Vehicular insurance premiums have increased over the past five years and one of the main reasons for its significant increase is because insurance policies keep speeding and parking tickets on a driver’s record for three years until it is overlooked by other insurance companies, causing drivers’ monthly bills or premiums to raise to a nasty, hefty bill. The policies that force insurance companies to do this are ridiculous because both parking and speeding tickets have nothing to do with how often an individual gets into a moving accident. For one, most mobile accidents occur at lower speeds because at these speeds drivers are less likely to pay attention compared to an individual moving at a speed greater than sixty miles per hour giving his or her undivided attention to the road. Another point on topic would be the correlation between parking tickets and insurance quotes along with how the tickets influence the price of insurance. The opposition seems like they have never even considered it because they cannot explain the connection with vehicular insurance and parking tickets. Insurance companies should not worry about parking tickets and should also reduce the hold on a speeding ticket from three years to one year.

Starting off, exploring statistics relating speeding and accidents as well as look at the percentage of last year’s accidents that were over speeds of sixty miles per hour would be necessary. When driving at higher speeds, one realizes that their life is at greater risk if an accident were to occur, so one would be more likely to pay attention to the road as well as their surroundings. Most accidents occur at intersections and exits because these accidents are not because of speeding, but because of careless operation in general. This proves that speeding may not contain a major influence on traffic accidents. The opposition states that speeding is the main reason for traffic accidents, but statistics show this.

Over the past decade, there has been an increase of economic expansion owed to the establishment of legalized gambling in the United States, this set apart from Las Vegas and Atlantic City. The reason for this economic expansion is due to the increase in revenues needed within the states and cities. Traditionally, the property tax has been the foundation for education aid in communities across the country. While it tends to be the more predictable source of revenue, it has led to wide variations in revenue across municipalities and district innovations (Sack 2005, 58). The case of legalized gambling and other sorts of gambling has led to the question whether gambling or lotteries are the ticket for economic freedom or development of new revenues. This paper will take on the responsibility of dealing with the question in hand, as a result will emphasis the meaning of economic development and apply some sort of reasonable informational applicable cost-benefit evaluation of casino gambling.

Several states in recent years have turned to legalize gambling to secure more revenues. This in turn is able to provide for the demand of more public services in the United States. State and local governments are faced with the growing demand of public interest groups who favor to decrease the reliance on wage, property, and sales taxes, also the federal government is also scrutinized for relying on personal and corporate income taxes as the major source of its revenue. For the states a new source of funding is some sort of gambling. Gambling in some form is now found in every state but Hawaii and Utah (Berman 2000, 325). Nevada, which has been legalized since 1931, derives about half of its revenues from taxes and license fees from gambling. Atlantic City, which opened in 1978 produces about a million a month on its first year of existence (Berman 2000, 325).

Mark Victor Hansen, the co-creator of Chicken Soup for the Soul, once said, “The best way to help the poor is to not be one of them.” In the United States, thirty-seven million people lived below the poverty line in 2004. Edward Wolff, a professor of Economics at New York University, predicts that the top 5 percent wealthiest own more than half of all wealth, and in 1998, they owned 59 percent of all wealth, “wealth is the stuff that people own”. One way to close this gap between the “rich” and the “poor” is through the United States tax system, specifically the corporate tax system. By lowering the taxes that are levied upon small and large businesses, businesses will sell their goods for less, be more flexible, and most importantly expand and grow.

Like the “personal income tax, taxes on corporations in the United States were a temporary emergency levy enacted during the Civil War. Corporate income taxation was ªrst adopted on a permanent basis in 1909. As with the personal income tax, its support arose from opposition to the prevailing taxes of the day and a belief that its burden would fall disproportionately on the wealthy. Unlike the personal tax, however, the corporate tax was able to escape constitutional problems, as Congress packaged it as an ‘excise’ tax. 10 Federal corporate income tax revenues followed a pattern similar to that of the personal income tax up through World War II.” The United States has the second highest corporate tax rate in the world, second only to Japan, with a 40 percent tax rate. America's corporate tax rate is higher than the rate in every European nation--even socialist welfare states like France and Sweden. The individual corporate tax rates are the following:

Corporate Income Tax Rates--2006, 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2000
Taxable income over Not over Tax rate
$0 $50,000 15%
50,000 75,000 25%
75,000 100,000 34%
100,000 335,000 39%

Abstract

Drug testing in the workplace is a controversial issue. There are those who feel that it is necessary to prevent risks to public safety caused by substance abuse while on the job. Others feel that the costs far outweigh the benefits and that it is an invasion of privacy. Ethical issues aside, evidence presented in this report supports the latter. The costs of drug testing are high and only a small percentage of employees are actually found to be substance users. Drug testing in the work place has the opposite effect on productivity than was originally intended. It actually reduces productivity instead of increasing it. Drug testing causes a feeling of mistrust and drug testing should not be a part of a healthy work environment.

Introduction

Drug testing in the workplace is a controversial issue. There are those who hold the position that drug testing in the workplace is an invasion of privacy. On the other side of the issue are those who believe that in today’s society drug testing is a necessary evil, regardless of the invasion of privacy issue. These persons point out that in positions where public and personal safety is an issue, the safety of the public over rides any other issue, as in the case of air line pilots, bus drivers and health care professionals, to name a few. The goals of employee drug testing include improvements in workplace safety, productivity, and product integrity so that the individual industry will have an improved fiscal bottom line. However, as a decline in the use of drug testing by companies would suggest, drug testing programs did not meet these goals. This research will support the theory that drug testing in the work place does not improve productivity, and that it costs more money than it saves for companies.

The Reliability Issue

“Social welfare is the sum of measures developed by a society in order to cope with its social problems” (Titmuss 47)."

Social welfare, as a concept, is a related system of social institutions in any society, a system unified by common values, goals, and operational principles; those institutional aspects of social life which express the collective concern of the society for the well-being of it’s member as individuals and in family and community groups” (Smith 17).

Since the eighteenth century, the United States has provided limited forms of relief for the poverty-stricken, usually through churches, private charities, or local governments. Considerable debate existed in both the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries regarding the relative merits of “indoor” versus “outdoor” relief. Indoor relief provided support for the poor within institutions, such as workhouses and almshouses. Outdoor relief did not require beneficiaries to reside in public institutions” (Rank 13).

Outdoor relief increased in popularity by the seventeenth and eighteenth century, but began to wane by the nineteenth century. It was felt that outdoor relief encouraged pauperism.
By the latter half of the nineteenth century, indoor relief had become the dominant legal method of providing for the poor in the U.S. and it remained so until the Great Depression.

Before the depression in 1929, 2.86 million individuals were unemployed in the U.S. By 1933, the number reached 15 million. “The scope of the economic decline was unprecedented, with many “solid citizens” joining the ranks of the poor” (14). This forced many Americans to apply for aid from the government to help support them.

For a family to qualify for welfare, a family’s income and assets must fall below a certain level. This means that programs like AFDC, the Supplemental Income (SSI), and General Assistance (GA) are aimed entirely at the poverty and near-poverty populations.

To hear the word ‘Immigrant’ we do not always think about ‘refugees’ as being a part of them. Refugees are seen as forced migrants; people who are literally being obligated to leave their country of origin because of political, social, cultural, and ethnic reasons, as well as for religious persecution or even fear of death. Refugees, indeed have a right to asylum. Because of this, I felt compelled and inspired to know more about them, who they are, what will become of them, and in regards to this course, are they a drain or gain on the Canadian economy?

I would use the five steps of the decision making process to decide whether I would want to buy or lease a car.

Identify the problem- I would have to look at my household income and what I would want to do. Do I want to own my title or the bank owns it? If I didn’t make enough money I would lease the car and have the bank own the car and keep the title and make payments on it if I didn’t have the money all at once to make the purchase.