When the strand of your hair
softly touches your shoulder
When with innocent smile
you are fixing dark lace–
Blush of sunset is bolder
on you virginal face.…

When the rain cries its river
lit with blossoming fire
of you hiding in shadows
all the worldly desire

When the rhythm of your heartbeat
substitutes loudest words
You embrace me, you leave me
I am found. I am lost.

You’re true to your nature
you are seamstress of light
knitting oceans and bridges
you are crossing at night

With each rise of your needle
Someone’s heart falling down
you are reaching your kingdom
Hell or Heaven is found…
Where you rule. You in power
to condemn or to rise
all the innocent Pages
Fools who lay in demise.

You are favoring Ravens
You are Queen of the Spades
Nude at firing arrows shot by
boy with pink face
trimming wings in the moonlit
Twirling mirror of life
with its glass-holy water
With its handle –as knife.

Written by Viktoriya von Berg

Sample

Based on extensive research of our target demographic group who in 2012 will turn 18–21, present economical situation, adopted business models, socio-economic issues and present ecological state of our environment, our group recognized the need to develop an innovative business model to reinforce a concept of sustainability as a future of retail business operations.

We look at sustainability at a different perspective that introduces  a shared value both to retailers and consumers.  Since, the requirement of initial capital is the main concern for a businesses to ‘’ go green’’, we developed our store prototype that requires relatively fewer resources and offers consumers more than just a merchandise.

Our portable store, which will be easily assembled and disassembled from standard American shipping containers, will become an interactive center, a comfortable place for our young audience to socialize, to  relax,  to learn and  shop. We visualize it as a social networking site so popular in today’s youth culture, but away from home computers.

We offer our customers to participate in creating such a place by taking their part in our sustainable green business model as consumers of our product and employees at our store.  As our consumers become more aware of the benefits of recycling, sustainable store operations and make a conscious choice toward greener products we offer, our store, that initially will travel, will  grow into stationary centers throughout the USA.…

Excerpt

By Viktoriya von Berg (Cortado)

Product -”Breath Right” nasal strips 

TARGET MARKET

1st Place: Term Project: Placing a Product in International Markets

Based on our research and analysis that involved hybrid segmentation technique, we created psychographic-demographic profile of women ages 18–34 who currently live in the USA.  To better market Breath Right nose strips, we decided to utilize concentrated marketing approach and further narrowed our target demographic. Specifically, we conducted a research on the subset of women who enjoy healthy lifestyles

According to our secondary research, in terms of psychographics/lifestyle segmentation, we identified our target group  as “Inward Alternative Seekers,” who use techniques like massage, aromatherapy and yoga to relax.  Our primary research backed up our findings.  For this project we surveyed thirty woman ages 18–34 -  twenty five  respondents pointed to a high level of stress  and the importance of its management (1)

Data from Mintel Analysis concerning women within the age bracket of 18–34 proves identical consumer characteristics stating that our target demographic is ”  especially concerned with reducing stresses, getting into and maintaining a positive mental state, exercising and having a good night sleep.” (2)

Based on physiographic analysis conducted by Mintel Group, “single women within our target age group  are prone to sleep-disorders, depression and anxiety disorders.  This attributes to stresses in women who are working to pursue higher education, career and ”finding one’s way in life. ‘’As a result, these women are seeking spa services, massage therapy and variety of relaxation or revitalizing techniques to relieve these symptoms.’’ (2)

MARKETING  STRATEGY

Considering the demographic profile of our customers, the growing usage of the Internet, blogging, iPhone and other portable electronic devices that play a significant role in the lives of our target market , we developed a unique marketing strategy that includes Viral Marketing, Product placement, Public Relations and conventional advertising such as Print, Television and Online Commercials.

To generate a social buzz about our newly re-vamped product, we decided to utilize viral marketing as an effective and unconventional method of advertising and promotion.  Since our target customers have a high SNP (social networking potential) we recognized the benefit of reaching them via several social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and variety of other social networking sites.….»We also decided to utilize product placement technique using an increasingly popular online video platform such as YouTube..»

In addition, we would like to spend a portion of our budget on a strong interactive web component. Our website  will include blogs about the product in addition to relaxation tips, information about aromatherapy and functionality of  the product . In addition, customers will be able  share stories, videos and receive coupons via email. In return,  we will build a comprehensive database of our consumers. Our company will utilize the database for further analytical research, direct sales and guide our future product development. In addition, our customers will  be able to make purchases through our web-site via e-store…»

Analy­sis of Brazil­ian econ­omy 2009

By Vik­toriya von Berg

In order to under­stand cur­rent mon­e­tary and fis­cal poli­cies of Brazil it is impor­tant to look at the dynam­ics of economic growth of the coun­try in the past two decades. In 1980 Brazil was endur­ing slow eco­nomic devel­op­ment com­pared to other devel­op­ing nations. This eco­nomic trend was attrib­uted to the large for­eign debt that was con­sid­ered to be the piv­otal part of eco­nomic dif­fi­cul­ties of Brazil. How­ever, by early 1990 it was obvi­ous that this view was uni­lat­eral in the sense that it over­looked the pub­lic sec­tor of the coun­try  which in itself was heav­ily indebted to local and for­eign creditors.

At that time many econ­o­mists came to the unan­i­mous con­sen­sus that it was impor­tant to see how this par­tic­u­lar sec­tor was financed given the fact that it was almost bank­rupt. Since in 1982 the for­eign credit flow was elim­i­nated, and the cost of domes­tic cap­i­tal was extremely costly, the deficit was thought to be financed through infus­ing mon­e­tary sup­ply which in turn sky­rock­eted infla­tion rate to 4,000% (four thou­sand per­cent) at annual rate.  (1) The adop­tion of Fis­cal Sta­bi­liza­tion Pro­gram in 1998 pos­i­tively affected fis­cal posi­tion of Brazil push­ing down country’s debt-to-GDP ratio. (3) Governmental spend­ing increased by 7% dur­ing this period of sta­bi­liza­tion (2) This resulted in the rel­a­tive sta­bil­ity of the coun­try until the global crises swayed the world in 2007 (2)

In 2009 Brazil is an emerging-market econ­omy that com­pared to the other devel­op­ing coun­ties is less affected by the global eco­nomic crises. Nonethe­less, it deals with the exter­nal and inter­nal dif­fi­cul­ties that neg­a­tively affect its econ­omy. In a con­text of cur­rent global crises Brazil is in a posi­tion of deal­ing with its rapidly dimin­ish­ing indus­trial pro­duc­tion, espe­cially in the motor sec­tor which is cap­i­tal inten­sive. The avail­abil­ity of the for­eign credit that was abun­dant before global eco­nomic dete­ri­o­ra­tion was dra­mat­i­cally reduced in 2008–2009 and the cost of domes­tic bor­row­ing went up.  (2) This period is also marked by the dwin­dled demand for Brazil­ian export that adds to pre­car­i­ous eco­nomic con­di­tions of the coun­try.  (2)

Fis­cal Policy-Rules Based Fis­cal Management

To effec­tively deal with cur­rent con­di­tions Brazil is in a process of imple­ment­ing fis­cal pol­icy reforms that are indented to recon­sider its indi­rect tax sys­tem that is extremely com­plex. The reform intends to lift up tax bur­dens on the motor and con­struc­tion indus­tries as well as on finan­cial sec­tor that includes finan­cial trans­ac­tions. The goal of fis­cal reform is to extend from enter­prises to the labor taxes by elim­i­na­tion of Salário-Educação, a fed­eral levy on pay­rolls and indi­vid­u­als and decreas­ing the social secu­rity con­tri­bu­tions of labor force.(5)

In addi­tion ‚the cur­rent fis­cal pol­icy reform dic­tates the extended time period for unem­ploy­ment ben­e­fits, increased min­i­mum wage that will con­tribute to the higher spend­ing, social hous­ing pro­grams and cap­i­tal invest­ments in the devel­op­ment of the infra­struc­ture. Since his­tor­i­cally pub­lic debt was the sin­gle most cen­tral point of macro­eco­nomic dilemma in Brazil, the new fis­cal reforms are note­wor­thy in a sense that they con­tributed to the lower pub­lic debt. (2) It is pro­jected that the sur­plus of the pri­mary sec­tor, or in another words debt, will decrease from cur­rent 4.6% to 2.3% as of 2009.

In addi­tion, the newly cre­ated Sov­er­eign Wealth Fund (Fundo Sober­ano do Brasil) was estab­lished in 2009 to pro­tect the econ­omy. Brazil intends to sell trea­sury bonds to finance its fund with the ulti­mate goal of facil­i­tat­ing local firms to extend abroad and engage in inter­na­tional trade. Also, it will facil­i­tate the invest­ment (4) According to Paulo Bernardo, the Min­is­ter of Plan­ning and bud­get­ing of Brazil, the gov­ern­ment might be well able to increase spend­ing by accu­mu­lat­ing $8.6 bil­lion in its Sov­er­eign Wealth Fund within next year while avoid­ing the increase in its deficit all together. (4)

In addi­tion, Sov­er­eign Wealth Fund might be able to finance the gap in tax losses. Tax breaks were granted this year and many firms choose to post­pone tax pay­ments aggres­sively exploit­ing the law of extend­ing tax pay­ments till next year.(4) As of begin­ning of 2009 Brazil is in posi­tion of los­ing 1. 9 % of tax rev­enue because of slow tax pay­ments, how­ever it claims that it is in a posi­tion of reim­burs­ing these losses using fund’s money in 2010(4)

Over­all, gov­ern­men­tal spend­ing increased from only 7% dur­ing the time of macro­eco­nomic sta­bi­liza­tion in 1994, to 32. 5 % of GDP in 2008.

Mon­e­tary Policy-Inflation Targeting

In order to acti­vate eco­nomic envi­ron­ment of Brazil, Cen­tral Bank of Brazil    reduced com­pul­sory deposit reserve, or in another words ‘’ require­ment for com­mer­cial banks to hold cash reserves equal the frac­tion of their deposits’’ to encour­age lending.

Also, the fed­eral gov­ern­ment granted loans of 4% of national GDP to BNDES (National Devel­op­ment Bank) and other banks that are owned by the government. (2)  This rel­a­tively low per­cent rate allows these banks to engage into lend­ing as well (2). In addi­tion, the author­i­ties allow large finan­cial insti­tu­tions to pur­chase dis­tressed port­fo­lios of smaller banks that have been affected by unfa­vor­able credit envi­ron­ment. (2) The inter­est rates of real ax ante are at his­tor­i­cally low lev­els. (2)

Besides fed­eral loans and mon­e­tary eas­ing, Brazil is advised to let auto­matic sta­bi­liz­ers to take on its pur­pose with­out fur­ther gov­ern­men­tal inter­ven­tion that oth­er­wise might carry a neg­a­tive effect. (2)

By Viktoriya von Berg

Outsourcing from China

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is the largest country in Eastern Asia. The Communist regime that assumes a single party system is dictatorial and dominating, and people’s rights are often nonexistent or significantly reduced.  However, Chinese government recognized the potential of its country on international business arena and introduced comprehensive economic reforms in 1978 that noticeably pulled out China from poverty. The availability of labor that is proportional to the large population of China, approximately 1.3 billion, is the major factor that influenced growth of the apparel manufacturers serving European and North American clients. The low cost of labor constitutes the major competitive advantage of Chinese suppliers along with improved technology, attractive lead times, quality control, high production volume and efficient communication.

China– is a permanent member of the UN Security Council and enjoys its membership within several multilateral agreements such as WTO (World Trade Organization), APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation), EAS (East Asia Summit), G-20, and SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization.)

World Trade Organization

Textiles and Apparel

The safeguard on textiles and apparels coming from China to the USA that allowed the USA workers and companies to respond to increased imports from China has expired in 2008. Quotas on textiles and apparel have expired in 2005 (2) Even before these changes took place, roughly by 2000, ‘’America became China’s second largest trade partner, supplying variety of goods.’’  However, there is a trade imbalance between two countries with China enjoying a hefty surplus by using high tariffs and restrictions on the USA exports. (3)

Permanent Normal Trade Relations

PNTR is the acronym used to describe free trade of the USA with any foreign nation. PNTR replaced the MFN ( the most favored nation) in 1998.  Since China is the member of the WTO it enjoys Free Trade Agreement with the USA.

Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) is comprised of 21 Pacific Rim countries with an ultimate goal of regional trade and investment cooperation in order to enhance ‘’economic growth and prosperity’’ (1) Its members constitute approximately 40% of the population around the world, more than half of the world GDP (54%) and lightly less than half of the world trade (44%) (1)

China is also a member of the G-20 –a forum of the world’s largest economies that play a crucial role in today’s global market.

Timely and efficient communication of Chinese suppliers was the major reason that affected my decision to work with one of the factories in that part of Asia.

After contacting dozens of different manufacturers in China, there was one particular company that responded in a timely and professional manner. Dongyang Mohang Imp & Exp Co., Ltd, is a manufacturer and trading company located at the city of Dongyang Province/State of Zhejiang. It operates as a full service factory with capacity of 50,000 per month. There is no minimum order requirement; however they do charge higher costs for limited orders.  The Dongyang Mohang Imp & Exp Co accepts LC (letter of credit) as a payment option. In addition, company has an established 5 year relationship with Target and K-mart. The company specializes in baby clothing –dresses, rompers, skirt, baby sleeping bags, baby suits, hats children. According to Susan Bao, manager, the number of employees totals to about 101. The factory size in sq. meters is 5,000–10,000. The company focuses Southeast Asia and Western European markets. They export approximately 81%-90%.

There are 5–10 people in quality control department. In addition, company works with third parties that perform QA/QC. The delivery time is about 25–30 days from the time of order.

Total Costs

The factory quoted the FOB Shanghai of 40$ and factory charges $4.05 per item. The shipment will be delivered to the Port of New York. There is 9.4 % tariff for children’s and adult cotton dresses according to HTS (please refer to the attached excel calculations.)

”If some unprecedented calamity should come upon this nation, I would be sacrificed to the unreasoning disappointment of people who had expected too much.”(Herbert Hoover)

In 1929 the United States was at the start of the Great Depression that lasted until 1939– a year marked by the beginning of World War II. It evoked a lot of debates, speculations and misunderstandings among politicians and economists of all levels. It is common to believe that Herbert Hoover was a  president who supported  ineffective policies thus allowing already crumbling economy of 1929 to go down into deep pit hole pulling along the entire nation. Majority of middle class population, who are not well rounded in economics and politics, judge Hoover upon the outcome and they do not seem to be unfair. Paul Johnson, in his book ” A history of the American people ”, reasonably said that ”there is no logic or justice in history-only chronology.”

Herbert Hoover came to his presidency in 1929 in a very difficult time in American history. The Wall Street crash was significant evoking a four-week panic. Indexes were down to 224 from 452, GM (General Motors) went down from GM 73 to 8; in deed a very deep plunge in a stock market. However, ”the stock values were right in relations to earnings”. Considering the preceding events that took place in American economy from 1920, with its self-adjusted recessions and artificial inflation, the downturn was inevitable and needed. Federal Reserve Bank System was created to maintain prosperity nationally and internationally by deliberately inflating monetary supply. ”Credit was expanded from 45.3 billion on June 30, 1921 to $73 billion in July 1929, a 61.8 percent expansion in eight years,” (Johnson, Paul). This process was managed by two powerful figures in the formation of the US financial policy domestically and internationally: Montage Norman– governor of the bank of England and Benjamin Strong, governor of the New York Federal Reserve Bank. The prices steadily were going up creating a demand-supply problem and resulting in recessions that successfully self-adjusted.

Another setback was the problem with tariffs. Although America had a very tolerant economy in 1920, meaning that the workers could demand wages and businessmen could work out different corporate polices, the high tariffs did not allow the healthy competition. Among those who benefited were domestic industries and banks. The working population, on the other hand, was denied the competitive prices produced by cheap imports. Overall, the republican leadership did not stand up for the economic freedom and artificial inflation along with low interest rates led to inevitable economic downturn and Wall Street Crash in 1929.

Herbert Hoover was not responsible for this vast economic plunge. ”The Great Depression was caused by monetary mismanagement at the Federal Reserve, as was thoroughly detailed by Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz in their brilliant “A Monetary History of the United States.”(Wall Street Journal).Contrary, Hoover genuinely wanted to help the suffocating economy of America. Orphaned at the age of nine he was a self-made individual who worked his way through the school and Stanford University to obtain engineering degree. He was liberal and never expressed any anti-Semitic remarks. His good will spread over the poor third world countries that he wanted to aid. Many politicians, including Roosevelt, considered him to be a great presidential candidate. ‘He is certainly a wonder and I wish we could make him a president of the United States. There could not be a better one.” (Franklin Roosevelt)

Herbert Hoover understood all the responsibility of being a president in such a hard time in American history. ”The battle to save our economic machine in motion in this emergency takes new forms and requires new tactics from time to time. We used such emergency powers to win the war; we can use them to fight Depression.” ( H.Hoover, May 1932) Nevertheless, with all his candid intentions did Hoover overestimate his own powers? Paul Johnson, the author of ”A history of the American People” compares Hoover to a social engineer. The concept of social engineering is the ability to determine the shape of the society by manipulating human beings with help of some powerful force, perhaps a president. The people, in such case, are compared to earth and concrete, and the great outcomes to such engineering wonders as the Boulder Canyon Dam. The interesting fact is that Lenin and Stalin were two leaders of socialistic regime who became fascinated by the concept of the organizing power over nature. As a result, the switching of vast rivers from Arctic to other outlets proved to be a disaster along with their imposing totalitarian regime over the entire nation that eventually led to the well-known crash of the Soviet Union in 1990.

Herbert Hoover was a dictator in his own way. His intentions to be the first, the inventor, the pioneer resulted in the San Francisco Bay Bridge, the Los Angeles Aqueduct and the Hoover Dam. ” More major works were started in the Hoover’s 4 years than in preceding 30 years of American history.” (Johnson, Paul). H. Hoover took the approach of the great inventor in saving American economy as well. He wrote: ” No president before has ever believed there was a government responsibility on such cases…there we had to pioneer the field.” And he did what he considered to be a new approach of the interventionist government: ”He resumed credit inflation, adding to the Federal Reserve almost $300 million of credit in the last week of October 1929 alone.” Instead of allowing wages naturally drop he decided to keep them high and even held several conferences taking promises from the corporate world to maintain the wages high and even to pay more whenever possible. This did not have a positive impact on those who did not have any wages at all, considering rising unemployment.

Besides keeping wages high Hoover did not consider interest rates that were too low. He certainly could allow the interest rates to go up, which would be the right economical decision, but he ignored it. In addition H. Hoover did not veto the Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930 about tariffs, which had a negative impact nationally and internationally. ”His policies were far from perfect, especially on trade,” wrote Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz in their “A Monetary History of the United States.( Wall Street Journal)

With all economical disaster of the Great Depression–education suffered enormously. Almost 1,500 higher education universities went bankrupt. ”University enrollment fell, for the first time in American history, by a quarter-million. ” Looking at the consequences of the Great Depression on education John Steinbeck said, ”When people are broke the first thing they give up is books.”

Herbert Hoover foreshadowed his future by saying: ”If some unprecedented calamity should come upon this nation, I would be sacrificed to the unreasoning disappointment of people who had expected too much.” The calamity was there, before the Hoover took over his presidency, and it turned into disaster during four years of him being a president of the United States. Was Herbert Hoover ”sacrificed” to the ”unreasoning disappointment ” of people with unreasonable expectations? Were the expectations of an American nation so unreasonable? The speculators are still not sure about the exact answer. Paul Johnson rightly said in his book: ”There is no logic and justice in history-only chronology.”

…

It has no shadow and its feathers’re missing
the gloss of dew and stardust of the night
It turns to Raven –when I read it listens
it turns to glittered quill in moonlight when I write

But interminably it comes when day’s in blossom
it’s missing wings are pitiful regret
Presiding over Salvador’s ”supreme ambition”
it squints at books I start to write but soon forget…

”Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings”
Salvador Dali

You scream I am Witch of darkened ages!
And make the fire with the pages
That praises me! You bare sages!
Me! Who drank old gin with drunken Poe?
Who filled the skull with blood of wine
for Byron playing in his castle?
Invited to soirees and rested on clover
Bed with Stevenson observing ‘’… child, far, far away,
And in another garden, play…’’ ?

I am condemned to burn in flames
Sustained by you with flapping pages
of poems read as shortened prose!
The masterpieces of new ages
Stored in the dusted schools of yours!
The instruments of inquisition to kill me more~!

I am The Rhyme!
I will survive the burning blaze
Of foolest pages yet receding!
The light of old will lit they way
To newest kingdom
Of my reign!
And not sustained thy flames will wane!