Sunday, October 6, 2019

About drinking Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

About drinking - Article Example The habit of drinking influences the way youth thinks about different aspects of life. Drinking also influences the youth’s perception of norms and values and the concept of good and bad. Excessive drinking becomes a habit of young adults when there is no one to stop them. Excessive drinking makes such adults cross the boundaries of ethics and moral. Drinking also creates a number of risks for the health of people. â€Å"Too much alcohol can lead to serious problems† (Zelman, 2005). Some of the widely observed risks are related to think abilities, liver’s functions, and hormonal changes. Drinking adversely affects the decision-making abilities of a young adult. Excessive drinking makes adults forget their moral and ethics. â€Å"Alcohol can activate a gene that has been linked to depression and other mental issues† (James, 2008). Excessive drinking not only create problems for the drinkers but also for the people whom they live with. Youth tends to be influenced easily by doing or watching any such thing, which inspires them. There are a number of causes of the rise of drinking habit in youth. Some of the major causes include influence caused by parents who are also habitual drinkers, escapism, problems in love life, and appreciation of the peers. â€Å"One of the common reasons why teenagers drink is because they have watched their parents rely on the bottle† (Lad, n.d.). When children grow up watching their parents drink, they also go for it because the behavior of parents puts a considerable effect on the minds of the children. â€Å"One of the causes of teenage drinking is that it soon becomes an addiction without youngsters realizing the negative effects† (Lad, n.d.). Many young people drink in order to escape from the hardships of life, such as, poor performance in school and college, problems in love life, and getting out of depression. Social influence is another major factor behind increase in the use of alcoholic

Saturday, October 5, 2019

Women's Involvement During Word War II Research Paper

Women's Involvement During Word War II - Research Paper Example The importance of this lay in the immense economic and sexual changes that then gave way to new formations in the family and the workplace. This paper shall look at these and the role that women had to play in the Second World War that led to the changes that have been talked of. The creation of the fictional character James Bond can be seen in the light of the wound that the collective masculinity of the British suffered following the Second World War. This can be seen in the hyper-masculine rhetoric that Ian Fleming employs in this series of novels where he builds up the British agent as a super-male. After the loss of colonies following the war, British soldiers returned home to find that many of their jobs had been taken up by the women who had till then been a part of the home and the family. They had, during the war, since many frontline positions had been taken up by the men, taken up the posts of office workers that had been left vacant. This shows that the women were a part of the war that created a void in the land where the war was not an everyday reality as it was on foreign land. This shows that the records of bravery that have been recorded regarding the war have been masculine accounts that have been made to suit the male needs of history. There are also accounts that say that women, especially those women who are a part of lower class backgrounds, have always worked for a living and to supplement their family’s income. In the cases of people of African American communities, it has always been the case that women have contributed a significant part to the economy of the land (â€Å"The Image and Reality of Women who Worked During World War II†, n.d.). Such commentators look at the recruitment of women during the Second World War as nothing but a channelization of the energies that women had directed towards other fields towards that of the war. This direction of energies towards the war resulted in an increase in the social status t hat was enjoyed by women and women of all races. A lot of the women were a part of the Nurse Corps that was instrumental in the reduction of the number of the casualties during the war. They were also sometimes a part of the army that fought at the frontline. Apart from this, there were women who were a part of the communities that stayed at home and created items that were necessary for the victory in the war. This included those women who worked in factories so as to keep the war a well-oiled machine and also those who would collect blood and roll bandages so as to keep the work of the nurses going. This led to great improvements in the way the war was fought and was also a great morale booster for the people who were at the frontline of the war (National Women’s History Museum, 2007). Despite these changes, even during the war, women were seen as secondary to the larger idea of serving the interests of the men who were at the forefront of the war. They were mostly paid les ser wages than the men and they were also viewed with a great deal of suspicion. This can be seen from the fact that they were not a significant part of the trade unions that came up following the war. They were also laid off by many employers or were forced to work at lesser wages than the men who returned from the war. This was very different from the attitudes that were adopted by the people who had employed them when there was an acute shortage of labor in the industries. What the women felt following the euphoria of the victory of the war was a sense of betrayal

Friday, October 4, 2019

Electronic Usage Policy Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Electronic Usage Policy - Research Paper Example Recent researches have shown an increase in the number of, individuals, especially in their workplaces, who access the internet everyday all over the world and these individuals have access to many databases, which may sometimes hold explicit, violent, prohibited and at times illegal content. This has created a situation where these individuals use the electronic resources of the organizations for which they work to access information that is not work related and this has been a source of concern for the managements of these organizations. In order to curb these tendencies by those who use their electronic media, especially the internet, many companies and organizations have chosen to adopt electronic usage policies whose purpose is to ensure that there is responsible use of this resource. Furthermore, these policies have been put in place to ensure that electronic resources are not used for purposes, which are not compatible with the objectives of the organizations in which they are used. ... However, despite the fact that many businesses and institutions have made the internet accessible to their employees for the purpose of ensuring that they conduct their activities with ease, it has been realized that its usage has become subject to abuse by those who use it. In this paper therefore, we shall look at some of the reasons why the use of the internet should be regulated through the introduction of electronic usage policies by various institutions. Literature Review Recent surveys that have been conducted by human resource managers on employees have found that approximately sixty five percent of employees spend at least some of their work time on non- work related internet activity. Among the employees who use social networks sites, it has been found that fifty six percent of them check their profiles during their normal workdays and that fifteen percent of this group spends at least one hour a day browsing the internet on non-work related sites. It was further found that over sixty one percent of employees sent personal emails, with nineteen percent sending more than five personal emails per day. The response of many institutions and organizations to non-work related internet activity has been to establish tougher  policies  regarding internet  usage  and  electronic  means to ensure that their employees are monitored (Ambrose & Noel, 2006). It has been found that the most dominant method of controlling the internet behavior of individuals, is through the blocking of sites, the monitoring of internet usage  and email, and finally, firing employees for  violating the electronic usage policies of their companies. The developments in employee potential misuse of electronic technology, and the

Thursday, October 3, 2019

Of Mice and Men shows how factors beyond the characters control prevent them from leading fulfilling lives Essay Example for Free

Of Mice and Men shows how factors beyond the characters control prevent them from leading fulfilling lives Essay John Steinbecks Of Mice and Men is set, and was written in the time of The Great Depression, 1929. During The Great Depression there were as many as fifteen million people, in the United States of America alone, left unemployed and with no way to feed their families. The Great Depression was caused by the Wall Street crash. The Wall Street Crash, when stocks and shares plummeted, resulted in America as a world trading country loosing gargantuan amounts money due to the many of the large companies of America going bankrupt. Because the companies went bankrupt they could no longer afford to pay any workers, this meant that they lost their jobs. Even the farms in the country could not stay running because of the Dust Bowl effect, this is when there is prolonged drought and the earth becomes like dust, entirely unsuitable to grow anything in. With a vast amount of the nation unemployed, people were desperately searching for work, simply in order to survive. When the idea came about that people could go and work the land in California, people jumped at the chance despite the appalling pay. The cruel thing is that the employers in California had paid their original workers more than they paid the migrant workers, and the migrant workers only worked because they were so desperate. The employers took advantage of their situation for their own benefit. It was very much every man for himself in that time, though in this novel there is an exception, Lennie and George, who for Steinbeck are the stereotypical migrant workers. I believe George to be living a fulfilled life within the dream he shares with Lennie and, later on in the novel Candy: the popular American dream of the period, to own a piece of land and be entirely self-sufficient from that land. The reason I think this is because George is constantly saying things such as well do her, well fix up that little old place an well go live there, this shows that they are living in metaphoric clouds (their dream), a far nicer place than reality, Lennie and George seam to be willing to live through anything just to achieve it. The fact that George lives for a dream, one that he truly didnt believe would happen, Jesus Christ! I bet we could swing her! this also shows that now George actually believes in himself it will happen, George would have no reason to dream if he was content in reality. Whilst living a content life inside the sanction of his dream, it is clear that he is not content in reality otherwise he would have no cause to dream of a better place. Another reason for George not being content could be that he had been burdened with Lennie all of his life and thus not been able to live his own life and be his own person, George says to Lennie in the novel that he could have a much better life without Lennie When I think of the swell time I could have without you, I go nuts. I never get no peace. This shows that even George feels Lennie as burden some of the time, if he felt this all of the time he could just get rid of Lennie, but he doesnt. I believe Lennie feels much the same as George in that he lives for the dream also, whenever Lennie is uncomfortable with his surroundings in any way he will ask George to tell the story of the dream to him so that he can escape reality into his imagination, as if in fact the dream is where he wants to be. Tell about the house George Lennie begs. An the rabbits. George has told Lennie that he can tend to the rabbits in their house, because Lennie is very simple this sense of responsibility and his fetish for soft things (the rabbits) provides the perfect attraction for Lennie to the Dream. Because Lennie also has to dream of a better place shows that his life is not being fulfilled on the ranch. If this was not evidence enough Lennie even says George, I dont like it here George clearly showing that he does not want to be there. The only woman on the ranch, Curleys wife, also I believe lives an unfulfilled life because firstly all she is known as throughout the novel is Curleys wife, making he sound like a possession of Curleys. This says a lot about the period in which this novel was written, women were treated as inferior beings at this time, and I personally find it hard to see how you could live a fulfilled life when you are being put down constantly. The men on the ranch also have very dim views on her such as Georges opinion of her, I dont care what she says and what she does. I seen em poison before, but I never seen no piece of jailbait worse than her, not only does this starve her for attention it puts her down also. Curleys wife also has a dream, a dream of becoming famous, as she tells Lennie He was gonna put me in the movies, showing that she cannot be content in reality either. Curleys wife is naturally seeking attention because she has married a man who she hardly ever sees and no one is willing to talk to her: Why cant I talk to you? I never get to talk to nobody. I get awful lonely, and she believes she should be in the movies, a place where you will always be in the spotlight so to speak, quite the opposite to how she is being treated on the ranch. Candy is the crippled swamper on the ranch, and is only able to do menial jobs around the ranch; this offers him no real fulfilment. Despite this Candys life amounts to the work he does on the ranch and his dog, these are all he lives for When they can me here I wisht somebodyd shoot me. As time progresses Candy realises that he has not got long left and with his dog, a huge part of his life having just been killed out of sympathy, he asks to join George and Lennies dream instead of his life being over once he has been told to leave the ranch Spose I went in with you guys. In wishing somebody would shoot him when he was told to leave the ranch shows that Candy fears for his future and where he has to go to when he is told to leave. To live your life in fear of your future, not knowing where you are going, not having control of you own life cannot be a very secure and pleasant mental environment to live in; Candy therefore cant have a very fulfilled life. Curley is a successful welterweight boxer, but unfortunately didnt quite make it to the top, instead he is stuck on his fathers ranch, a place where he doesnt always get the respect/fear he craves, so he has to be rude and hostile in his talking Well, nex time you answer when youre spoke to. This shows that Curley is not living the life he wants to live, thus making his life unfulfilled. Curley has a huge problem with intimidation, meaning bigger people intimidate him easily. He is also obsessed with power and authority: Curleys like a lot of little guys. He hates big guys, and on a ranch full of large men, he does not always have the security he wants. Curley is in a loveless marriage despite what he thinks he feels for his wife, she refuses to pay him the same attention: he aint a nice fella. Curley does not have his life going his way at all, he is stuck living somewhere he does not want to be, without the power he wants and with people he does not like; his fathers ranch. On top of this, he is in a marriage where the only love is on his behalf. This all leads me to the conclusion that Curley does not a have a fulfilled life. Crooks is a black stable buck in the novel, and during this time black people were regarded as inferior beings, this leaves Crooks open to much discrimination. Using Crooks as a stereotype, Steinbeck tries to show the relationship between black and white people in America in the 1930s. Throughout the novel, Crooks is treated with great disrespect, for example he is constantly being referred to as a God damn nigger. Crooks also gets segregated from the rest of the workers, this makes him incredibly lonely, we can tell this from a touching extract between Lennie and Crooks Crooks says gently, Maybe you can see now. You got George. You know hes goin to come back. Spose you didnt have nobody. Spose you couldnt go into the bunk-house and play rummy cause you was black. Howd you like that? Crooks is insulted countless times every single day of his life, the name nigger is used such as the term mate is used today, so without meaning to insult Crooks people did it every time they chose to speak to him. Every time when Crooks elevates himself above his usual status by making the odd chance comment or voicing his opinion, he is simply thrown back down to the ground. For example Crooks began to introduce his opinion into a conversation and was quite bluntly told by Curleys wife, you keep your place, then Nigger. I could get you strung up on a tree so easy it aint even funny. I find it near impossible to even think that Crooks could lead a fulfilled life when he is treated like a dirty animal, and his thoughts or feelings are considered worthless. My thoughts are that Slim is the only main character in the whole novel that possibly leads a fulfilled life. Unlike Crooks, Slim is paid much respect by all of the other workers. Candy refers to Slim as Hell of a nice fella, and comments are also made about peoples reactions when he speaks, all talk stopped when he spoke. This gives Slim a sense of belonging and importance. Slim is a highly skilled worker and the ranch would not be the same without him, and he knows this, so do the other workers on the ranch, Hes capable of driving ten, sixteen even twenty mules with a single line to the leaders. It is comments and views such as these which make Slim feel needed. Slim is favoured by all on the ranch, perhaps especially by Crooks and Curleys wife as he treats them without any prejudice or discriminative views. For example, Slim is very polite and actually pays a compliment to Curleys wife Hi, Good-lookin'. Throughout the novel, Slim does not mention any other life that he might prefer, nor does he show any evidence of him having a dream, this shows that he must be reasonably content with his life on the ranch as he has no cause to dream. I believe Slim to be the only main character in the novel to live a fulfilled life because he is clearly respected by all members of the ranch and very much favoured by them. Slim has security and he is also very independent, because of everyones admiration he also feels good in himself, Slim must have a great sense of fulfilment in his life. In a time where everyone had to make the most of what they had, only one person in this novel has succeeded, and that in my eyes would be Slim. It was a dog eat dog world during the Great Depression and Slim manages to rise above all of the bad things that have happened to him due to it. He manages to lift himself up above everyone else who were stuck in the rut of their own self pity, he manipulated the situation and uses it to his advantage. He took the wrong things in the other peoples lives and offered solutions for example he gave George someone to talk to, or the fact that he was polite to those who were treated like dirt, this made people like and respect him which is what drove him on inspite or the Depression.

Wednesday, October 2, 2019

Social influence

Social influence Social influence has a number of meanings in psychology, it is generally used to summarise the field of social psychology. Studying how thoughts, feelings and behaviour of individuals are influenced by actual, imagined or implied presence of others (Allport, 1968). Our social life is characterised by social influences; influences we are aware of and some we are not. As individuals we occasionally give way to social influence to fit in and at times we do it because we are not sure of the right way to feel or act and so use others as a resource of information. Our social life is also characterised by social norms, which are usually accepted ways of thinking, feeling and behaving that are shared among others in a social group. When a social group has well recognised norms, pressures arise for individuals to maintain such norm (to conform). This essay will explore a variety of examples of social influences (majority and minority effects and obedience) and explanations of why people yield to such influence. An individual is said to conform if they choose a course of action that is preferred or considered socially acceptable by the majority. Because the individual is influenced by how the majority thinks or behaves is referred to as majority influence. The fact that an individual conforms along with the majority in public, does not necessarily mean they have changed their private outlook or beliefs. Therefore, most majority influence is characterised by public compliance rather than private acceptance. Asch (1956) conducted a well recognised experiment on majority influence. The aim of the study was to find out how individuals would behave when given an unambiguous task (asking participants which of the three lines of different lengths were the same length as the standard line). All but one of the participants were confederates, who were instructed to give the same incorrect answer. Asch found, 36.8% of the responses were incorrect, indicating participants conformed to the incorrect res ponse given by the confederates. 25% of the participants never gave a wrong answer; therefore 75% conformed at least once. The study shows a strong tendency to conform to group pressures in a situation where the answer is clear. Asch later interviewed some of his participants and found that they gave one of the three reasons why they conformed. Distortion of perception (they really thought their wrong answers were right), distortion of judgement (felt some doubt with their judgement and therefore conformed) and distortion of action (they did not want to be ridiculed). This study itself does suggest individuals are sometimes aware of social influences but yield to such influences for different reasons. Asking people to judge the length of lines is a rather irrelevant task to real life; the findings only tell us about conformity in special circumstances. For example, Williams and Sogon (1984) tested people who belonged to the same sports club and found that conformity may be even high er with the people you know. Asch was not the first psychologist to investigate majority influence. Jenness, 1932 (cited in Cardwell Flanagan, 2004) asked students to guess the number of beans in a jar. After being given the opportunity to discuss their estimates, they were asked to give their individual estimates again. Jenness found that individuals estimates tended to converge to a group norm. It seems, reasonable to suggest that in an ambiguous situation, people look to others to get some ideas about a sensible answer. Similar study by Sherif, 1935 (cited in Cardwell Flanagan, 2004) found answers to an ambiguous stimulus become quite similar after discussions demonstrating a tendency to establish and conform to group norms. People conform for various reasons, ranging from complete acceptance of the majority viewpoint (informational influence), to simply going along with the crowd (normative influence). Normative influence is the result of wanting to be liked and informational influence is the result of wan ting to be right (Morton and Harold, 1955). Factors that affect majority influence include size of the majority: Asch (1956) found that the size of the opposing majority did affect conformity and, cultural factors: compared to individualist cultures, conformity appears to be higher in societies where group harmony is a priority (Smith and Bond, 1993). Minority influence is an alternative form of social influence where people reject the established norm of the majority of group members and move to the position of the minority. Minorities generally have less power or status and may even be dismissed as troublemakers, but this raises the question, how do they have any influence over the majority? Moscovici, 1976 (cited in Cardwell Flanagan, 2004) claims the answer lies in their behavioural style. Moscovici, Lage and Naffrenchoux (1969) aimed to investigate the process of innovation. They found that the participants agreed with the minority on 8.42% of the trials (saying the blue slides were green). Notably, 32% gave the same answer as the minority at least once. The findings demonstrate that minorities can influence majority opinion. Group identification and social cryptoamnesia are the key explanations why people yield to minority influence. Maass, Clark and Haberknorn (1982) arranged for a group of heterosexual participants to hea r arguments about gay rights. If the minority group was gay, it had less influence on the participants than if it was straight, seemingly because the participants were able to identify with the straight minority and this led to greater influence. Social cryptoamnesia refers to major attitude changes which only take place when the zeitgeist changes. By the time change occurs people have forgotten the original source of opinion change, but innovation is due to minority influence. (Perez, Papastamou and Mugny, 1995). Within a social group, after some members have started to agree with the minority, the minority turns into a majority. Van Avermaet (1996) referred to this as the snowball effect. So far, the essay has looked at types of indirect social influence where people can choose whether or not they will yield to the perceived pressure of the majority or minority, suggesting we are completely aware of such social influences on our behaviour. Obedience to authority (a direct form of social influence) refers to an alternative type of social influence whereby someone acts in response to a direct order from a figure with perceived authority. Milgram (1963) set to investigate whether ordinary people will obey a legitimate authority figure, even when required to injure another person (electric shocks). The findings of the study suggest that ordinary people are surprisingly obedient to authority when asked to behave in an inhumane manner. Gradual commitment, agentic shift and the role of buffers are explanations to why people obey (in terms of Milgrams study). As participants have already given lower-level shocks, it becomes harder to resist the experimenters requirement to in crease the shocks. Having committed themselves to a particular course of action (giving shocks), it becomes difficult for participants to change their mind. Essential to Milgrams explanation of obedience is what he termed the agentic state, by which he meant, the condition the person is in, when he sees himself as an agent to carrying out another persons wishes. Milgram, 1974 (cited in Card, 2005) argued that people move between an agentic state and an autonomous state (state a person is when they see them self acting on their own. Entering an authority system, Milgram claimed the individual no longer views themselves as acting out of his own purpose but sees themselves as agents for another. In Milgrams classic study into obedience, the teacher and learner were in different rooms, with the teacher protected (buffered) from seeing his victim. When the learner was in the same room, this buffering effect was reduced. The role of buffers/buffering effect is similarly used to explain the apparent willingness to dispatch weapons of mass destruction (Solomon, Mikulincer, and Hobfoll, 1986). Milgrams research has been quite controversial; however, it can be argued that the great value of this research, in helping us understand obedience to authority, justifies the deception and the distress caused to the teachers. Society itself can influence the behaviour of people in many ways. It can pass laws through governmental establishments, develop a strong desire for ethics and morals, hold its professionals to strong ethical codes of conduct, educate and inform through school systems and the media. But the primary reason why a society can control the behaviour of most people is our innate psychological need for intuitive growth and maturity. There seems to be a natural preference within the human psyche to behave in a moral or ethical manner. (Schueler, 1997). To conclude, there is evidence to suggest people are in fact aware of social influences whether it is majority and minority effects or obedience to authority; people yield to such influences for a variety of reasons: normative and informational influence, group identification, social cryptoamnesia, gradual commitment, agentic shift and the role of buffers; nevertheless, social psychologists continue to argue that people are often unaware of th e influences on their behaviour, thoughts and emotions. (Nisbett Wilson, 1977)

California Utility :: essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Chris Parker   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  482.004 Dr. Singer  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In 1996 deregulation allowed California utility companies to sell power plants and collect over 19 billion dollars in ratepayer subsidies. The money was used to purchase plants in other countries, reward executives with huge pay raises and buy back stock. A handful of unregulated companies withheld power, causing shortages to boost wholesale prices.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Deregulation led many consumers to believe that open markets would bring in an array of choices and lower prices. Consumers will have to settle for a single power provider at higher prices. Rates are nearly 150 percent higher than last spring. Power companies are exploiting the market for their own advantage. Some companies have jacked rates up to 200 percent than offer a deal at a 50 percent hike.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Utility companies promised to modernize the electricity market and reduce business and residential bills. The California public utilities commission is caving in to pressure to make the investor owned utilities look good on Wall Street. Utilities are to use their markups to pay investors for stranded assets incurred during regulation. Utility companies lobbied to pass a law that suited their needs, and now the situation has changed it is trying it again. In 1998 big utility companies lobbied Proposition #9 buy paying a local consum er reporter 106,000 dollars to create a campaign. Proposition #9 would decrease electric bills and promote modernization of the industry. Also, many agency boards are stacked with officials with ties to energy companies, creating conflicts of interest. A member of Public Utilities Commission is being sued for an overseas investment. Taxpayers are paying for his legal bills. The investment was in a company his commission regulated.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  A recent study has found incriminating information on the California utility industry. Plant operators would skip maintenance routines. These errors would cause machines to break down and force power cut back. The plants would have sudden shutdowns with no justifiable reason. Shutdowns were calculated to shrink the amount of power available driving up the price. They would hold back power until the state is desperate and vulnerable. They could sell power at super high rates. They sold power to other states. Selling to other states allowed for an increase in wholesale prices.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The California utility companies had planned to make a large amount of profit off of deregulation.

Tuesday, October 1, 2019

Effects of Foreign Direct Investment Essay

The possible positive and  negative effects of FDI  inflows Ing. Tomà ¡Ã… ¡ Dudà ¡Ã… ¡, PhD. Possible positive effects FDI provides capital which is usually missing  in the target country Long term capital is suitable for economic  development Foreign investors are able to finance their  investments projects better and often cheaper Foreign corporations create new workplaces Possible positive effects FDI bring new technologies that are usually  not available in the target country. There is empirical evidence that there are spillover effects as the new technologies usually spread beyond the foreign corporations Foreign corporations provide better access to  foreign markets Ex. Foreign corporations can provide useful  contacts even for their domestic subcontractors Possible positive effects Foreign corporations bring new know-how and  managerial skills into the target country Again, there is a spill-over effects – as people leave the corporations they leave with the knowledge and know-how  they accumulated Foreign corporations can help to change the economic  structure of the target country With a good economic strategy governments can attract  companies from promising and innovative sectors Possible positive effects â€Å"Crowding in† effect The foreign corporations often bring additional  investors into the target country (ex. their usual subcontractors) Foreign corporations improve the business  environment of the target country Ethical business or rules of conduct Possible positive effects Foreign corporations bring new â€Å"clean†Ã‚  technologies that help to improve the  environmental conditions Foreign corporations usually help increase the  level of wages in the target economy Foreign corporations usually have a positive  effects on the trade balance Possible negative effects Foreign corporations may buy a local company  in order to shut it down (and gain monopoly  for example) â€Å"Crowding out† effect We can see this effect if the foreign corporations  target the domestic market and domestic  corporations are not able to compete with these  corporations Possible negative effects Foreign corporations may cut working  positions (privatization deals or M&A  transactions) Foreign corporations have a tendency to use  their usual suppliers which can lead to  increased imports (no problem if the  production is export driven) Possible negative effects Repatriation of the profits can be stressful on the  balance of payments The high growth of wages in foreign corporations  can influence a similar growth in the domestic  corporations which are not able to cover this growth  with the growth of productivity  The result is the decreasing competitiveness of domestic  companies Possible negative effects Missing tax revenues If the foreign corporations receive tax holidays or  similar provisions The emergence of a dual economy The economy will contain a developed foreign  sector and an underdeveloped domestic sector Possible negative effects Possible environmental damage  Ã¢â‚¬Å"Incentive tourism†