Government Intervention And Antitrust Law Essays -

Government Intervention And Antitrust Law Government Intervention in Individual Markets: A Look at Government Intervention and Antitrust Law via the Microsoft Case Growth and Development in the US Economy 36-363 Professor Burnett Josh Preiser 0032432 May 9, 2000 Preface In light of recent developments, I took a different approach to this paper. The Microsoft Antitrust case has been somewhat of a phenomenon that has become one of the most prominent cases in recent years. Because of this, I decided to look at government intervention into individual markets, along with antitrust law, via that particular case. I am of the opinion that we can learn a great deal by using that particular ongoing litigation. Antitrust law protects the public from companies that attain an undue domination of the marketplace via mergers, tying 1 product to another, vertical integration, and other practices tending to eliminate competition or bar entry into the market to newcomers. In the early 1980s, Microsoft was a much smaller company than it is today. However, it had already established a reputation of being a predator, a greedy predator. They were known to terminate licenses mercilessly once they figured out a way to clone a given technology, regardless of whether it was legal or not. Back then, Microsoft had some enthusiastic competition. The biggest of which were Borland (programming), Ashton-Tate (databases), Visicalc and Lotus (spreadsheets), as well as Wordstar and WordPerfect (word processors). All of these companies have now either merged out of existence or are completely defunct, with the exceptions of Borland and Lotus (which are barely afloat). Microsoft now has the leading product in each sector of the market once occupied by these firms. The company was responsible for ridding itself of these early competitors by either buying them out or simply driving them into the ground. This early disregard set the tone for how Microsoft does business eve n today. Microsoft's advantage comes from their domination of operating systems (OS). ?By definition, if the OS maker creates applications, they will run better with the OS than a third party's, and the OS owner can, over time, create modifications that will make this even more so,? (Rapacious 1). Microsoft has the power to leverage their dominance in operating systems (Microsoft currently has its Windows software in over 90% of all PCs) to gain a large market share in the various application sectors. They have always been able to do this and as a result have been able to get, or achieve, whatever it is that they have wanted. This is the vertical integration that the antitrust laws talk about. In a July 1994, settlement, the Justice Department came to an agreement with the software giant over the antitrust charges it had filed against the company. The charges were brought after the department found out that Microsoft was giving personal computer manufacturers a discount on their OS when the PC manufacturer would pay the company a royalty for each computer sold, including those without MS-DOS or Windows software installed. ?The practice gave PC makers little incentive to install competing programs since they would have had to pay a royalty to both the competitor and Microsoft,? (Ramstad 1). The settlement only dealt with this single count and left Microsoft alone to continue performing its numerous other anti-competitive practices. In the spring of 1995, Judge Stanley Sporkin rejected the deal that the Justice Department settled on. He did so on the grounds that: 1. The government refused to give the court enough information about the agreement; 2. The deal was too narrow; it failed to deal with issues like OS/application leverage, and allegations that Microsoft intentionally made changes to Windows that made third party applications hard to run; 3. The parties did not adequately consider anti-competitive issues; 4. The deal was unsatisfactory when it came to enforcement and compliance mechanisms. Around the time of the settlement, some suggestions started to come about how to deal with Microsoft. Stewart Alsop suggested ?that Microsoft be forced to document the API's in Windows, so that other companies could legally clone it. That would still leave Microsoft an eighteen month head start on each release,? (Rapacious 3). It was also suggested that the company be broken up. This way, the operating system and the applications would be separated into different companies and the playing

An Analysis and Comparison Between Talbots Inc. and Chicos Fas, Inc. Essays

An Analysis and Comparison Between Talbots Inc. and Chicos Fas, Inc. Essays An Analysis and Comparison Between Talbots Inc. and Chicos Fas, Inc. Essay An Analysis and Comparison Between Talbots Inc. and Chicos Fas, Inc. Essay A Brief Summary of the Businesses The purpose of this term paper is to discuss the similarities and differences between Talbots Inc. (Talbots) and Chicos FAS Inc. (Chicos). This paper will detail the nature of each companys respective business, past financial performance, and expected future outlook. The paper is divided into two sections. The first section will discuss each companys history, business structure, and future plans independently from each other. The second section will discuss several important financial ratios and provide a detailed analysis comparing the two companies. By the end of this analysis, the reader will have a better understanding of these two retailers and the industry in which they operate. Chicos is a specialty retailer of private label womens merchandise, with fashion looks ranging from casual to dressy. The company also sells intimates, accessories and other non-clothing items. Chicos began its operations in 1983 with its target market being women over 35 years old and of moderate to high level income households. The company designs the vast majority of its products in-house or through its independent vendors. Chicos has made small acquisitions of product lines and/or companies, including the White House / Black Market (WHBM) brand and Somas, as well as acquiring most of the assets of Fitigues which operated 784 retail stores in 47 states, the District of Columbia, the U. S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. Over the past several years, Chicos has continued to open new stores. Chicos business strategy is focused on its private-label merchandise and the accessories it sells at a great, bargain value. As of March 17, 2006, Chicos operated 31 Chicos brand outlet stores, eight WHBM brand outlet stores and one Fitigues brand outlet store. Currently, the distribution for all brands (except the Fitigues brand) is handled through Chicos distribution center in Winder, Georgia. As of January 28, 2006, Chicos had roughly 11,000 employees. In fiscal year 2005 (FY 2005 ), Chicos continued to see strong growth in its financial performance. Chicos reported its ninth consecutive year of double-digit comparable same store sales increases, as well as record revenues, net income and its highest ever operating margin. They also elieve that the increase in comparable Company store net sales in the current fiscal year resulted from the continuing effort to focus Chicos product development, merchandise planning and allocation, buying, technical design, and marketing departments on Chicos target customers. In FY 2005, net income rose 37. 4% from $141 million to $194 million. Net sales increased for the FY 2005 by 31. 7%, to $1. 4 billion and operating income rose 33% to $298 million. The main drivers in the increase of net sales were catalogue orders and Internet orders for FY 2005, which increased by $9. 3 million, or 34. 7%, compared to FY 2004. It is believed that this increase was primarily due to the increased circulation of catalogue mailings and additional television spots in FY 2005 compared to FY 2004. Comparable store sales for Chicos owned stores increased 14. 3% year over year, primarily due to increased transactions compared to FY 2004. Chicos believes that comparable store sales growth is critical in achieving its ability to manage their stores efficiently and continue future increases in financial performance. In other words, by increasing the transactions per store, while minimizing markdowns, and other miscellaneous costs, the same store sales will increase. Besides their operating liabilities, Chicos is virtually debt-free, while having cash and marketable securities of over $400 million. In FY 2005, Chicos generated $268 million of cash flow from operations compared with $224 million in FY 2004, an increase of 20%. Strong cash flow is paramount to Chicos future success. By efficiently managing its cash flows, Chicos will help support its general operating needs and capital expenditure requirements while simultaneously increasing shareholder value (i. e. , increasing the present value of future cash flows). In FY 2005, Chicos brand strategy was re-focused by refining the business operations, and broadening the customer base. In FY 2005, Chicos opened a total of 106 new stores, 57 Chicos stores, 44 WHBM store, and five Somas stores. In addition to its new store openings, 36 stores increased their square footage, thus allowing them to have more merchandise readily available to the customer. Based on its current business strategy, Chicos will continue improving their existing stores by increasing the square footage as additional selling space is needed. In addition, the Chicos loyalty club (also known as Passport) reached 1. 7 million permanent members with spending in excess of $500 by the end of FY 2005. As Chicos moves into FY 2006, their goal remains unchanged: to continue to create and grow strong branded concepts that target compelling niche markets and ultimately deliver predictable, sustainable growth to out shareholders . In FY 2006, Chicos plans to open between 140 and 165 net new stores (as of January 2007, there are currently 920 total stores). Talbots is a national specialty retailer and cataloguer of womens, childrens and mens classic apparel, accessories and shoes. Talbots operates stores in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. They offer many varieties of clothes, ranging from sportswear to casual wear and shoes. They also brand their own merchandise in misses and womens petite sizes. Talbots merchandising strategy focuses on achieving a classic look, emphasizing different styles and quality. Talbots stores and catalogues offer the option to mix and match clothing with accessories, enabling the customer to complete their wardrobe. Talbots has two reportable segments, including the retail segment and direct marketing segment (i. e. , the internet and catalogue sales). Each segment requires a different marketing and management strategy. The retail segments (based on television and printed advertisements) revenue is driven primarily by the in-store sales of women, children and mens clothing and accessories. The direct marketing segments (based on online advertising and mailings) revenue is driven primarily by its approximately 25 catalogue mailings per year and online, via the website. Talbots currently circulates 48 million catalogues per year. As of January 28, 2006, Talbots employed 11,600 people and operated a total of 1,082 stores (as compared to 1,049 stores in FY 2004). Based on Talbots filing of the 10-K, net sales in FY 2005 were $1,808,606 compared to $1,697,843 in FY 2004, an increase of 6. 5%. Operating income was $152,148 in FY 2005, compared to $142,115 in FY 2004, an increase of 7. 1%. Cash flow from operations was 12% of sales, or $211,438 for FY 2005, compared to $155,223 for FY 2004. Total revenues for the year rose 7% to approximately $1. billion. Comparable store sales also grew at a modest 2. 6%. Comparable store sales were positive in each of the first seven months of FY 2005, driven by a healthy sales performance across the U. S.. However, the catastrophes of Hurricane Katrina and Rita, led to a decrease in comparable store sales in September 2005 as Talbots had significant operations in the south (roughly 50 stores, from Louisiana to Alabama , up to Arkansas and Kentucky). Due to the natural disasters, Talbots needed to markdown its merchandise in order to clear out unsold inventory. Another reason for the small comparable same store sales, year over year, was also due to the fact of more of the same styles, thus, resulting in fewer options to choose from for the customer, again resulting in markdowns. The final reason for the lower sales was due to Talbots releasing fall clothing in September, based on customer patterns, but the customers were not ready to buy such clothing at that time period. In other words, for this time period, Talbots did not have a good sense of product differentiation, as many of these styles werent unique or unusual to the general population. Customers were not enthusiastic about the semi-annual sale either, and much of the summer inventory was also left unsold. Because of this, inventory was up 3. 4% in FY 2005 as compared to FY 2004. Talbots direct marketing business also increased at 9% to $265 million, driven by an impressive 28% increase in internet sales. Online sales accounted for roughly 42% of the total direct marketing sales, up from 36% in FY 2004. Besides record profits for the third consecutive year, Talbots set a record for Internet and catalogue order fulfilments. Based on the companys studies, 50% of customers who visit Talbots online are considered window-shoppers, who would then make their purchases at their local stores. Likewise, 67% of those who receive catalogues would also shop in the store within two weeks. Talbots has a credit charge card, except theirs does not go through a third party, as they have their own department who process orders and fulfil sales (also known as the Talbots Charge Card), to roughly 600,000 customers. The nature of the business tends to create two different distinct selling seasons; spring and fall. During the spring season, direct marketing sales are stronger in the first quarter, while retail store sales become stronger in the second quarter. During the fall and winter seasons, both the retail stores and direct marketing have strong fourth quarters, as Christmas holiday season is the primary cause. The Companys fourth quarter sales for the last two years were 26. 9% for FY 2005 and 27. 7% for FY 2004, of total sales for the year. The Companys merchandising strategy focuses on liquidating seasonal inventory at the end of each selling season which historically happens at the end of the second and fourth quarters. These markdowns usually lead to an increase in sales; however, since these are markdowns, this negatively impacts the companys bottom line. Understanding the Businesses, based on Ratios and Financial Statements I will now start discussing the financials of both companies, based on the form 10-K filed with the SEC. A comparison of both companies will be performed from the perspective of financial ratios as well as benchmarking against the industry average for several of the ratios. The first ratio that I will discuss is the price earnings ratio, also known as the P/E ratio, as well as price multiple or earnings multiple. The P/E ratio is calculated by the market price of the security in relation to the earnings per share of the security. The historic P/E ratio for Chicos as of January 28th, 2006 was 39. 8, while the P/E ratio for Talbots during the same time was 16. 5. In general, a high P/E suggests that investors are expecting higher earnings growth in the future compared to compani es with a lower P/E, but this isnt always the case. For Chicos, an investor is willing to pay $39. 8 for $1 of current earnings while Talbots investors are willing to pay $16. 5 for $1 of current earnings. I will now touch upon another very important ratio, the quality of inventory turnover analysis. As we are dealing and focusing on retail businesses, understanding this ratio is paramount to the industry, as this is the heart of the business. The inventory turnover is calculated by taking the cost of goods sold divided by the average inventory for the year. This ratio measures the efficiency of a companys inventory management and should be compared against industry averages. A low turnover implies poor sales and therefore, excess inventory. A high ratio implies either strong sales or ineffective buying. For FY 2005, Chicos inventory turnover was 6. 5, while Talbots was 4. 8. Based on these numbers, we can see that Chicos inventory moves more quickly through the production process to the ultimate sale to the customer, thus reducing storage and miscellaneous costs. Since 2001, inventory turnover has increased each year for Chicos, while Talbots inventory turnover has decreased during the past year. Much of this has to do with the hurricanes during September, as well as incorrectly forecasting customers patterns of when they would buy products, thus resulting in price markdowns. To note, the industry average inventory turnover is 4. 56. Gross profit margin (GPM) is also a very important measure for retailers. The GPM shows the relationship between sales revenue and cost of sales and indicates the portion each dollar of sales that contributes to the companys profit. GPM is calculated as revenue minus cost of goods sold divided by revenue. Chicos GPM was 61% in FY 2005, 61. 4% in FY 2004 and 60. 5% in FY 2003. The GPM for Talbots during the past three years was 36. 2% in FY 2005, 35. 6% in FY 2004 and 38. 3% in FY 2003. Gross profit margin serves as the source for paying additional expenses and future savings. As with most retailers, they [i. e. the industry] are very fickle with fashion (i. e. wrong guess in style and design could ruin an entire season). This typically results in price markdowns. In this particular case, I feel that Talbots fluctuation between FY 2003 to FY 2005 could be based on the fact that they had bad styling and designs for the line of clothing and accessories, and the customers were not pleased. Another ratio I will discuss is the net profit margin (NPM) . It is calculated as net income divided by net sales. Based on FY 2005 results, the NPM for Chicos was 13. 8% while the NPM for Talbots was 5. 15%. What NPM truly shows is managements effectiveness at controlling revenues and expenses to generate greater shareholder returns. Basically, it measures the portion of sales a company actually keeps in earnings. Since 2003, Chicos NPM has steadily increased, while Talbots NPM has steadily decreased. The NPM since 2003 for Chicos was 13. 24% in FY 2004 and 13. 04% in FY 2003. The NPM for Talbots over the same time span was 5. 2% in FY 2004 and 6. 44% in FY 2003. This may also be attributable to Talbots inefficiency to sell and market their products. I will now touch upon another very important ratio, the quality of income ratio (QIR). The QIR is calculated as cash flow from operating activities divided by net income. The QIR measures the portion of income that was generated in cash. With all things being equal, a higher QIR indicates greater ability to finance operating and other cash needs from operating cash flows. Any ratio [QIR] that is greater than 1:1 is considered quality income. Based on FY 2005, Chicos QIR was 1. 38:1, while Talbots was 2. 27:1. Based on the assumption that anything greater than 1:1 is quality income, both Chicos and Talbots have quality income. The next two ratios are considered liquidity ratios . The first ratio that I will talk about is the working capital turnover. Working capital turnover is used as a means of comparing the depletion of working capital to the generation of sales over a given time period (i. e. money used to fund operations and the sales generated from these operations). This provides some useful information as to how effectively a company is utilizing its working capital to generate sales. It is calculated by dividing sales by working capital . Based on FY 2005 results, the working capital turnover for Chicos was 3. 38, while the working capital turnover for Talbots was 4. 81. In a general sense, the higher the working capital turnover, the better, because it means that the company is generating a lot of sales compared to the money it uses to fund the sales. The current ratio is also a term used frequently when discussing a companys liquidity. The current ratio measures a companys ability to pay short-term obligations utilizing current assets. It is calculated by dividing current assets by current liabilities. It is also known as liquidity ratio, cash asset ratio, and cash ratio. The higher the current ratio, the more capable the company is of paying its current obligations. The current ratio for Chicos is 4. 39:1 and Talbots is 2. 54:1. Based on these ratios, it can be assumed that both companies do not have any issues paying off their obligations. Free cash flow (FCF) is an integral part of every company. It is a measure of financial performance calculated as operating cash flow less capital expenditures and dividends. In other words, FCF represents the cash that a company is able to generate after expending the money required to maintain or expand its asset base. FCF is important because it allows a company to pursue opportunities that enhance shareholder value. Without cash, it is difficult to develop new products, make acquisitions, pay dividends or reduce debt. Based on the calculations, the FCF for Chicos is 120,771 and the FCF for Talbots is 113,420. Debt to equity is yet another important term used when discussing companies. It is a measure of a companys financial leverage calculated by dividing its total liabilities by stockholders equity (also can be calculated by long-term debt divided by stockholders equity). It indicates the portion of equity and debt the company is using to finance its assets. Chicos debt to equity is 0. 24 (24%) while Talbots is 0. 83 (83%). In this case, both Chicos as well as Talbots assets are primarily financed through equity. In the same category as debt to equity, return on equity (ROE) is also a useful tool in measuring a corporations profitability. It reveals how much profit a company generates with the money shareholders have invested. The ROE is useful for comparing the profitability of a company to that of other firms in the same industry. ROE is viewed as one of the most important financial ratios. ROE is equal to a fiscal years net income (after preferred stock dividends but before common stock dividends) divided by total equity (excluding preferred shares), expressed as a percentage. Based on FY 2005 calculations, the ROE for Chicos was 28. 4% and the ROE for Talbots was 15. 3%. Based on these calculations, it shows that Chicos is more efficient at generating profits for every dollar of net assets, and to that extent, shows how well it uses investment dollars to generate earnings growth. Gross profit percentage (GPP) is another measurement used to analyze companies. It measures how much of every sales dollar is considered gross profit. All things being equal, a high gross profit results in higher net income. For FY 2005, Chicos GPP was 61%, while Talbots was 36. 2%. Historically, the GPP for Chicos was a bit higher than 61% (61. 4% in FY 2004 and 61. 3% in FY 2003). The decrease of 40 basis points over the last year resulted primarily from a decrease in merchandise margins from their outlet stores, as well as their investments into WHBM and Somas. Year over year, Talbots GPP increased from 35. 6% in FY 2004 to 36. 2% in FY 2005. The final ratio I will talk about is the total asset turnover (TAT). The TAT can be defined as sales (or operating) revenues divided by average total assets. In other words, the amount of sales generated for every dollars worth of assets. Asset turnover measures a firms efficiency at using its assets in generating sales or revenue the higher the number the better. It also indicates pricing strategy: companies with low profit margins tend to have high asset turnover, while those with high profit margins have low asset turnover. Based on FY 2005 results, the TAT for Chicos as well as Talbots was 1. 64. Regarding the common sized income statement, I will now express the ending fiscal year figures since for Chicos as well as Talbots. CHICOS To note, all percentages above represent their respective dollar amounts over net sales, with net sales being 100%. For instance, the gross profit (net sales minus cost of goods sold) was $857,042. $857,042 divided by $1,404,575 is 61%. TALBOTS The same situation is expressed here. Net sales for the year were $1,808,606 (expressed in thousands). Hence, if cost of sales was 63. 8%, then the actual dollar amount was equivalent to $1,153,890. Thus the gross profit (not expressed above) is $654,872 (roughly 36. 2%). Every percentage is divided by the net sales to achieve the desired result (within reason). In conclusion, there is a lot to be said about these two companies and where they are going. They are both highly motivated to produce the highest quality merchandise and they scale their merchandise to the mid-income families, more towards the women 35 and over. While one company was gaining ground versus their peers, the other was having an average year, but the negativity was centered on the hurricanes and bad judgement of when styles were in and when to have their sales. Much can be said about these companies, and where they are heading. Both CEOs seem very upbeat and optimistic about the market as well as their expansion. Both companies feel that their future success relies on the many different factors, and that uncertainties will occur. These potential risks and uncertainties include the financial strength of retailing in particular and the economy in general, the extent of financial difficulties that may be experienced by customers, the quality of merchandise received from vendors, the extent and nature of competition in the markets in which the companies operate, and the extent of the market demand and overall level of spending for womens private label clothing and related accessories, to name a few. Hopefully, after reading this analysis and comparison of Chicos and Talbots, you were able to understand a bit more about the nature of their businesses and management strategies.

Power, poliics and knowledge Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Power, poliics and knowledge - Essay Example Power is very important to the managers or leaders of any organization since it is essential in the directing of its staff. However, the process of acquiring power and using it usually ruins the ethics and values held in the organization (Kelly, 1988 p.3). Discussion Power defines leadership in any company and by definition; leadership refers to the ability of directing a group of employees towards achieving the goals of an organization. Therefore, leadership has formed the basis of classifying managers into five groups or profiles, namely: leader, destructive achiever, builder, mechanic, and innovator (Kelly, 1988 p. 4). The leader refers to the ethical manager who effectively uses his charisma to lead other employees towards achieving organization goals. The builder on the other hand refers to the manager who might be ethical but lacks charisma. Therefore, they are referred to as leaders with limited leadership potential. The destructive achiever is an unethical manager who, even t hough might have high potential, he or she will not contribute towards the achievement of the long term goals of the organization. The innovator is a very creative manager in his or her field but is not termed as a leader and is sometimes termed untrustworthy. Lastly, the mechanics refers to the persons that are competent in their profession but lack the personal impact towards settling of group issues. Therefore, they are not considered leaders or builders of the organization. From the managers listed above, it is evident that for any organization to be prosperous, it requires leaders who are ethical and have charisma which are essential in the realization of the long-term goals of the organization. Ethics is demanded by the society in any given part of the world. Therefore, it has led to the classification of ethics into two groups: ethics of integrity and ethics of social responsibility. The demand for integrity in the business came into existence following the arrival of new mil lennium, which led to the increased number of accounting scandals that occurred in different parts of the world. The results were negative for example; many organizations lost their trust in the corporate world. The demand for social responsibility maintains safety to the society as well as the environment it operates (Jeurissen 2007, p. 3). According to ethics, the exercise of power must conform to the cultural standards as well as the legal standards of ethics. For instance, it has been termed unethical for any organization to use power for its own gain by engaging in illegal activities. For example, an HR assistant has the power of representing the services of the company to client companies as a process of obtaining customers. However, if he or she lies to the clients as a way of gaining more clients is an unethical behavior (Society for Human Resource Management, 2006 p.180). Many workers or employees of an organization have been in dilemma following the use of power by the sen iors. Many employees have experienced tough challenges in choosing between what is good for the organization in terms of profitability and what is right according to the set ethical standards in the community. The findings of the research conducted among the graduates at Harvard revealed that young managers were being forced to make decisions, some of which were unethical by their seniors. Even though the actions were unethical, the young managers still complied because of fear of losing their jobs.

Market Structures Analyses Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Market Structures Analyses - Essay Example The producers can't afford the labor without selling their crops. Their debts build up and their crops are left to ruin. In a perfectly competitive market, there are many buyers and sellers and therefore no individual player can influence the market as a whole. Hence the firms become "price takers" by accepting the price determined by the intersection of the demand and supply curves. Therefore the firm's demand curve is perfectly elastic and price equals marginal revenue as shown in the graph. Individual firms cannot increase prices due to the competitiveness of the market and the highly elastic demand curve. Hence there are normal profits to be gained for the producers. The products are homogenous and therefore the buyers are indifferent as to which firm they purchase from. There are no barriers to entry or exit; hence firms can enter and leave the industry with no cost liabilities. In such a competitive environment, there is maximum efficiency and competent allocation of resources with minimum wastage. A trace of monopolistic competition is found in chapter 13 of the book where the Joads stop to fill gas at a gas station. The owner of the station is characterized as a crushed man, one who is afraid of the change that the world around him has embraced. He talks about how he sees cars move west all day and the only ones that stop in his station are the ones that have no money. They exchange beds, baby buggies, pots, pans, dolls, even shoes for the gas. The rich cars, however, stop only at company stations in town. He refers to these stations as the yellow painted ones in town. We also notice how the owner tries to imitate the company stations with the yellow paint but fails because of the loose hangings and the old cracks in his beaten old station. Monopolistic competition or imperfect competition is relatively similar to that of perfect competition except that the products are not homogenous. There are large number of players in the market, but due to differentiation of products, each individual firm has a small market share and a limited ability to influence prices. In this market, the barriers to entry are very small and there is sufficient product knowledge among the consumers. Product differentiation, which is the characteristic of monopolistic competition, creates a difference between products by deeming them similar but not identical. The product of one producer can be differentiated from that of another. A competitive producer uses non price competitive methods such as advertising, packaging, brand names, design to differentiate his products. There are substitutes in the market but they are not perfect substitutes. Firms have some control over prices, but the demand curve remains downward sloping and elastic. The producer aims at maximizing his profits by charging as much as he can over and above the output where his marginal revenue and costs equal, without compromising his sales. In the long run, however, new entries will shift the demand curve and the cost curve, thereby squeezing the profits. Oligopoly Chapter 19 narrates the

Poetry Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Poetry - Essay Example The gloominess of the poems is enough to create a sense of hopelessness and human misery. This paper tends to analyze the two poems, and makes a comparison to comprehend the similarities and differences in them. Let’s start with the 14 line poem â€Å"For My Daughter† by Weldon Kees. The poet starts with a narration of his daughter, and describes the three kinds of miseries that she is going through, or is expected to go through. Lines 2-3 â€Å"Beneath the innocence of morning flesh/ Concealed, hintings of death she does not heed† reveal that the girl is suffering from some disease, and is near to death. The poem was written in a time when disease would go untreated, and this shows in the poem too. She is â€Å"fed on hate† (line 10), which means that her life is burdened with abhorrence. â€Å"Bride of a syphilitic or a fool† (line 12) shows that the girl has been married to a person who is sick with a sexually transmitted disease. He has infected her too which is why she is waiting for death to come to her. The essence of the poem is in the lines 13-14: â€Å"These speculations sour in the sun./ I have no daughter. I desire none.† These lines show the worthlessness of the life of a woman. First, it gets revealed that the poet is talking about a made-up character and has considered it as his daughter; and second, the poet shows hatred toward that character by stating that he does not want a daughter. We assume that he believes that if he had a daughter, she would have gone through a very miserable life, which is why he does not long for her existence anymore. He believes that it is better to have no daughter than to have one and leave her to face all the hurdles of life. This reveals the insignificance of a woman’s life that is stereotyped as despondent and bleak, so much so that it makes a daughter an unwanted being. The free-verse, three stanza poem â€Å"Grass† by Carl Sandburg is a depiction of death leading to worthlessness. The narrator of the poem is â€Å"grass†, which also implies â€Å"Nature†. The grass orders to pile up the bodies of soldiers at Austerlitz, Waterloo, Gettysburg, Ypres and Verdun. Soldiers that have died in wars have to be piled and buried at these places. â€Å"Shovel them under and let me work† is repeated twice, which stress upon the fact that the Nature is running its course no matter what happens. â€Å"I am the grass† and â€Å"let me work† also appear twice, which highlights the power of the Nature. This strength shows in line 3: â€Å"I am the grass; I cover all† because this depicts the fact that Nature has the power to cover the filthy work of humans, making them as clean and pure as they were born. The poem tells how soldiers are killed and buried, and how their sacrifices are easily forgotten by people. Time passes, and people even forget who they were and where they were buried. This shows the worthl essness of the lives of dead soldiers. â€Å"Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor: What place is this? Where are we now?† shows how easily people forget what has happened in the past which enabled them to be what they are. Lessons of history are forgotten but repeated. Whatever happens, Nature continues its work. Putting it all together, it is seen that both the poems compared above are based on the same themes: death and worthlessness. Both the poems are based on different ideas, but talk about human misery, pain,

Communicative Functions of Sentences

Communicative Functions of Sentences (Timothy. Shopen 2007) stated that, there are at least four senses in which one can talk about clause or sentence types in a language. One way is in terms of the distinction between declarative, interrogative, imperative, and exclamatory sentences. A second sense of clause type is represented by the distinction between main clause and subordinate clause, and among different types of subordinate clauses. Issues related to this sense are discussed in the chapters on subordination, A third sense of clause type concerns the way the same event or situation can be spoken about, from different perspectives, with grammatical consequences such as voice and pragmatic consequences such as topic and focus. The fourth sense, the one discussed, involves different types of clauses in terms of their internal structure, primarily surrounding different types of predicates. Here, the most basic distinction is between verbal and nonverbal predicates. Literature review: Sentence in traditional grammar Introduction: B.A.Okolo(2008) stated that the traditional grammarian fellow a certain procedure according to what he understand about the nature of the language, he added that if the language is the reflection of our thought, then there must be correlation between what we think and the language that we express our thoughts, and that why traditional grammarian began his description with complete meaning full statement, imposing that each sentence must has subject and predicate, thus these parts contribute each other to the meaning of the whole sentences. Definition of a sentence in traditional grammar Sidney. Greenbaum (2002) stated that the traditional definition of the sentence is that A sentence is a group of words that express a complete thought but he argued that this definition is notional, because it could lead to misunderstanding to what it meant by a complete thought, so he approved this assumption by explaining that some sentences have more than a thought. B. A. Okolo (2008) added that the words complete thought in traditional definition of a sentences do not mean logically complete, because logical complete thought does not turned out to be a sentence, but the paragraph, the essay, the chapter or even the whole book. Sidney (2002) defined the sentence as a group of words that begins with capital letter and ends with full stop, but again he argued this definition stating that there are a large number of sentences begin with two capital letters (in the case of nouns) and still considered as sentences, and others begin with capital letter but not end with capital letter like imperatives, exclamations and questions, so this definition is not adequate. Another common definition of sentence in traditional grammar is that a sentence is a group of words that consist of subject and predicate but A. B (2008) argued that by stating that lots of sentences in English do not consist of subject take like for example imperative take off your shoes thus sentence is easy to describe (explain) rather than define. Bas Arts and April MCmahan (2006) defined the sentence as A sentence is basically a group of words which are tied together and convey an idea, event or description. The words in an English sentence have a certain order and rules regarding ways to either expand or shorten it. The boundaries of a sentence are easily recognized, as it begins with a capital letter and ends with a terminal punctuation mark (period, question mark or exclamation point). It is important for English writers to know the language of sentence grammar terms in order to be able to analyze and develop their writing Sentence types according to meaning and word order: M. Verspoor and K. Sauter (2000) stated that English sentences can be classified according to communicative functions and patterns into four basic finds: Declarative, Interrogative, Imperative and Exclamatory sentence patterns, they added that when people communicate, they communicate for various reasons, but the four main reasons are: To inform someone of something To get information from someone To get someone to do something To express ones attitude about something And each of these communicative functions has the following patterns John is leaving. Is John leaving? Leave! How awful John is leaving! So these patterns have the following syntactic characteristics: Subject- whole verb Part of verb- subject- rest of the verb Verb by itself How à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦..Followed by remainder of sentence Thus the words john is leaving express the following functions Informing (declarative) Asking for information (interrogative) Getting someone to do something (imperative) Expressing feeling/attitude (exclamatory) B.A.Okol (2008) added that traditional grammarians generally agreed that sentences can express four kinds of meaning Facts (declarative sentences) The declarative sentence is used chiefly to make an assertion; usually it states a fact, but sometimes a probability, a possibility, or even an impossibility, the normal word-order of the declarative sentence is subject-verb or subject-verb-complement. This order is usually changed. Commands (imperative sentences) An imperative sentence expresses a command or a request, there is usually no formal difference between an imperative sentence with expressed subject and a declarative sentence. Thus you sing out of context may be either a request that you do the singing (imperative) or a remark that you know how to sing (declarative). But sentences using the verb (be) can be distinguished by the form of the verb: You be the singer (imperative) You are the singer (declarative) Questions (interrogative sentences) The interrogative sentence usually asks a question Exclamations (exclamatory sentences) An exclamations sentence expresses feeling or emotion. Exclamatory sentences are often introduced by what or how, as a modifier of the complement Interrogative Sentences The interrogative sentence usually asks a question: Have you seen Sam? Do you know that John is sick? Did the doctor say it will be twins? Is the food good? Sentence according to verbal predicate Transitive and intransitive clause: Timothy Shopen (2007) explained that the distinction of the clause with verbal predicates, is that the distinction between transitive and intransitive, transitive clause takes two or more argument, whereas intransitive takes only one argument, so in languages like English the distinction can be, by saying that transitive clause has an object, whereas intransitive does not as in the following examples: My dog ate the hamburger (transitive) My dog is sleeping in the abasement From the examples above, it is clear that transitive verbs like eat need an object to complete the meaning of the clause, but intransitive verbs like sleep does not need an object, although there a prepositional phrase followed the verb sleep in the above sentence but it is not an object, it is an adjunct because the meaning is still complete if this prepositional phrase removed from the sentence. Ditransitive clause Timothy (2007) stated that some English constructions contain more than object, or at least two nonsubject arguments, so these constructions are so called ditransitives as the examples below explain: Nancy gave Jeff some flowers Bob told Sally a story So in these examples the noun phrases Jeff and Sally are so called indirect object, and the noun phrases some flowers and a story are direct object, in the previous examples indirect objects flowed immediately the verb, whereas direct objects end the sentence, but in the construction with preposition direct object flowed the verb immediately and indirect object flowed the preposition as in the following constructions: Nancy gave some flowers to Jeff Bob told a story to Sally Data collection and analysis: Data collection: For the purpose of this assignment the researcher selected randomly a chapter from the book titled, the memories of babikr bedri, this book is written by Babikr Bedri in Arabic and translated to English by his son yousif bedri, the chapter selected is chapter one which is titled, Babyhood and Youth page 1-14 . And the motivation beyond this is to investigate clause types in English language according to the following criteria: According to meaning and word order And according to verbal predicates Data analysis: The data collected for the purpose of this study were analyzed in the following steps: Step one: to identify clause types according to meaning and word order Step two: to identify clause types according to verbal predicates Step one Clause according to meaning and word order Facts (declarative sentences) Our teacher sat down (Para 1 Page 6) I mastered the memorization of koran in the year 1880 (Para 4 Page 7) We arrived in Madani (Para 5 Page 9) Commands (imperative sentences) Come here (Para 2 Page 5) Go and wash your slat (the same Para) Come and write what you washed off before (Para 3 Page 5) Questions (interrogative sentences) When and in what circumstances did you copy this book? (Para 2 Page 12) Do you eat better than that in rufaa? (Para 2 Page 10) What food do you have? (Para 2 Page 10) To who did recite the previous piece? (Para 2 page 5) Who was with you? (Para 2 page 5) Exclamations (exclamatory sentences) How he put me down (Para 3 Page 1) Step two Clause according to verbal predicates Transitive clause Our teacher Muhammad had studied the Koran and other subjects (Para 2 Page 12) I was explained the word wabar (Para 3 Page 10) Intransitive clause We all laughed (Para 3 Page 10) We agreed (Para 3 Page 10) Ditransitive clause My parents told me that I was born on 8 August 1861 (Para 1 Page 1) Let me tell you about this man (Para 1 Page 4) A pupils family send a feast to the school (Para 1 page 7) She put my books in a cloth satchel (Para 2 Page 9) Conclusion In this study, you saw that sentences may have different communicative functions and that each of these communicative functions is expressed with a typical sentence pattern, called the declarative, interrogative, imperative or exclamatory pattern. The declarative sentence pattern is the most common and will be studied the most in this study. A typical declarative sentence gives information about a situation or event and may name one or more participants, a process, an attribute of one of the participants, and various aspects of the setting. The sentence constituents naming these are subject, and predicate. The predicate names the process, and possibly other participants, attributes or setting. The predicate consists of a predicator, which names the process, and its complement. The complement in the clause with verbal predicate (transitive, intransitive and ditransitive) can be a direct object and indirect object. If there is a direct object, there may also be either an indirect or benefactive object or an object attribute in the complement. English language is unlike other languages, it can employ different clause types in its sentences according to different aspects that why anyone could not talk about definit clause types without referring to all these criteria, but I think that clause can explained rather than classified.

The Relationship Between War and Man Essay -- Psychology

War dates back to the earliest of ages. Leaders have come out triumphant and countries have come out ravaged. Entire generations have been extinguished and humanity’s morale destroyed; all at the cost of a victory. Everyone is familiar with war, however we are not so quick to understand the lasting toll it takes on those who experience it for themselves. War has been fought through out many countries for various reasons since the beginning of times, the tactics and warfare themselves may have changed, but the meaning of war remains the same. In turn the soldiers, whom give it all in the name of their countries, never come back the same. It is glittered with words like glory, honor and devotion, however war, in my eyes, is anything but. It brings about many more problems, one of which is the substantial psychological effects it has on those who experience war first hand. World War I was said to have been the war to end all wars. We now know that not to be true as there have been countless wars since that proposition. The attitudes surrounding the initiation of World War I were very distinct from that of proceeding wars to come. Citizens were excited, families were proud to know that their sons were enlisted and patriotism and brotherhood were alive and well. Young men were very much encouraged to join the war effort and advertisements soliciting the call to arms were seen in a positive light. Enlistment was something expected of these young men, they wouldn’t dare be the ones to be â€Å"ostracized† or called â€Å"coward† . With no way around the Great War many did indeed join the armed forces; little did they know what they were in for. â€Å"A word of command† , and a powerful one at that, put these young men on the path to destruction. ... ...rd we take, as a war to end all wars was virtually never in sight. We must become human again; as it seems to be the only way to make existence worthy once again. Works Cited Cohen, Harold, PH. D. "Two Stories of PTSD." PsychCentral. PsychCentral, May 2012. Web. 9 May 2012. . Remarque, Erich Maria. All Quiet on the Western Front. New York: Ballantine Books, 1982. Print. US National Library of Medicine. "Post-traumatic Stress Disorder." PubMed Health. National Center for Biotechnology Information, 2012. Web. 9 May 2012. . WebMD. "Post-traumatic Stress Disorder." WebMD. WebMD, 2012. Web. 9 May 2012. . Sassoon, Siegfried. â€Å"Dreamers.† 1968.