Tuesday, April 28, 2009
In Texas, flu cancellations and closings draw questions
Everyone is panicking about the outbreak of the swine flu. It comes up a question, should the school be closed in order to prevent the spread of the flu? Based on the U.S. cases so far, the virus is still mild. However, due to the swine flu Fort Worth school district shut down its 144 schools. A lot of school activities are canceled. Some people say there is no evidence of transmission, so the closure is redundant. However, I disagree with that. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that swine flu is contagious. It spreads from human to human. So people should avoid contact with people who are sick. Even though traveling season has not come yet, there is a small amount of people who go around from city to city for work. There is still a small possibility of spreading. I think Fort Worth school district made a good decision on preventing the spreading. Especially in high school, students have to move around for classes. Even one person with swine flu can spread the illness easily and quickly. It will be too late when the kids are infected, then they go home and spread the illness to their parents. Although what I just mentioned has not happened yet, early prevention is always better.
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Response to "No Refusal" Policy for Austin DWI
The "No Refusal" Policy is a great idea to get rid of drunk drivers on the road. Basically it gives authorities to the police officers to draw blood from the suspected drunk drivers if they refuse to take a breathalyzer test. Although it might sound crazy to most people, I personally agree with the police should take stronger action to stop people from drink and drive. I think the government is giving too much individual right to the people and neglected the consequence of it. As I just took a defensive driving class couple weeks ago, I was told that drunk driving is the No.1 cause of accident. I really agree with my classmate in injury lawsuit is waiting to happen. Forcing a needle in them to draw blood might cause certain level of injuries. However, are a poke and a couple drops of blood worthier than the other innocent drivers' life on the road? As an individual, it seems like violating a person's rights. But as a whole, it gives more safeties to other people. Furthermore, there will be no reason to refuse taking a breathalyzer test rather than a blood test if the suspected drunk drivers didn't drink. The only thing I don't agree with the policy is that the drawing blood is done by the police officer. As what my classmate said, "people who haven't been to nursing or medical school should not be taking the blood out of someone's body."
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Austin can't dump its failing students
The increasing students with poor academic performance or discipline problems are giving headache to Austin school district. The school district is paying a price for the at-risk students who mostly end up dropping out. Many school principals urged the district to outsource those at-risk students to a private company.
Sending out the at-risk students to a place would definitely make school environment into a better place. Those who always cause troubles would not distract the others. But what would happen if those who do not study stay together? They tend to not study at all. This will result in the same as they drop out. In my opinion, the goal of education is to bring out the full potential of the students. We are going to pay for trapping the students into a place without educating them.
On the other hand, if the school district decides to keep the at-risk students it will probably have to increase the spending on them as their problems get bigger. But it is worth to do so. The school must have more hard working students. It already has a good environment that might have affect on them. It is more possible to change them from dropping out comparing sending them to a place with no help. Moreover, private company is not a non-profit organization. It will probably cost more to the school district. As we see, sending the at-risk students to a private company is not a solution. It will have a worse consequence.
Sending out the at-risk students to a place would definitely make school environment into a better place. Those who always cause troubles would not distract the others. But what would happen if those who do not study stay together? They tend to not study at all. This will result in the same as they drop out. In my opinion, the goal of education is to bring out the full potential of the students. We are going to pay for trapping the students into a place without educating them.
On the other hand, if the school district decides to keep the at-risk students it will probably have to increase the spending on them as their problems get bigger. But it is worth to do so. The school must have more hard working students. It already has a good environment that might have affect on them. It is more possible to change them from dropping out comparing sending them to a place with no help. Moreover, private company is not a non-profit organization. It will probably cost more to the school district. As we see, sending the at-risk students to a private company is not a solution. It will have a worse consequence.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Too big to fail? Too big to be left alone.
Too big to fail? Too big to be left alone.
The U.S economy is going through a hard time. Not to mention the small companies, the large companies have no exception to face the crisis of closing. If they are unable to continue the business, the result will be a disaster. Thousands of people will lose their job. The Great Depression in the U.S history will probably happen again. In order to save the economy of this country, government has to help them.
This article is intended for those people who think that government should not have control over the business. I think those people did not consider the consequence of the bankruptcy of large companies. It seems like they tend to think that equity is more important than anything else.
A lot of smaller companies are trying to save themselves by lying off their employees. Therefore the unemployment is increasing rapidly. As we see the small companies already have a big affect on the economy, so what about the large ones? They are the major stand of financial system. They have grown so large that their failure will bring down the economy so much.
The author of this article thinks that in order to prevent the worse consequence in the future, the government should have authority to regulate the big business. I agree with the author. In the article it says "[t]hough the government has considerable authority over commercial banks, it has much less power to regulate other huge financial enterprises". In this situation I think government should extend its power to regulate them in order to save the economy. The economy is related to everyone, everyone will be affected.
The U.S economy is going through a hard time. Not to mention the small companies, the large companies have no exception to face the crisis of closing. If they are unable to continue the business, the result will be a disaster. Thousands of people will lose their job. The Great Depression in the U.S history will probably happen again. In order to save the economy of this country, government has to help them.
This article is intended for those people who think that government should not have control over the business. I think those people did not consider the consequence of the bankruptcy of large companies. It seems like they tend to think that equity is more important than anything else.
A lot of smaller companies are trying to save themselves by lying off their employees. Therefore the unemployment is increasing rapidly. As we see the small companies already have a big affect on the economy, so what about the large ones? They are the major stand of financial system. They have grown so large that their failure will bring down the economy so much.
The author of this article thinks that in order to prevent the worse consequence in the future, the government should have authority to regulate the big business. I agree with the author. In the article it says "[t]hough the government has considerable authority over commercial banks, it has much less power to regulate other huge financial enterprises". In this situation I think government should extend its power to regulate them in order to save the economy. The economy is related to everyone, everyone will be affected.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
More Efficiency, Less Equity
Housing rescue will benefit economy
I was taking an economic class last year. I learned that there is a tradeoff between equity and efficiency. In order to clean up the housing mess, President Obama just proposed a housing rescue plan to help the people who can't really afford the loans they got. Otherwise it will still be so hard for the lenders to lend money because they haven't got the money back from the borrowers. However, this plan is not going to help every borrower. For those who bought houses as an investment, owned far more on their house than it is worth, and worked so hard to keep up their house payments won't get help under this plan. It is so unfair that the people who didn't consider their ability on buying house and failed to pay off the loan can get benefit from the government, but the people who are able to keep up their house payments won't receive any help from the government. On the other hand, if the government chooses to have more equity in this case, for example the money is spent on helping every borrower, that won't be efficient to solve the problem.
I think this article is intended for the people who are paying attention to the economic issues. This article addresses an argument that whether we should choose efficiency or equity. The author is pretty natural, but I think this person agrees slightly more on efficiency and which is what I agree with. Choosing to have more equity to keep everyone happy is short-term, I believe nobody is happy in the declining economics. On the other hand choosing to have more efficiency is long-term, because once the econmic starts growing again everyone can live easier.
I was taking an economic class last year. I learned that there is a tradeoff between equity and efficiency. In order to clean up the housing mess, President Obama just proposed a housing rescue plan to help the people who can't really afford the loans they got. Otherwise it will still be so hard for the lenders to lend money because they haven't got the money back from the borrowers. However, this plan is not going to help every borrower. For those who bought houses as an investment, owned far more on their house than it is worth, and worked so hard to keep up their house payments won't get help under this plan. It is so unfair that the people who didn't consider their ability on buying house and failed to pay off the loan can get benefit from the government, but the people who are able to keep up their house payments won't receive any help from the government. On the other hand, if the government chooses to have more equity in this case, for example the money is spent on helping every borrower, that won't be efficient to solve the problem.
I think this article is intended for the people who are paying attention to the economic issues. This article addresses an argument that whether we should choose efficiency or equity. The author is pretty natural, but I think this person agrees slightly more on efficiency and which is what I agree with. Choosing to have more equity to keep everyone happy is short-term, I believe nobody is happy in the declining economics. On the other hand choosing to have more efficiency is long-term, because once the econmic starts growing again everyone can live easier.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
More Food Inspectors is a must
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/02/17/0217health.html
The Plainview peanut plant is being investigated that it might be relative to the salmonella outbreak. This plant is owned by Peanut Corporation of America. After the long request of investigation, bird feathers and dead rodents were discovered. This plant is currently close. They already ordered a recall of all the products from this plant. Since March 2005, this plant has been operating without state license or being inspected.
Surprisingly, there are only 46 sanitarians inspecting more than 17,000 food manufacturers. As we see there is definitely a labor shortage of doing the inspection. Dr. David Lakey of the Department of State Health Services is proposing the increasing salary for that job. However, he said there is trouble attracting candidates for these positions because federal jobs pay more. Food is a natural need of human. The food contains harmful bacteria may cause deaths. After reading this article I hope government will do a better job on inspecting food manufactures in order to protect the health of people.
The Plainview peanut plant is being investigated that it might be relative to the salmonella outbreak. This plant is owned by Peanut Corporation of America. After the long request of investigation, bird feathers and dead rodents were discovered. This plant is currently close. They already ordered a recall of all the products from this plant. Since March 2005, this plant has been operating without state license or being inspected.
Surprisingly, there are only 46 sanitarians inspecting more than 17,000 food manufacturers. As we see there is definitely a labor shortage of doing the inspection. Dr. David Lakey of the Department of State Health Services is proposing the increasing salary for that job. However, he said there is trouble attracting candidates for these positions because federal jobs pay more. Food is a natural need of human. The food contains harmful bacteria may cause deaths. After reading this article I hope government will do a better job on inspecting food manufactures in order to protect the health of people.
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