Strategy Implementation Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Strategy Implementation - Term Paper Example Introduction The main purpose of the paper is a complete investigation of the various significant strategies that have been implemented by Southwest Airlines in order to attain its desired business objectives. The analysis of the strategy implementation of Southwest Airlines will be conducted on the basis of the organizational design, key strategic control procedures, providing primary concern towards human resource issues and the cultural factors that are present in Southwest Airlines. Moreover, the effect of these significant facets upon the implementation of the strategy of Southwest Airlines will also be taken into account in this particular paper. Thus, it can be stated that the analysis regarding the implementation of the assorted business strategies of Southwest Airlines will be accomplished by acquiring a brief idea about the above mentioned facets of Southwest Airlines. Organizational Design of Southwest Airlines The organizational design of Southwest Airlines is known to co mprise several areas that principally include the issues relating to control and authority, division of products, communication and potential market structures. Southwest Airlines emphasizes and possesses strong capability with regard to these significant areas. Due to the expansion of the business of Southwest Airlines, the organization follows a hybrid, complex, multi-divisional arrangement that is based upon vertical as well as horizontal differentiation and is quite concerned with maintaining a good relationship with the customers by offering them superior quality of service. The major reasons for Southwest Airlines to follow the multi-divisional organizational arrangement are the need for augmenting the competence of the organization, ensuring profitable growth as well as firm control. Moreover, according to the multi-dimensional organizational structure of Southwest Airlines, the organizational behavior is learnt to be controlled through an important aspect of internal upward mobility. This particular facet means that especially the divisional managers of the organization are usually groomed in order to enter the corporate world of Southwest Airlines. They are provided with attractive financial rewards in the form of incentives on the basis of their performance in order to get promoted to higher positions. Additionally, the organizational structure of Southwest Airlines is designed in such a way as to focus upon the demand of the consumers for the purpose of making effective decisions on the basis of their level of satisfaction and reaction (Dearinger, 2010). Key Strategic Control Systems of Southwest Airlines The most important key strategic control system of Southwest Airlines is about the establishment and the execution of point-to-point flights rather than employing the approach of â€Å"hub-and-spoke† mechanism. The application of point-to-point flights instead of utilizing hub or spoke arrangement is regarded as one of the vital airport hub strategies of Southwest Airlines. The other significant strategic control system of the organization is the application of online bookings for its large customer base through the website of the company. It has been apparent that a considerable amount of passenger revenue of Southwest Airlines is generated by the execution of online boo

Organizing Function Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Organizing Function - Essay Example In this the firm has to handle five areas namely, division of labour, departmentalization, establishing span of control and delegation, (Boone 2005). Within division of labour else called work specialization, the manager tries to match the work demands with the skills, knowledge and experience of the employee. Division of labour is more effective when the most qualified employer by means of skill level and experience is assigned a given task. The more compatible a worker is to the work process requirements, the greater the extent of possible specialization. In departmentalization, the manager seeks to group employees or jobs into manageable entities. This can be done in five ways, (Plunkett et al (2005). Functional departmentalization is done according to the nature of activities in the department. Product departmentalization brings together all the functions necessary for successful production and distribution of a particular product. Process departmentalization is based on the cycles that a product goes through. The cycles determine the department. Geographical departmentalization uses zones to create a department e.g. ... Customer departmentalization is defined by possession of a shared set of characteristics like the mental hospitals as a source of clients for an establishment working with mentally retarded persons. Span or control means the manager defines the extent to which the chains of command run and the limit in number of employees within one line of production or level of command. One employee ought to be accountable to only one supervisor, in what is called the unity of command. In the scalar principle, the line of authority should be clearly outlined for each worker. The manager is also concerned about delegation, which is the transferring of tasks and responsibilities and the issuing of authority commensurate to the tasks assigned to subordinates. This improves the flexibility of operations meaning the organization is better able to address the needs of its clients, (Boone 2005) In organizing, the manager is also concerned with knowledge management, which is the ability to organize and control gathered information within an organization. A manager gathers information from various sources. He empowers his team to be able to use the available information to better the organization that way the team can be said to have for knowledge (the capacity of people or groups or organizations to act on information). Opportunities, threats strengths and weaknesses of an organization can best be addressed only in the event that the organization is able to use information available. The process involves a conscious effort to use the information. For the information to be useful to the organization however, it has to be accurate, reliable and up to date. This can be said to an organization's intellectual

Discovery of a Novel Oral Antithrombotic Drug Apixaban

Discovery of a Novel Oral Antithrombotic Drug Apixaban Shuangyu Ma Background Thrombosis, which is generally defined as the formation of blood clot inside blood vessels, is a major health issue in western world. Thrombosis associated disease, such as ischemic stroke and high blood pressure, remain to be the leading causes of morbidity and mortality each year in developed countries [1]. To make things worse, thrombosis is also known as a chronic disease with episodic recurrence [2]. According the American Heart Association, thirty percent of the patients diagnosed with venous thromboembolism develop recurrence within the next 10 years [2]. The balance between thrombosis formation and bleeding is prudently regulated by the blood coagulation cascade, one of the most delicate systems in human body (figure 1, [3]). The signal transmission and amplification along the cascade was conducted by a series of trypsin-like serine proteases with high specificity, often referred as zymogens [4]. The zymogens are cleaved by the previous coagulation factor to become activated proteases, which can thereby cleave the next zymogen along the cascade and achieve the signal amplification. Blood coagulation process can be triggered by intrinsic pathway or extrinsic pathway; both are followed by the activation of common pathway. The prothrombin is then cleaved by activated factor X to generate thrombin, eventually lead to the formation of stable fibrin clot. Fig 1. Blood coagulation cascade: (figure extracted from Haematology (2nd edition) by C. J. Pallister and M. S. Watson [4]) Until now, the most well-known oral anticoagulant is warfarin, which is the current standard therapy for clinic thrombosis treatment and prevention. Despite its widely application, warfarin has a huge draw back on its dosing issue. Many of the coagulation factors, including factors II, VII, IX and X are Vitamin K dependent; the ÃŽ ³-carboxylation by Vitamin K is essential for their biological activity. Targeting on vitamin-K conversion cycle, warfarin produces an anticoagulation effect by reducing activities of the four vitamin K-dependent coagulation factors. However, the responses to warfarin can be interfered dramatically by genetic and environment factors, such as the common mutation on cytochrome P450 encoding gene, disease states variation, drug-drug interaction or even diet change [5]. Hence, warfarin treated patients need blood test regularly (often once a week or even worse) to determine a safe dosage case by case. Despite handling with great cautious, the anticoagulant-asso ciated intracerebral hemorrhage keeps increasing [2]. Thus, many efforts have been put on developing a novel antithrombotic drug with low risk and high potency. From lead to drug: the development of apixaban The drug Apixaban, approved by FDA in 2012 for thromboembolism treatment and prevention, is developed by Pfizer and Bristol-Myers Squibb to serve as an optimized risk-benefit oral anticoagulant. The mechanism of apixaban is entirely different with warfarin it specifically targets on activated coagulation factor ten (FXa), rather than vitamin K. Several clinical trial has proved its higher efficacy compared to asparin and lower risk compared to warfarin treatment [6]. Given the central position in the blood coagulation cascade, FXa evolved as an attractive drug target for developing anticoagulants. The DuPont Merck Pharmaceutical Company first launched a high throughput screening on FXa inhibitor in 1997 [7]. Because of the substrate similarity between FXa and the GPIIb/IIa receptor, they screened the compound library which was originally designed to be GPIIb/IIa receptor antagonist. A hit was found with low micromolar FXa affinity (coumpound 1, Ki= 38.5 ÃŽ ¼M). However, most of the reported FXa inhibitor in literature at that time posse the bisamindinoaryl structure, such as 2 and 3 (figure 2a). Inspired by these compounds, they modified the hit to be bisamidines and obtained the first list of leads (including compound 4), as shown in figure 2b. Aiming at a higher potency, molecular modeling studies were conducted to further optimize the lead compound, which resulted in the removal of methylene unit between the isoxazoline ring and the amidine carbonyl together with the à ¯Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã†â€™ substitution to the carbonyl. After the comparison of different substitution groups, they obtained compound 5 with Ki of 94 nM (Figure 3) [7]. Fig 2 a. The structure of hit compound and several known FXa inhibitor b. The bisamidine lead compounds (figure extracted from [7]). Fig 3. Effects of the amidine group position and à ¯Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã†â€™ substitution (figure extracted from [7]) However, as an oral drug candidate, this dibasic lead compound might not have good oral absorption due to its hydrophilicity. Therefore, the next goal is to reduce its basicity by replacing one of the amidine groups with a neutral species. The molecular modeling of compound 5 bound to FXa indicated that the p-amidine group fits in an hydrophobic aryl-binding pocket of FXa, which is consist of three aromatic residues (Trp215, Tyr99 and Phe174, figure 4a) [8]. Therefore, it is possible to replace the p-amidine with aromatic functional groups without largely interrupt the affinity. They employed a biaryl group and obtained compound 6 with only 2-fold decrease in potency. Further investigation on different substitution at the terminal phenyl ring resulted in large enhancement on potency, such as compound 7 (Ki = 6.3 nM). (Figure 4b) Fig 4 a. Effects of substitutions on terminal phenyl ring (figures extracted from [8]). b. Chemical structure of compound 6 and 7 Nevertheless, another concern emerged to be the metabolic instability, as compound 7 bears an ester side chain, which is labile to esterase once it gets inside human body. Since the corresponding acid metabolite is three-fold less potent than the original ester [9], replacing the ester side chain appears becomes the imperative next step. Again, a list of compound 7 analogs bearing different side chains were synthesized and tested. Among all the functional groups, tetrazole substitution was found to be most potent, and compound 8 (Ki= 0.52 nM) was developed with additional modification on the biaryl ring motif (figure 5a). Variation on the position of amide moiety attachment and isoxazoline aromatization resulted in compound 9 (Ki= 0.15 nM, figure 5b) [10], while further investigation on a series of five-membered heterocyclic ring gives compound 10 with equal potency (Ki= 0.15 nM, figure 5c) and lower basicity [11] . Fig 5. Chemical structure of compound 8, 9 and 10 Despite the high potency and selectivity, compound 10 is still far from perfect due to potential mutagenicity of the biarylanilines motif [12]. Therefore, the cleavage of amide bond must be prevented by either ligating or eliminating the nitrogen (figure 6). Compound 11 was developed to have the optimized pyrazole with an even higher FXa affinity (Ki = 0.03 nM). After the scaffold was settled, more compound 11 analogs with various substitution groups and terminal aromatic rings were synthesized and compared to afford the final drug candidate as compound 12 (apixaban, Ki= 0.08, figure 7a) [1]. The optimized drug selectivity towards FXa was shown in figure 7b. The therapeutic index of the final drug compared to warfarin was demonstrated in rabbit thrombosis models and shown figure 7c) [6]. The drug candidate was sent for preclinical studies followed with several clinic trials, and eventually approved by FDA for venous thromboembolism prevention after hip/knee replacement and artrial fibrillation treatment. Another clinical trial for acute venous thromboembolism is still in progress. Fig 6. Compound 11 bearing the optimized pyrazole. Fig 7 a. Apixaban (compound 12) b. In vitro Ki values of apixaban for FXa and other human enzymes with structural or functional similarities (figure extracted from [6]). c. Therapeutic index of apixaban and warfarin in rabbit models (figure extracted from [6]). Conclusion Comparing to the initial lead compound, the eventual drug changed dramatically in chemical structure, while its FXa inhibiting potency was enhanced by 107. Tracing back to each modification step, the comprehensive consideration in drug potency, selectivity, absorption, metabolism and toxicity is truly impressive and reveals the tremendous efforts embedded in a single drug. It is worth noting that molecular modeling with FXa structure played a critical role during the rational drug modification process. The discovery of apixaban also demonstrated the importance of defining new drug target in modern drug development. The success of apixaban is largely attributed to the better drug target FXa. However, the clinical trial of apixaban on acute coronary syndrome was discontinued due to increased bleeding events [6], which suggests that other anticoagulants are still in demand for treating various type of thrombosis. Reference [1] Pinto, D. J.; Orwat, M. J.; Koch, S.; Rossi, K. A.; Alexander, R. S.; Smallwood, A.; Wong, P. C.; Rendina, A. R.; Luettgen, J. M.; Knabb, R. M.; He, K.; Xin, B.; Wexler, R. R; Lam, P. Y. Discovery of 1-(4-methoxyphenyl)-7-oxo-6-(4-(2-oxopiperidin-1-yl) phenyl)-4, 5, 6, 7-tetrahydro-1 H-pyrazolo [3, 4-c] pyridine-3-carboxamide (Apixaban, BMS-562247), a highly potent, selective, efficacious, and orally bioavailable inhibitor of blood coagulation factor Xa.Journal of medicinal chemistry. 2007,50, 5339-5356. [2] Go, A. S., Mozaffarian, D., Roger, V. L., Benjamin, E. J., Berry, J. D., Borden, W. B., Turner, M. B et al. Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics: 2013 Update: A Report From the American Heart Association. Circulation. 2013, 127, 143-146. [3] Pallister, C. J.; Watson, M. S. Haematology, 2nd ed. Scion Publishing: Banbury, 2010; pp 336–347. [4] Krishnaswamy, S. Exositeà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ driven substrate specificity and function in coagulation. Journal of thrombosis and haemostasis. 2005, 3, 54-67. [5] Hirsh, J., Fuster, V., Ansell, J., Halperin, J. L. Foundation guide to warfarin therapy. Journal of the American College of Cardiology. 2003, 41, 1633-1652. [6] Wong, P. C.; Pinto, D. J.; Zhang, D. Preclinical discovery of apixaban, a direct and orally bioavailable factor Xa inhibitor.Journal of thrombosis and thrombolysis. 2011,31, 478-492. [7] Quan, M. L.; Pruitt, J. R.; Ellis, C. D.; Liauw, A. Y.; Galemmo, R. A., Jr.; Stouten, P. F. W.; Wityak, J.; Knabb, R. M.; Thoolen, M. J.; Wong, P. C.; Wexler, R. R. Bisbenzamidine isoxazoline derivatives as factor Xa inhibitors.Bioorganic Medicinal Chemistry Letters. 1997, 7, 2813-2818. [8] Quan, M. L.; Liauw, A. Y.; Ellis, C. D.; Pruitt, J. R.; Carini, D. J.; Bostrom, L. L.; Huang, P. P.; Harrison, K.; Knabb, R. M.; Thoolen, M. J.; Wong, P. C.; Wexler, R. R. Design and Synthesis of Isoxazoline Derivatives as Factor Xa Inhibitors 1. Journal of medicinal chemistry. 1999,42, 2752-2759. [9] Quan, M. L.; Ellis, C. D.; Liauw, A. Y.; Alexander, R. S.; Knabb, R. M.; Lam, G.; Wright, M. R.; Wong, P. C.; Wexler, R. R. Design and Synthesis of Isoxazoline Derivatives as Factor Xa Inhibitors 2. Journal of medicinal chemistry. 1999,42, 2760-2773. [10] Pruitt, J. R., Pinto, D. J., Estrella, M. J., Bostrom, L. L., Knabb, R. M., Wong, P. C. Wright, M. R., Wexler, R. R. Isoxazolines and isoxazoles as factor Xa inhibitors.Bioorganic medicinal chemistry letters,2000, 10, 685-689. [11] Pinto, D. J.; Orwat, M. J.; Wang, S.; Fevig, J. M.; Quan, M. L.; Amparo, E.; Cacciola, J.; Rossi, K. A.; Alexander, R. S.; Smallwood, A. M.; Luettgen, J. M.; Liang, L.; Aungst, B. J.; Wright, M. R.; Knabb, R. M.; Wong, P. C.; Wexler, R. R.; Lam, P. Y. Discovery of 1-[3-(Aminomethyl) phenyl]-N-[3-fluoro-2-(methylsulfonyl)-[1, 1-biphenyl]-4-yl]-3-(trifluoromethyl) -1H-pyrazole-5- carboxamide (DPC423), a Highly Potent, Selective, and Orally Bioavailable Inhibitor of Blood Coagulation Factor Xa 1.Journal of medicinal chemistry. 2001, 44, 566-578. [12] Pinto, D. J.; Orwat, M. J.; Quan, M. L.; Han, Q.; Galemmo, R. A., Jr.; Amparo, E.; Wwllsg, B.; Ellisj, C.; Hek, M. Y.; Alexanderf, R. S.; Knabbb, R. M.; Mersingerg, L.; Kettnera, C.; Baih, S.; Hed, K. Wexlera, R. R.; Lam, P. 1-[3-Aminobenzisoxazol-5†²-yl]-3-trifluoromethyl -6-[2†²-(3-(R) -hydroxy-N-pyrrolidinyl) methyl-[1, 1†²]-biphen-4-yl]-1, 4, 5, 6-tetrahydropyrazolo-[3, 4-c]-pyridin -7-one (BMS-740808) a highly potent, selective, efficacious, and orally bioavailable inhibitor of blood coagulation factor Xa.Bioorganic medicinal chemistry letters. 2006,16, 4141-4147.

Zen Buddhism Essay -- essays research papers

Ch’an and Zen Buddhism Throughout the early years in many East Asian countries, there were many people who were looking for answers to this world’s, and otherworldly, questions. When Gotama became enlightened, and began preaching the practices of Buddhism, it came at such a time when the Han dynasty was collapsing, citizens were tired of Confucianism and looking for a new ideology that they could put there hearts and souls into. Over the years, Buddhism proved to be much more than just a religion; it became a way of life. But over time, the powerful orthodoxy transformed, and many different Buddhist sects emerged. One of the more popular sects, Ch’an, or Zen, Buddhism, has become one of the most influential religions in China and Japan, and is still flourishing today.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In the year 220 AD, as the Han dynasty was collapsing, Confucianism, then the state ideology, began to lose its popularity. This, along with the demise of the Han order, set up a situation in which the people of China were hungry for new ideas. There were also many dignitaries within the Chinese government that were looking to gain good political footing in order to ensure staying power. These factors all opened up the gate for Buddhism to enter Chinese society and gain popularity with the Chinese culture.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  At first, Buddhism was transmitted to the different East Asian countries via the Silk Road, but as its domination grew, many people began to interpret their own meaning of the Buddhist doctrines that had been translated from Indian to Chinese. â€Å"By the fourth century AD a much greater number of sutras were available in both north and south China, and the Chinese were beginning to realize the immensity of Buddhist literature.† Buddhism did not reach Japan, however, until October 13th, 538, from the Korean kingdom of Paekche.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  At this point in time, there were two major schools of Buddhism in China. The first form to emerge was known as Hinayana, or Theravada Buddhism. This loosely translated means, â€Å"The Lesser Vehicle.† Theravada Buddhism was mainly concerned with reaching individual enlightenment; how one could rise above the cycle of samsara and reach nirvana. Mahayana Buddhism, or, â€Å"The Great Vehicle,† became the popular form practiced in most of China, Japan and Korea. The followers of Mahayana believed that the entire world could reach salvation, and that those who f... ... other religions. Many of the new centers are combinations of Soto and Rinzai from Japan, Ch’an from China, and Son from Korea. It is still too soon to tell if these new factions throughout our country and Europe will be as much of a success as those of the Eastern Asian countries proved to be; as one Japanese Zen master recently stated, â€Å"The first hundred years are the hardest.† This statement seems to be true so far, with modern Zen’s popularity growing and subsiding. There is an old Zen adage that offers some of the new Zen teachers encouragement: Though the bamboo forest is dense, Water flows through it freely. Many people believe that the water is beginning to make its way through the forest, opening people’s eyes and hearts to the reality of Zen. Japan and China have always remained very similar in most everything that is done within the countries. Borrowing from each other, the two countries have shared quite a lot in common. So it comes as no surprise to learn that Ch’an and Zen Buddhism are very similar. While many people were not sure if these two factions of Buddhism would remain strong in both countries, followers of the two religions have proved the skeptics wrong.

Financial Crisis

The latest global financial crisis was exploded in 2008. This was the most serious financial crisis since the economic depression which occurred in sass and it severely impacted the global financial market. Lots of corporations collapsed during the 2008 financial recession which was caused by breakage of capital chain. Although some companies did not bankrupt during that period, they also had suffered huge loss. The 2008 global financial crisis began from America. American financial crisis came from the prosperity of real estate.Before the 2008 global financial crisis, a large umber of financial derivatives were generated and financial bubble became more and more serious. Finally, American sub-prime crisis occurred which leaded to a large number of bank failure. This paper will analyze the reason of American sub- prime crisis and indicate the relevance between Shoal's article, agency theory and the 2008 global financial crisis. This essay will argue that agency theory contributes to the 2008 global financial recession. 2 Review of the literature 2. Agency theory Agency theory has described a relationship between principals and agents. It also an solve this relationship through a contract that ‘one or more persons (the principal(s)) engage another person (the agent) to perform some service on their behalf which involves delegating some decision making authority to the agent' denser and Neckline, 1976:308, citied in Lehman and Continue, 2013). 2. 2 Bad theory and humans morality and ethic After the collapse of Enron, Shoal (2005) strongly argues that business school does not need to do lots of things.In contrast, they Just need to terminate some old courses which they are teaching for their students. The reason is that the root of the issues in management practices can be found in the theories of management. Additionally, management practices which are condemned are enhanced by these ‘theories and ideas' (Shoal, 2005: 75). Moreover, business school ca nnot address the issues of moral and ethic. Clansman, Setback and Heckler (1998: 77, citied in Shoal, 2005) claim that management studies is regarded as ‘a branch of' the social sciences.Namely, the issues of business studies can be analyzed and resolved in method of social sciences. However, Ghosted (2005: 77) strongly argues that people use ‘scientific' way o explore regulation so that they have ignored the moral and ethics of humans. Because there are some underlying basic diversities between physical sciences and business studies, some theories of physical sciences are not suitable for business studies. Furthermore, the parts of business studies which are related to physical (2005), even though ‘scientific methods' (p. 7) exerts some positive influences, the cost is expensive. Therefore, this approach denies the subjective initiative of human. In addition, humans morality and ethic which are neglected by individuals are inevitable in human intentionality. Jense n and Michelin (1976, cited in Shoal, 2005: 75) assert that an idea which ‘mangers cannot be trusted' was taught to their students in business school. As a result, when these students graduate, they hardly trust their leaders and do not realize that they should strictly maintain personal integrity.Additionally, Even though Friedman (1953, citied in Shoal, 2005) acknowledges that the duty of agents is to maximize the profit of shareholders, Shoal discounts this view and argues that compared with finding a new Job by employees, it is easier that shareholder can sell their corporation (Shoal, 2005). Furthermore, shareholder value minimization is the fundamental of the agency theory. However, Shoal (2005: 81) strongly asserts that they are not relevant and points out that these research and analyses are built on incorrect assumption, which meaner they are ‘unrealistic'.Moreover, ‘Chicago Agenda' extreme emphasis laws and rules and against human intentionality and indic ates that ethic and morals which are only relevant with persons can be removed from social science (Shoal, 2005). Nevertheless, Shoal disagrees this view and approves of the stewardship theory, because it can effectively give consideration to he profit of ‘customers, employees, shareholders' and their ‘communities' (Davis, Chairman and Donaldson, 1997, citied in Shoal, 2005: 81). 2. 3 Background of financial crisis The 2008 global financial recession has been described a ‘once in a century credit tsunami' (Earl, 2009: 785).This is a disastrous blow to global financial community. Ballard (et al, 2009, citied in Huh et at, 2012) points out that many economists regarded the global financial crisis as the most serious global finance disaster since sass. Compared with only 11 banks was bankruptcy during 2003 to 2007, at least 160 American banks went broke in 2008 and 2009 (Fide, 2011, citied in Huh et al, 2012). From this statistics, it is not difficult to know how stro ng influence brought by this financial crisis. There is a close link between the 2008 global financial crisis and sub-prime crisis.Bernard (2007, citied in Hellenize and Chaos, 2012) asserts that ‘sub-prime mortgages are loans made to borrowers who are perceived to have a high credit risk, often because they lack a strong credit history or have other characteristics that are associated with high probabilities of default'. Furthermore, during 1990 to 2000, cause of the IT bubble economy, the American government took some steps to prevent economic downturn, such as reducing interest rate, cutting tax, decreasing the cost of sub-prime etc.Even though there were higher risks that some of sub- prime borrowers cannot repay currency punctually, the sub-prime mortgage had become an extremely phenomenon in that period, because this kind of debits can get more return due to the higher interest rate. In addition, secondary market had Thus mortgagor can easier receive mortgage credit, no matter he or she is the sub- prime borrowers or prime borrowers. As a result, sub-prime mortgage market had developed rapidly.Furthermore, a large portion of American preferred to buy a house in installment plan before the 2008 global financial crisis and some of them were sub-prime borrowers. Basic and Chine (1996, citied in Change and Chine, 2013: 14) claim that people need ‘more than enough' fortune to certify their social status. This is why lots of American purchased a house in installment plan. Because of the higher interest rate, local banks were pleasured to borrow currency to these sub- prime borrowers. Goodhearted (2007) claims that in order to assess the default risk, here is no experience that the price of house has declined in the whole of America.However, the price of house started to fall from the end of 2006 in lots of areas of America (Goodhearted, 2007). Because the value of mortgage is less than the debts and the growing interest rate, increasingly sub-prime borrowers gave up repaying currency to banks. Consequently, even though lenders had sold these mortgages, it cannot cover the loss. In other words, the income gained by selling houses was not enough to offset the values of the credit and interest. As a result, these banks were suffering serious loss and some of them had to close down. 4 The link between Shoal' article, agency theory and financial crisis In recent years, agency theory is widely used in lots of corporation and regarded it as the fundamental theory of corporate governance. Agency theory has played an important role in traditional control systems. Moreover, in this theory, shareholders use the method of supervision and reward to control mangers and employees. It is the foundation of agency theory to maximize the value of shareholders. Principals need to supervise agents whether they focus on shareholder' interest when they are operating a corporation.However, Shoal (2005) strongly points out hat this theory does not im prove the company's performance, because it is analyzed by physical science and then neglect the moral and ethic of human. Because the different perspectives between shareholders and agents, they can make the diverse decisions. Thus some primary issues should be focused on in agency theory. Firstly, because of the diverse goals between principals and agents, how to ‘align' them has become thorny (Lehman and Continue, 2013: 1). Secondly, how to guarantee agents carry out according to principals' ideas. Lehman and Continue, 2013). Shareholders are interested in long-term strategies which can sustainable evolve their corporations. In other words, in long-term strategies, shareholders' value, such as stock price and dividends, can be maximized (Klein, 2009). In contrast, agents focus on short-term strategies so that they reject long-term strategies. In this way, they not only can effectively avoid unpredictable emergency which usually occur in long-term strategies, but also can ge t profit in a short time. It is why leaders Just pay attention to currently profit and overlook long-term development.For example, they may use ‘inferior raw material' to manufacture (Lehman and Continue, 2013: 1). As a result, current margin can increase; however, they have overlooked some more corporation. Obviously, the loss of long-term cannot be estimated. This is similar as the sub-prime mortgage. Lenders prefer to lend currency to sub-prime borrowers, because of the higher interest rate. They can collect more properties in a short time. In addition, if the housing price is higher than the price of mortgages, borrowers will try their best to repay the debt, because they do not want to lose their house.To assume, if a mortgagor cannot timely repay, house, as a mortgage, will belong to the bank. Namely, when the bank sale this house, it can get extra property immediately. In this case, lending currency to borrowers, even though they are sub-prime borrowers, it is hardly to get damage to lenders. However, loaners have only noticed the short-term profit, therefore, they loaned mortgage to sub-prime borrowers instead of prime borrowers; however, they had neglected sustainable development, especially when the price of house dramatically declined.In fact, when the housing price decreased, some borrowers preferred to give up the mortgage to lenders, especially the value of house is lower than the loans (Klein, 2009). In other words, banks only can receive these mortgages instead of the loans. As a result, huge loss derived these banks collapse. Furthermore, mortgage lender also can resell theses mortgage to investment bank. However, some of them had hided some information in order to a higher price (Klein, 2009). In this way, some drawback of mortgage cannot be known by a new buyer.What is worse, these shortcomings may be modified to become some advantages to attract others. This fraud and sharp practice had continuing occurred. Namely, there are increasin gly investing companies were involved in this event. Nevertheless, because the housing price decreased, these mortgages had devalued, which caused a serious debt crisis. Shoal (2005) points out that business school should open some ethic courses to teach their students more accountable. Obviously, he has predicted this perspective.Initially, if lenders do not only pay attention to short-time strategies, they did not only pursue the minimization of value in a short time and preferred to lend currency to prime borrowers rather than sub-prime borrowers. Even though the price of house decreased, borrowers are bound to consider their reedit, because they do not want to be classified in sub-prime borrowers. Additionally, they had stable Jobs to ensure the possible of repayment. Namely, banks may not consistently suffer such a huge blow.Furthermore, in order to earn greater profit, some agents had lent more than 20 times cash than the value the company's security assets. Was (2010) convinc ingly points out that ‘highly leveraged balance' existed in some financial institutions. For example, investment banks' liabilities-to-assets ratio was 0. 96 at the end of 2006 (Was, 2010). In other words, the majority of assert was borrowed. Even though these agents used insurance to transfer risk, blind pursuit of interests had brought some huge hazard. Sometimes, if an agent is indeed regarded as a selfish man, it will damage the benefit of his or her corporation.Even though it may be reasonable that agent should some underlying differences between physical science and business studies. In other words, some theories which are correct in physical science cannot be reasonably used in business studies. Eisenhower (1989, citied in Lehman and Continue, 2013: 1) points out that it is a significant issue that if an agent makes a decision, it will be fisticuff for principals to check whether this decision is beneficial for the company, such as ‘creative accounting' which is s eriously harmful the profit of corporation.Furthermore, managers may not want to spend capital on ‘long-term research and development', because it can reduce the short-term interest (Lehman and Continue, 2013: 2). Therefore, even though it seems exact that mangers should maximize the value of shareholders, Shoal discounts this view. He (2005:81) convincingly argues that this is the ‘unrealistic assumptions' and humans moral and ethic have been overlooked in this theory. In fact, shareholders and agents have the diverse goals, which meaner that shareholders are interested in long-term strategy; oppositely, agents prefer to focus on the short-term strategy.Because of the unrealistic assumptions, agency problems which contribute to the 2008 global financial crisis are ignored. 3 Implication in article 3. 1 Stewardship can remit financial crisis In Shoal's article, he argues that stewardship theory which can be alliterative to replace the agency theory can remit the problem between principals and agents (Shoal, 2005). Stewardship theory does not advocate personal interest, but the elective profit. In this theory, collective profit is higher than the personal benefit.Hernandez (2008) points out that agents' and shareholders' benefit can be aligned in stewardship theory. ‘Responsibility' and ‘psychological ownership' are combined with the profit of shareholders (Block, 1996; Davis, Chairman, and Donaldson 1997; citied in Spheres et al, 2012:2). In other words, they have become a collective and the interests of collective have closely linked with personal profits. According to Hernandez (2008), employees can feel more responsible and fulfill their obligations in stewardship theory.Because the interest has become consistent, the conflicting goals may not exist. Compared with agency theory which monitoring is necessary between shareholders and agents, shareholders and staff can cooperate in a harmonious environment. Furthermore, stewardship is a lso beneficial for realizing the interactions between sales personnel and consumers (De Router, De Gong and Wetness 2009; Hernandez, 2008, citied in Spheres et al, 2012). Therefore, it is good for a corporation to pay attention to customers, staff and shareholders simultaneously.Take sub-prime crisis makes an assumption, if the majority of corporation accepted he stewardship theory instead of the agency theory before the 2008 global financial crisis, the credit tsunami might not occur or it was not as heavy as this. Interest among agents', shareholders' and customers' are tightly relevant. In other words, agents and shareholders may not only focus on the short-term profit and ignore long- place. Therefore, they may prefer to lend currency for prime borrowers while limit the amount of loans which is loaned to sub-prime borrowers.In addition, when lenders resell their mortgage, they may not deliberately hide weak information and ay not modify shortcomings in order to resell a higher p rice. Even though the agency theory has been extensively used in the world, Shoal has realized the drawback of it and try to replace it. The agency theory has contributed to the 2008 global financial crisis to a large degree. Namely, Shoal has forecasted the issue which has widely existed in the majority of companies. Furthermore, the stewardship theory advocated by Shoal can effectively remit the problems between shareholders and agents.It also can decrease the harm brought by financial crisis to some extent. 4 practice relevance 4. The power of government While it can effectively decrease the probability of financial crisis that using the stewardship theory replaces the agency theory, it is not enough. Therefore, the power of government cannot be overlooked. Because it can cause economic bubble that a government continually slash interest rates or dramatically reduce interest rates. However, American government had constantly reduced the interest rate thirteen times from 2001 to 2 003.As a result, it caused the boom of American real estate. In addition, the application condition of sub-prime mortgage had decreased. A large umber of people preferred to purchase a house in installment plan, which caused the 2008 global financial crisis. Therefore, except for the stewardship theory, government also should pay attention to the frequency and the range of decreasing rate. Excessively fast decline the interest rate or oversize decrease them may cause economic bubble, which can harm for the domestic financial market.What is worse, it can lead to global economic crisis. Thus improper regulations may indirect lead to financial crisis. In addition, it is important that government should limit the rate of the sub-prime mortgage in any investment bank. Klein (2009) points out that regulation which can defend financial marker should be built by government. In other words, reasonable legislative can effectively prevent financial crisis. Consequently, the effect of governmen t cannot be ignored. It also can effectually protect financial market and prevent huge loss.While the dominant economic system is free marker, governmental macro-control, which is beneficial to the current economic system, is inevitable. 5 Conclusion Agency theory has described the relationship between principals and agents. Even Hough the foundation of the agency theory is to maximize the value of shareholder, Shoal (2005: 81) convincingly points out that it is incorrectly built on an ‘unrealistic crisis. Because sub-prime borrowers have the lower credit and lower repayment ability, when the value of mortgage was less than the loan, they preferred to give up repaying the debt.As a result, sub-prime lenders had to sustain the huge loss. However, agents only focused on the short-term profit. They preferred to loan currency to sub-prime borrowers. Therefore, borrowing currency to sub-prime borrowers had become a common phenomenon in that period. Even though Shoal's article was p ublished before the international financial crisis, he was still aware of the problems of agency theory in economic system. While agency theory is accepted by the majority of corporations, it still has some serious problems.

Division of Household Labor Essay

Using information presented in class lectures, discuss the division of household labor (DoHL) in the United States. Specifically, discuss: a) how the DoHL has changed since 1965 (with particular emphasis on core versus â€Å"other† tasks); b) the five factors that explain the DoHL; c) the effects of the DoHL on psychological well-being; and d) how the DoHL affects couples’ marital quality and stability (including material from class lectures and Hochschild’s Second Shift). The DoHL changes after having children which tends to be more equitable between the man and woman since they have to split their time to make sure that they can work on a safe and happy environment for everybody, especially children. The change in DoHL between 1965 to present has drastically changed because women started to have their own careers, so for example in 1965 women would put in 7. 2 hrs more than fathers in taking care of the household and in 1985, women would put in only 2 more hours than fathers. The reason that is, is because most women in 1965 were committed housewives whereas as time progressed, with more women rights, women were focused on establishing their own career path. The core tasks are tasks that simply cannot be ignored, so for example cooking, cleaning, dishes and laundry are core tasks and now it has changed because it would usually be the women doing all of that back in the 60’s. Currently they don’t have time to do that so they learn how to split the chores with their husband. That’s why in the gender outline, you see the total hours under fathers generally increasing and the total hours under mothers decreasing as the years go by. If they are both working long hours, if they have enough money, they can hire someone to come and do the core tasks. There are five factors that explain DoHL; husbands’ and wives’ gender role attitudes, educational level, race and ethnicity, wives’ employment and presence of minor children. Starting with attitudes, it all starts with traditionalism. If the wife is a traditionalist, then by large she will do a lot more household labors compared to a wife who isn’t a traditionalist. If the wife isn’t a traditionalist, and her husband is, then there will be a struggle in DoHL, most likely she will end up doing most of the housework. Most successful marriages are when they are both non-traditionalists. Next factor is education, on average, the more education they have the more liberal attitudes they will hold on social issues in general, therefore being less traditional. However if they have quite some money, then gender attitudes may change, so for example, if he can support the whole family with a high salary, she may not see a need to work and would decide to stay at home with the children. In race and ethnicity white men tend to have the most traditional beliefs, black men have the least. Looking at core tasks, black men do the most, Hispanics next, then white last. Another factor, wives employment does change it because if she has a career the less time she will have to do the core tasks. If the wife is employed, her core tasks and her husband’s core tasks go down because of less time on both people. In other tasks (like paying bills), which is less time consuming, the numbers increased. The last factor is the presence of minor children, if they don’t have children, then as what we would expect, the disparity in terms of household labor is very small, however if they are both working and have children with childcare, then there is noticeable discrepancy, since women put in almost twice as many hours as men. The effects of DoHL on psychological well being varies. It can be very hard on both when they are tired and snappy from a long day at work and just not feeling like doing the â€Å"second shift† The single best predictor of long term relationships stability is common values and backgrounds because they would typically share similar interests and values. Now by looking at core tasks and distribution, the hours put in core tasks doesn’t effect the woman’s psychological well being however if the distribution is uneven (ie. She does more than 50 percent of the work) then the lower her psychologically well being. For men, it’s the opposite, it’s the hours that affected them even if the distribution was uneven. So the higher number of hours he puts in, the lower his well being psychologically. Looking at the studies on the effects of division of household labor on marital quality and stability, they found that in couples, if the wife perceived the DoHL as unfair at time one, they were 3 times more likely to get divorced 8 years later, however if the husbands perception of the DoHL was unfair at time one, it didn’t really affect the marriage, its mainly the wife’s perception that matters. In conclusion, if they both thought that the DoHL was fair, then it would predict their marital quality as good. Take for example, Nancy and Evan Holt in the book, â€Å"The Second Shift†, they would fight a lot based on DoHL, she was a feminist and he was a traditionalist, so having non common values didn’t help their fighting but because equality was so important to her, didn’t want to get divorced, and wanted things to be fair, she decided to do the upstairs (mainly the core tasks) and he would do the downstairs (other tasks, like cleaning the garage and taking care of the dog). Did the DoHL between them end up working? Yes because equality was so important to Nancy. For Carmen and Frank, the DoHL didn’t really bother them, first of all they both had similar values but its also because they really needed each other’s money and help. He did about half of the work especially cooking rice, using the ATM machine and doing bills simply because she wasn’t good at those things. She did the other tasks that she was good at, so there was truly quite a fair division; therefore their marriage was content.