Borroni-Bird 2. 05 1. 56 EEA 2. 14 1. 56 EEA Methodology Share of Cost Contributor or Category MSRP (%) 50. 0 Vehicle Manufacturing 17. 0 Overhead 7. 0 23. 5 Selling 97. 5 Sum of Costs 2. 5 Profit 100. 0 RPE Share of RPE (%) 46. 9 22. 1 22. 9 91. 9 8. 1 100. 0 Page 7 Cuenca, R. M. , L. L. Gaines, and A. D. Vyas, 2000, Evaluation of Electric Vehicle Production and Operating Costs, Argonne National Laboratory Report ANL/ESD-41, Argonne, Ill. (to be published). Vyas, A. , R. Cuenca, and L. Gaines, 1998, â€Å"An Assessment of Electric Vehicle Life Cycle Costs to Consumers,† Proceedings of the 1998 Total Life Cycle Conference, SAE International Report P339, Warrendale, Penn. , pp. 161-172.