Reason For The United States Imports Economics Essay

Reason For The United States Imports Economics Essay In recent years, studies show that the United States imports more than it exports. Imports are any goods or services brought in from one country to another for sale. Exports, refers to the selling of goods and services produced in the home country to others. This means that the United States is buying more than we are selling at this very moment. Companies import goods in order to supply the domestic market at a cheaper price. Companies, also import goods that may not be available in the local market. Exports outweighing imports helps widen the trade deficit. This overall widening of the countrys deficit shoes how difficult it will be to rebalance the global economy so that the United States does not consume more than it produces. The United States importing more than it exports affects the economy by tipping the balance of trade. The Balance of trade also known as net exports, is the difference between the monetary value of exports and imports of output in an economy over a certain period. In easier terms it is the correlation between a nations imports and exports. The United States importing more than it exports places the United States in what is known as a trade deficit, or trade gap. According to the United States Census Bureau, in 2011, the United States trade deficit was $559.956 billion. This was due to the United States having $2.1 trillion in exports minus the $2.67 trillion the United States had in imports. This is an example of how the United States Economy is becoming stronger, considering the fact that this is way better than the outlandish $753 billion dollar trade deficit that happened only four years prior. The reason for the United States imports is because its imports in oil, consumer goods and automotive products outweigh exports in many of the same groups. Being that the United States is the third largest exporter in the world; the economy still manages to export a large amount of goods. The United States is only behind China and the European Union. It is a known fact that two-thirds of the United States exports are material goods. The most imperative export for the United States is services, which is the remaining third of the economies exports. As the biggest service exporter in the world the United States manages to stay atop the three largest exports categories in service which are royalties and license fees, travel services and financial services. On the contrary the United States is the worlds largest importer; more than 80% of the United States imports are goods (BEA). The largest category is industrial machinery and equipment, within this the largest group is oil and related petroleum products. In order to get out of the recession the United States needs to figure out how to try and balance out the trade deficit. As a result of production levels dropping and the continuing of selling off our large companies to foreign interests, tax revenue has receded and we have fewer American owned companies remaining to produce wealth and generate taxes. American owned companies are what we need to build the economy. The persistent importing of goods from other countries will hurt our economy even more. Small businesses help drive the American economy. Small businesses also provide jobs for over half the nations private workforce. The debt enlargement has impacted every level of our economy. This ongoing trade deficit is detrimental to the nations economy over the long term because it is financed with debt. The trade deficit also helps the United States lose its competitiveness. This means one day we wont be able to compete with other countries. When purchasing goods overseas for a long period of time, the United States companies lose their expertise and even factories to make certain products. The government will have to continue to borrow money and import more goods in order to operate. One of the biggest issues existing today with imports and exports, are the rising and falling of gas prices. In the past year, the United States exports of oil rose above its imports of oil. Being that in the past year, gas prices have reached an all-time high, this shows that exporting more than importing is not always a positive thing. In fact, The Energy Department reported, For the first time since 1949, the United States exported more gasoline, heating oil, and diesel fuel last year than it imported (Winter). This change is significant because for years, the United States economy has depended heavily on other countries for imports of fuel to meet demand. In the past year, the capacity of fuel exports has been rising because many citizens are using less fuel, and in return buying more resourceful cars. This case allows U.S. refiners to export more fuel to rising economies such as South American countries. For example, In 2011, U.S. refiners exported 117 million gallons per day of gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and other petroleum products, up from 40 million gallons per day a decade earlier (USATODAY). The more fuel the U.S. economy exports the higher the prices of gas will be. This statement is true because the more fuel and oil that is sent to other countries, the less of a supply pillow the United States will have. These facts and statements show while the United States exported more oil than imported, the downside is that gas prices were higher than they ever were. When President Obama took office, he prompted that he planned to change the economy in a substantial way. According to CNN, his initiative to enhance the economy was to increase the amount of exports over the next five years, while in return creating 2 million plus jobs. As said earlier in the analysis, the balance of trade needs to be rebalanced as the economy recovers. Obama and his teams support of increasing exports has not only created a surplus of jobs, but also will shift the economy towards exterior trade. In conclusion, it is clear to see that the United States has put the economy into quite a predicament. Because of the negligence of the future, America has continued to create a massive amount of debt. With all of the problems being faced, lets look at a possible solution to this problem. There are many resources that the United States must import. However one of the biggest issues is oil and can be something that can definitely be manipulated for the future. The United States possesses its own oil supply that it has yet to dig into for various political reasons. If this oil is found and used then not only will we not have to import oil, but gas prices can go down tremendously in America. In the midst of everything that is currently occurring, there is good news as of late. According to the New York Times, exports last month have increased by 3.1 percent and a 1.5 percent increase in imports. This is good news and a slight sign of improvement. Further, President Obamas plans to enhance the economy will help our future. If the United States can continue to keep this progress, then maybe the economy can decrease the trade deficit more every year until we can maintain some type of balance. When it comes to the future state of the United States economy we can only be optimistic in the nation and hope for a better tomorrow. If bad decision making continues as far as our country and our money, we are making it harder for the future leaders of this country. That is simply making disarrays for someone else to clean which is not the type of behavior this country needs to continue to exuberate. The choices we make today effect our tomorrow and if we plan on staying strong as a nation, the way we handle our finances must be improved and be more strategic. If not our future will be unclear, and our great country will go into an uncontrollable downward spiral.

The Other Lover Essay example -- essays research papers

The Other Lover In the Shakespearean sonnet, â€Å"The Sonnet-Ballad† by Gwendolyn Brooks, the speaker uses such techniques as: repetition, metaphors and personification to show how her relationship is doomed because of war. The poem shows how war can change a man who was once confident and unaffected by pain, into one who accepts death without a struggle.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  In this sonnet, death is personified and shown as the speaker’s opponent in a struggle for her lover. Death is described as being coquettish and possessive. These attributes are used to describe death because they show how hard it would be to overcome this opponent. The descriptions show that death flirts with the man, in order to make him accept her. Once death has claimed him, the speaker can never have her lover back; he has been caught in death’s possessive arms. By giving these characteristics to death it is shown that, because of the war, the man is forced to court death instead of his lover. Once her lover has gone to war the speaker says, â€Å"Now I cannot guess what I can use an empty-heart-cup for.† This comparison shows how lost the woman is feeling now that she has realized she will probably never see her lover again. It describes how lonely she is, as well as the fact that she does not know how to deal with what she is feeling. Her heart was once full of love for the man, but now that he is gone, it is empty. The poet also compares death to a woman. She describes death as being coquettis...

How Social Media Has Changed Our Society Media Essay

Social media has changed the way we live in many ways. It has changed everything from the way we communicate with each other to where we get our news from. It happened so fast that people hardly realized just how much their lives had changed. Personal and professional communities are now intertwined and within arm’s reach and our once small social and work networks have now expanded to proportions that were once unimaginable. Just like in any revolution or period of expansion, there are many positive and negative aspects involved in the world of social media. The world of social media is complex and nowhere near its pinnacle. It’s exciting to think of where it will take us in the years to come. Needless to say, our communication has sped up tremendously since social media was introduced. It has made it easier to keep in touch with people all over the country or all over the world for that matter. Social media has even made finding a date easier to a certain extent by mu ltiplying the size of our social circles. Social media allows people with similar interests to connect and converse. It allows professionals to network easier than ever before. Social media allows businesses to advertise for free and actually seem somewhat human to consumers. It also allows for cost effective campaigns and strategies for growing businesses. It also has the power to drive traffic to a website or even a real business. Some people think that social media is adding to human interaction while other people think that social media sites are basically replacing face-to-face interaction. see more:speech about social media Online interactions can become a substitute for actual human contact. It can encourage people to say or do things they never really would have done or meant to do, due to the fact that they feel like it’s not reality. It can lead to covert dealings and perhaps lead to infidelity. This social media frenzy has allowed bullies to spread destructive information about others and they can even bring out the nastiest conversations because people feel anonymous in some instances. Social media can ruin the image of a company due to the wrong angle or brand image. It can also have a negative impact on worker productivity. Either way you look at it, whether you like it or not, social media is changing our lives in one way or another. One aspect of society that will experience the greatest amount of social change over the next ten years is social media. Social media is going to grow larger and become more encompassing of our lives and able to capture more of our lives. Because we capture more of our  lives the people in our social circles will spend more of their time living vicariously through us. Therefore, they will spend less time learning about society and less time developing their own interpersonal relationships. Already social media encompasses several different media forms. Currently, these forms are music, writing, video, and pictures. Soon social media will include other forms of communication, such as augmented reality. Projects like Google Glass place a screen in front of your eyes all day; the glasses can recognize people’s faces and provide information. The glasses are able to listen to your conversation and provide relevant Google search results, for information you might want to know during the conversation. Therefore, interactions between people will be more fact-checked by information people make on the internet. As augmented reality projects like Google Glass become more widespread and developed, people will be constantly plugged into the internet and to the â€Å"hive-mind†. Eventually people will start dreaming their lives on the internet in part or in whole. You will become more of a public person, and in doing so more shaped by the society around you. Social media changes at the speed of which the technology that supports social media is developed and embraced. For new developments in social media to be embraced the new technological developments must be useful and intuitive. People need to have a reason to care about a new development. Society embraced the sharing of pictures because we like to capture glimpses of other people’s lives. We have embraced video because it expands upon pictures. Words were the first versions of social media, and were exchanged because they are the essence of communication. As long as people exist we will continue to seek new ways of exchanging information. What we call social media now will be but a small fraction of what social media is ten years from now. Eventually social anthropologists will look back at these times just as current social anthropologists examine cave paintings. We can ask ourselves, â€Å"What are the engines that are driving this change in our society?† For example, there are many reasons that drive people to use the site know as Facebook. Research resulted in nine ways that drive people to use Facebook; to conduct a survey, upload photos, putting your page together, posting an event, ask a question, create desktop backgrounds using images from an ev ent, and you can even post a picture of the day. The news media even use it to run a contest and give away merchandise, and posting of videos. Facebook has become an  overnight sensation for social networking, and what makes this so amazing is that Facebook did not even exist until 2004. Three college students created it to allow other students to network and meet each other, and it has caught on with people around the globe. Facebook has had many impacts on today’s technologically advanced society. It allows people who probably never would have met each other in person to communicate; it creates new relationships and friendships, and it places distance between people who could communicate in person but instead choose to communicate online. Facebook is nothing more than a medium for communication, and yet, it is so much more than that. At a glimpse, a person can learn everything from what gender a member of Facebook is, to what religion they believe in, what school he or she attends, and their likes and dislikes, with just a click of a mouse. An article in the Network Journal of Communications written by Brent Leary, compares and contrasts popular social networking sites and his recent experiences with them. He talks about being a member of over twelve differe nt social networking sites in which he has spent time using each network. One of the main interest in this article was the author’s insight into his most recent addition to his list; Facebook. He also notes that business application providers such as Yahoo, Finance, Zoho, etc. are building widgets to work with Facebook in order for Facebook to infiltrate further into the business networking field. The most appealing characteristic of Facebook is that they have been able to grow from what was once only a college based network, to a worldwide network with many different areas of interest. Most importantly they have been able to do this while staying very user friendly, professional, and private, unlike other social networks such as MySpace. This has allowed Facebook to become as financially valuable to its creators as it is socially valuable for its members. It is very interesting to see how Facebook has not only established itself in the networking world, but in the financial market as well that people use it for. Experts estimate that many people now spend at least 50 percent of their waking time online. For many, a large part of this time is spent in social networking sites like Facebook. Facebook on the surface is a socially acceptable networking site for students and others to connect, share experiences, and meet old friends. It does say some disturbing things about how our society is adjusting to the age of technology, and it brings into question how a generation of Face  bookers will deal with the challenges of the real world in person like career, family, and success. There are tons of data that show that the social media wave (hype) is going to continue and is here to stay. Take Facebook and Twitter for instance. Many large associations and companies advertise on these social media platforms like the NBA, NFL, MLB, and NHL to name a few. From a company stand point CBS, CNN, Wal-Mart, and Apple advertise on these social media platforms also. According to Michael A. Stelzner, â€Å"Social media marketing involves engaging people with online social networks to generate exposure, increase traffic, gather insight, improve search rankings, enhance customer relations, build strong brand advocates, generate quality leads and grow sales† (â€Å"Quickly Grow Your Business†). Social media helps businesses grow around the world. This is one major reason why social media is going to continue to prosper. Social media involves a lot of youth in today’s society. For example, social media has greatly influenced youth to vote or seek education about this year’s Presidential Election. According to Foster Web Marketing, â€Å"The younger genera tion (18 to 35 years old) is the largest group of social media users. They pretty much rely on social media and other internet sources for information. With the structure of social media, information is easily skewed as users exchange it with others. Because someone has to pass on the information to another, they can add their 2 cents along with the relevant content, meaning the end result can lean heavily toward one side or another†. It was said that in this year’s Presidential Election, the youth played a big role in the reelection of Obama. Social media played a major role this election and is projected to play a bigger role in the next Presidential Election. Social media also allow news companies and news stations to get information out to the world within minutes. Good or bad, social media has impacted the world in a major way. It has allowed long lost friends, family members, and lovers to reunite. Since its arrival, social media has changed the way the world socializes in general. Undoubtedly, social media is capable of bringing people together. They potentially create friendships and partnerships, expose users to advertisements therefore developing business endeavors, and allow individuals who would otherwise remain silent virtually shout their thoughts and opinions to a broad range of strangers, friends, and acquaintances alike. There are certainly already  acknowledgeable pros and cons to social media. With the cyber doors wide open, people are able to learn a lot about someone before they even lay their own eyes on them: name, address, looks, personal preferences, etc. It is easy to assume that many social media users are alienating themselves from true personal contact with potential friends and partners. Granted this will not always hold true, younger generations who will grow up under the direct influence of social media will come to believe that it’s okay to meet all their acquaintances through the internet which would ultimately hinder their social skills, confidence, and charisma. In order to measure the future impact of social media on society, over the next decade we will inevitably have to look to efficient research methods for accurate conclusions. Sociologists rely on surveys to gather information about both small and large populations- mostly behavioral and opinion information. â€Å"Surveys are one of the most commonly used quantitative research techniques in sociology.† This method of research is the most effective because surveys allow the sociologist to capture an opinion of a large group which will therefore give the data that is needed to site the information. This information will show the change accurately and promptly. Random sampling for the survey w ill give everyone an equal opportunity in participating in the survey. A diverse amount of people will result in finding an abundant amount of opinions about this topic. We have seen the social media change in just months since new phones have emerged such as the iPhone 5. Apple is one of the number one leading companies in technology and their Apple products are constantly updating. From the article on the apple website, it states, â€Å"We use the iPhone to log in and launch an infrastructure management client. I can screen share with senior architects and lead them through the challenges they’re facing. Being able to do that anywhere — without a computer — is a major benefit to us. We can respond to customer needs much faster and solve problems on the go.† As we can conclude from this quote, the change is inevitable because it’s more convenient, and convenience is what we love. Social media has undergone such a significant change since its founding. This is due to all of its possible uses. When social media first began it was for the purpose of enabling it’s users to locate and communicate with others. Now it has broadened from that into many other possible uses. There has been such a variety of benefits, for both  individuals and business, to using social media. For individuals, one of the benefits has been that they have been able to keep in touch with their friends and loved ones. They are able to see what they have going on in their lives and contact those that they have lost contact with. Individuals are able to stay abreast of the different activities and functions in both their area and other areas. They also use social media to spread the word of functions, using this as a free method of invitation. Social media has also been a beneficial tool for children as well. Kids gain confidence from interacting with others online, which has long term benefits. Online communities are very diverse and expose children to different viewpoints, technologies and ideas. In addition, this is the easiest way of communicating internationally. For businesses, they have caught hold to the trend and have acknowledged the benefits and possibilities to grow their corporations. This has become used by both large and small businesses. They use social media to both promote and survey their businesses. They have saved an abundance of money by using it as a method of free advertising. Many businesses have grown, become established, or have been saved by using social media. They also use this as a way to widen business contacts and as recruitment tools. Social media will experience more social change than a ny other in its class because as times change, need will change. Social media will adapt to meet the needs of society. There will be different and more advanced searches and possibilities for both individuals and businesses. Technology has become the forefront of advancement in today’s society and social media will be modified to meet the needs and encourage different endeavors for its users. With the already present benefits of social media, there will continue to be advancements that will add greater opportunities for growth than any other area in the next ten years. We all enjoy a little social media one way or another in today’s society. Some of us, in fact many of us can’t survive a day without updating our MySpace, Twitter, or Facebook. With the help of these social networking sites, the internet has made our lives as Americans extremely simple and easier. These sites allow their patrons to not only connect with their friends, but are very useful for things such as employment, networking and even getting your brand as an artist, whether music, drawing or any other talents that you may have, out and viewable by today’s society. But with time always comes change. Whether  good or bad, change is the one constant entity in society. The functionalist theory of social change best describes the change in social media because these sites have changed the way we as Americans live and adapt to this new phenomenon. Functionalism is a macro level of analysis, which basically describes how each level or part of society contributes to society as a whole and when something changes from the norm the ability to adapt to that change. Take this for example; milk of course comes from cows for the most part, so it would originate from a farm somewhere in Middle America. After being collected from the farms, it would be transferred via most likely an eighteen-wheeler to a factory for processing. After being deemed consumable, it would then be bottled up and placed perhaps on another eighteen-wheeler, plane or other mode of transportation to be transferred to your local market, and later delivered to your doorstep by your milkman. In this instance, the farm, the eighteen-wheeler, the factory, the market and the milkman are all parts of society working together in the milk industry. But what happens if you were to remove one part of the process. Milk delivered to your front door step isn’t very common anymore, which took the milkman out of the equation. Society didn’t just stop enjoying the great taste of milk; they simply went to the market themselves to purchase the milk. They adapted to the change that was presented to them. Social media has no doubt changed society as a whole, but have we as a society been able to adapt to that change? Without a doubt, the answer is yes. A lot of parts in certain processes that are being used in today’s society have experienced changed due to social media. Take Facebook for example and the effect it has had on the hiring process. Generally, face to face interviews were used to develop an idea of what type of person an applicant may be, but now if you throw Facebook in the mix, employers can take a look at potential employee’s page and develop an idea on that person’s character from their page. In this instance an interview may not be needed, and if you do get an interview, the employer may have developed an idea of your character and has decided whether or not you’re going to get that job. The internet changed the hiring process and we as a society have adapted. Functionalism best explains the change in social media and social networking. Our society has shown that change will always occur but it’s the ability to adapt to the change that actually brings the change to light. In conclusion, social media has forever  changed the way society works, whether it’s the sharing of an idea, the communication of news, or the availability of a product or service. Society today is on the verge of a new way of existing that it’s never experienced before. No longer will people from one side of the world be really able to say that they will never see a person or communicate with someone from the other side of the world ever in their life. No longer will people not be able to share an idea, if they really want to share it (no matter how radical it may be or no matter how many people may disagree with it). No longer will the spreading of information or the expressing of an opinion be able to be completely silenced. As long as there is a person who wishes to express their opinion, share their music or art, or simply say hello to another human being in another country or culture, social media will allow them to do so.

The Role of the Antagonists in the Short Stories Where...

Like all great stories throughout time, a compelling villain is the key to making a story worthwhile. In short stories like, â€Å"Where have you been, where are you going,† and, â€Å"Love in LA,† a though provoking antagonist was used by the authors to really give the stories some depth. The antagonist of, â€Å"Where have you been†¦Ã¢â‚¬ Arnold Friend takes on the persona of temptation to the protagonist Connie and really emphasizes the theme of be careful what you wish for. Connie was a young girl who repeatedly met up with older more mature boys; but one day Arnold Friend arrives at her house and coerces her to leave with him. The story abruptly stops there leaving the reader hoping for more. The antagonist of, â€Å"Love in LA†, Jake, an unemployed dreamer,†¦show more content†¦Arnold could be the Devil, while Jake could be the snake, and Arnold resorted to premeditated stalking to win over Connie while Jake just unexpectedly met Marianna, and finally Arnold tried to coerce Connie to come with him by promising her love and cars, etc.. and Jake just flat out lied to win over Marianna. When first reading the book, â€Å"Love in LA†, the name Jake seemed reminiscent of snake, and snake could loosely be connected to the story of Adam and Eve, or temptation. Now many could also argue that in,†Where have you been†¦Ã¢â‚¬ , the character Arnold Friend could in fact be the devil himself. While describing Arnold Friend, the author said, â€Å" One of his boots was at a strange angle. It pointed out at the left, bent at the ankle.† (pg 90) In most depictions of the devil, the character usually has hooves, so instead of feet stuffed oddly into his boots, could they in fact be the hooves of the devil? Even though Jake wasn’t portrayed as the devil in, â€Å"Love in LA,† he could still be a biblical character. â€Å" He made up a last name and address and wrote down the name of an insurance company an old girlfriend once belonged to.†(63) Like the biblical snake in the Garden of Eden, Jake showcases his sly, untrustworthy side. Both of the characters take on the personas of temptation and mischief to finally get what they want in the end of their stories. In addition to having an underlying biblical meaning, both storiesShow MoreRelatedThe White Man s Burden By Rudyard Kipling10612 Words   |  43 Pages‘Since freedom is our natural state, we are not only in possession of it but have the urge to defend it’ Étienne De La Boà ©tie Take up the White Man s burden– Ye dare not stoop to less– Nor call too loudRead MoreDeveloping Management Skills404131 Words   |  1617 Pagesmymanagementlab is an online assessment and preparation solution for courses in Principles of Management, Human Resources, Strategy, and Organizational Behavior that helps you actively study and prepare material for class. Chapter-by-chapter activities, including built-in pretests and posttests, focus on what you need to learn and to review in order to succeed. Visit www.mymanagementlab.com to learn more. DEVELOPING MANAGEMENT SKILLS EIGHTH EDITION David A. Whetten BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY Read MoreStephen P. Robbins Timothy A. Judge (2011) Organizational Behaviour 15th Edition New Jersey: Prentice Hall393164 Words   |  1573 Pagesrequest to Pearson Education, Inc., Permissions Department, One Lake Street, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458, or you may fax your request to 201-236-3290. Many of the designations by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book, and the publisher was aware of a trademark claim, the designations have been printed in initial caps or all caps. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Robbins, Stephen P. Organizational