An important factor in a market-oriented economy is the mechanism by which consumer demands can be expressed and responded to by producers. In the American economy, this mechanism is provided by a price system, a process in which prices rise and fall in response to relative demands of consumers and supplies offered by seller-producers. If the product is in short supply relative to the demand, the price will be a bit up and some consumers will be eliminated from the market. If, on the other hand, producing more of a commodity results in reducing its cost, this will tend to increase the supply offered by seller-producers, which in turn will lower the price and permit more consumers to buy the product. Thus, price is the regulating mechanism in the American economic system.
The important factor in a private-oriented economy is that individuals are allowed to own productive resources (private property), and they are permitted to hire labor, gain control over natural resources, and produce goods and services for sale at a profit. In the American economy, the concept of private property embraces not only the ownership of productive resources but also certain rights, including the right to determine the price of a product or to make a free contract with another private individual.
In Line 9, Para.1, "the desire of individuals to maximize their incomes" means ______.
A.Americans are never satisfied with their incomes
B.Americans tend to overstate their incomes
C.Americans want to have their incomes increased
D.Americans want to increase the purchasing power of their incomes
Task 2
Directions: This task is the same as Task 1. The 5 questions or unfinished statements are numbered 41 through 45.
If you own a car, you are probably considering buying some kind of car insurance (保险). However, when you are actually purchasing car insurance, it can be difficult for you to decide which is your best choice. The ideal buying process is to first research and decide, then purchase. Research first
Before buying car insurance, you should find out the purpose of your purchase and how the insurance meets your needs.
Decide on suitable Car Insurance Policies (保单)
A neglected part of car insurance is the part which covers medical bills. Medical payments can add up very quickly in an accident situation, and the insurance should cover the bills incurred(招致) both by you and by the passengers in your car. Make sure you know the full value that your insurance covers.
Purchase the best Car Insurance for your needs
You have a number of choices when it comes to the actual purchase of the car insurance. Each has advantages and disadvantages, and these may be influenced by your individual taste and previous buying experience. Insurance companies may offer you goodadvice, but prices on the Internet are often better.
According to the first paragraph, when buying car insurance, one should first______.
A.decide on the number of policies to purchase
B.do careful research on the different choices
C.choose the best insurance company
D.look for the lowest insurance rate
Mahmood is a junior employee of Tzo Company (a large, listed company). Tzo is a processor of food labelled as containing only high quality meat. The company enjoys the trust and confidence of its customers because of its reputation for high quality products. One day, when passing through one area of the plant, Mahmood noticed some inferior meat being mixed with the normal product. He felt this must be unauthorised so he informed his supervisor, the factory manager, who told Mahmood that this was in fact a necessary cost reduction measure because company profits had been declining in recent months. Mahmood later found out that all stages of the production process, from purchasing to final quality control, were adapted in order to make the use of the inferior meat possible.
The factory manager told Mahmood that the inferior meat was safe for humans to eat and its use was not illegal. However, he told Mahmood that if knowledge of the use of this meat was made public, it would mean that customers might stop buying the products. Many jobs could be lost, probably including Mahmood’s own. The factory manager ordered Mahmood to say nothing about the inferior meat and to conduct his job as normal. Mahmood later discovered that the main board of Tzo was aware of the use of the inferior meat and supported its use in seeking to reduce costs and maintain profits. In covering up the use of the inferior meat, the factory produced a fraudulent quality control report to show that the product was purely based on high quality meat when the company knew that this was not so.
When Mahmood heard this, he was very angry and considered telling an external source, such as the local newspaper, about what he had seen and about how the company was being dishonest with its customers.
Required:
(a) Explain how Mahmood might act, in each case, if he were to adopt either conventional or post-conventional ethical assumptions according to Kohlberg’s definitions of these terms. Your answer should include an explanation of these two terms. (8 marks)
(b) Construct an ethical case for Mahmood to take this matter directly to an external source such as a newspaper. (8 marks)
(c) Some jurisdictions have a compulsory regulatory requirement for an auditor-reviewed external report on the operation and effectiveness of internal controls (such as s.404 of Sarbanes Oxley).
Required:
Explain how such a requirement may have helped to prevent the undisclosed use of the inferior meat at Tzo Company. (9 marks)
Section B – TWO questions ONLY to be attempted
Introduction
Flexipipe is a successful company supplying flexible pipes to a wide range of industries. Its success is based on a very innovative production process which allows the company to produce relatively small batches of flexible pipes at very competitive prices. This has given Flexipipe a significant competitive edge over most of its competitors whose batch set-up costs are higher and whose lead times are longer. Flexipipe’s innovative process is partly automated and partly reliant on experienced managers and supervisors on the factory floor. These managers efficiently schedule jobs from different customers to achieve economies of scale and throughput times that profitably deliver high quality products and service to Flexipipe’s customers.
A year ago, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Flexipipe decided that he wanted to extend the automated part of the production process by purchasing a software package that promised even further benefits, including the automation of some of the decision-making tasks currently undertaken by the factory managers and supervisors. He had seen this package at a software exhibition and was so impressed that he placed an order immediately. He stated that the package was ‘ahead of its time, and I have seen nothing else like it on the market’.
This was the first time that the company had bought a software package for something that was not to be used in a standard application, such as payroll or accounts. Most other software applications in the company, such as the automated part of the current production process, have been developed in-house by a small programming team. The CEO felt that there was, on this occasion, insufficient time and money to develop a bespoke in-house solution. He accepted that there was no formal process for software package procurement ‘but perhaps we can put one in place as this project progresses’.
This relaxed approach to procurement is not unusual at Flexipipe, where many of the purchasing decisions are taken unilaterally by senior managers. There is a small procurement section with two full-time administrators, but they only become involved once purchasing decisions have been made. It is felt that they are not technically proficient enough to get involved earlier in the purchasing lifecycle and, in any case, they are already very busy with purchase order administration and accounts payable. This approach to procurement has caused problems in the past. For example, the company had problems when a key supplier of raw materials unexpectedly went out of business. This caused short-term production problems, although the CEO has now found an acceptable alternative supplier.
The automation project
On returning to the company from the exhibition, the CEO commissioned a business analyst to investigate the current production process system so that the transition from the current system to the new software package solution could be properly planned. The business analyst found that some of the decisions made in the current production process were difficult to define and it was often hard for managers to explain how they had taken effective action. They tended to use their experience, memory and judgement and were still innovating in their control of the process. One commented that ‘what we do today, we might not do tomorrow; requirements are constantly evolving’.
When the software package was delivered there were immediate difficulties in technically migrating some of the data from the current automated part of the production process software to the software package solution. However, after some difficulties, it was possible to hold trials with experienced users. The CEO was confident that these users did not need training and would be ‘able to learn the software as they went along’. However, in reality, they found the software very difficult to use and they reported that certain key functions were missing. One of the supervisors commented that ‘the monitoring process variance facility is missing completely. Yet we had this in the old automated system’. Despite these reservations, the software package solution was implemented, but results were disappointing. Overall, it was impossible to replicate the success of the old production process and early results showed that costs had increased and lead times had become longer.
After struggling with the system for a few months, support from the software supplier began to become erratic. Eventually, the supplier notified Flexipipe that it had gone into administration and that it was withdrawing support for its product. Fortunately, Flexipipe were able to revert to the original production process software, but the ill-fated package selection exercise had cost it over $3m in costs and lost profits. The CEO commissioned a post-project review which showed that the supplier, prior to the purchase of the software package, had been very highly geared and had very poor liquidity. Also, contrary to the statement of the CEO, the post-project review team reported that there were at least three other packages currently available in the market that could have potentially fulfilled the requirements of the company. The CEO now accepts that using a software package to automate the production process was an inappropriate approach and that a bespoke in-house solution should have been commissioned.
Required:
(a) Critically evaluate the decision made by the CEO to use a software package approach to automating the production process at Flexipipe, and explain why this approach was unlikely to succeed. (12 marks)
(b) The CEO recommends that the company now adopts a formal process for procuring, evaluating and implementing software packages which they can use in the future when a software package approach appears to be more appropriate.
Analyse how a formal process for software package procurement, evaluation and implementation would have addressed the problems experienced at Flexipipe in the production process project. (13 marks)
A.A purchasing organization can be assigned to multiple company codes
B.Multiple purchasing groups can be assigned to a purchasing organization
C.A purchasing organization can be assigned to multiple plants
D.A purchasing organization can be assigned to multiple controlling areas
Please contact Robert Chen for______in purchasing office equipment.
A.store
B.type
C.help
D.furniture
Purchasing the new production line will be a ________ deal for the company.
A.profitable
B.tremendous
C.forceful
D.favorite
A.A plant can be directly assigned to just one reference purchasing organization
B.A plant can be directly assigned to just one purchasing organization
C.You can assign only one standard purchasing organization to a plant
D.You can assign a plant directly to a controlling area.
A.forceful
B.profitable
C.tremendous
D.favorite