Micro And Macro Benefits Of Raising Cuny Community College...

Micro and Macro Benefits of Raising CUNY Community College Graduation Rates There are many micro and macro benefits associated with raising graduation rates. The following an overview of these benefits: Micro Benefits An individual who completes an AA degree has the potential to gain considerable benefits, including: †¢ The employment participation rate for individuals with an AA degree (68 percent) is higher than individuals with only a high school diploma (50 percent) (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2015). †¢ The average New Yorker aged 25 to 29 with only a high school diploma ($17,000) makes significantly less than individuals with â€Å"some college† coursework ($ 22,000), an AA ($ 29,000) degree and BA degree ($ 42,000) (Center for an Urban Future, 2013). †¢ A worker with an AA will earn almost $ 500,00 more than someone who only a high school diploma, and no further education (Ibid). †¢ College educated adults also enjoy â€Å"non-monetary† benefits, such as decreasing the likelihood of smoking and obesity (Ibid). †¢ The benefits of higher educational attainment does not simply benefit the individual who completes their degree, but their children are more likely to attain the same educational credentials, if not more (NYC Public Advocate, 2015). Macro Benefits There are several micro benefits with raising community college graduation rates. New York State and New York State would enjoy substantial benefits if graduation rates were raised. Raising the graduation

Friendship Is An Essential Aspect Of Human Happiness

The first relationship we experience, apart from what we have with our family, for the first time to explore our lives, is friendship. At this time, people tend to discover many of their strengths and flaws through having many friends and feel emotions that they have never felt before. Friends help shape who we are and where we fit in society, always learning and improving through one another. Many philosophers today and in the past will agree that friendship is an essential aspect of human happiness. Friendship is understood as a distinctively personal relationship that is grounded in a concern on the part of each friend for the welfare of the other, for the other’s sake, and that involves some degree of intimacy (Helm). But what exactly†¦show more content†¦Friendship based on utility and pleasure become selfishness. Human naturally set up relationships, going from person to person, for personal gain. Aristotle describes these kinds of friendship to be easily dissol ved and forgotten, for they are easily split apart. (Aristotle) We can see these types of relationships in businesses or parties, where people greet each other and create small talk, but no real relationship is present. Their motivation and objective is to get what they need and move on as quickly as possible. According to Aristotle, this type of friendship pertains mostly to younger people, who are advantageous, for they â€Å"...are at such a time of life pursue not what is pleasant but what is beneficial.† (Aristotle) For example, a regular customer at a pizza restaurant might quickly transition to a newly opened restaurant that provides better service for a cheaper price. Furthermore, utility and pleasure are desires that are influenced by passions and feelings, which are constantly and abruptly changing. Aristotle says that people in this state â€Å"...quickly become friends and quickly stop...† and â€Å"...love and stop loving quickly...† (Aristotle) The se relationships are unstable and unpredictable which might cause more harm than good. Aristotle moves on by showing that a perfect friendship is based on goodness

Rhetorical Analysis Of On The Briefcase, Poor Americans...

Rhetorical Analysis Essay: â€Å"On The Briefcase, Poor Americans Have ‘Prove’ Themselves,† In Margaret Lyons’s Vulture article, â€Å"On the Briefcase, Poor Americans have to ‘Prove’ Themselves,† was posted on May 26, 2015. Lyons discusses how ‘The Briefcase’ follows â€Å"Middle Class† American families that are experiencing financial hardships. The context of this article is economical situations present in American â€Å"middle class† families, as represented on a television show viewed all over the world. Lyons exigence is how the game show is purposely exploiting middle class Americans are using their setbacks against each other. She supports her claims with the ethos through opinionated information such as the real reason why the briefcase actually helps middle class people; logos, sharing the evidence on Les Moonves on how they make more money than the game show does in a month, pathos; how a woman is so overcome with joy she vomits. Initially, Lyons begins her article with an ethical appeal as she shares the exploitation of middle class Americans. As she began to get in depth with how the game show is an embarrassment, she shows only in view of the argument, which is disagreeing with everything that they are doing. The game show is a disappointment to society, the show lets us think that they are helping middle class families. Lyons stated, But there s something really perverse about Les Moonves earning money based on the emotional and financial anguish of poor people, by

Auditing Standards Executive Committee

Question: Discuss about the Auditing Standards Executive Committee. Answer: Introduction: IFRS Practice Statement -Application of Materiality to Financial Statements was drafted with the aim of assisting the management in determining what entails materiality when applying this concept to general purpose financial statements ('American Institute of Certified Public Accountants,' 2006). Ideally, information or data would be considered material if misstating or omitting it could influence the decisions of users to make about a particular reporting entity, that is, the perception of the users of that entity. For instance, if material information is misstated, the users of the financial statements may have a wrong impression about the company making them invest in the firm and thus realizing a financial loss in the future. This draft provided guidance on materiality characteristics, and application of the concept of materiality in deciding whether to present and disclose information. Besides, provided guidance on assessing whether omissions and misstatements are material (Aren s, Elder, Mark, 2012). This question of this research paper provides an analysis into these three areas as well as the recognition and measurement of materiality. Characteristics of Materiality According to IFRS, information is material if omitting or misstating it could change the perception or the decisions that the users of the financial statements make based on that financial information about the entity that is reporting the financial statements (Arens, Best, Shailer, Fiedler, Elder, Beasley, 2007). Ideally, the purpose of an audit is to enhance the confidence of users in the financial statements of an organization. The auditor, therefore, has to express an opinion on the true and fair view of the financial statements of the reporting entity stating whether in all material aspects the financial statements have been prepared in agreement with IFRS. The information would, therefore, be considered material if the magnitude of its misstatement or omission would make it probable that it would affect the judgment of a reasonable person that relies on that information. Materiality has four key features, namely: pervasiveness, relevance, reliability, and whether some informat ion has been omitted or misstated. Information is considered reliable if it assures the users of the financial statements that it is free from any biased or error and that it represents what it was supposed to represent. Apparently, if that information was not free from any error or biasedness and it was used by the users of the financial statements, then it would be regarded to be material (Boynton, Johnson, 2006). Information is relevant if it has a high capacity to influence the decisions of the users of the financial statements in that the information could help the users make predictions about the past, present and future events of the entity. The information will be considered pervasive if the benefits of the users of the financial statements using it outweigh the costs. Ideally, each user of the financial information will perceive the value attached to the quality information in a unique way (Cosserat, Rodda, 2009).Ultimately, a standard body such as the IFRS has to assess the information presented and disclosed to the public to ensure that it meets their needs. Besides, the body must be aware of the calculus of costs and benefits and make sure that the information presented and disclosed meets this calculus. To justify the need for a particular disclosure, the IFRS must ascertain that the benefits perceived to be derived from that disclosure exceed the costs associated with it. The last characteristic of materiality is to ensure that some information has been misstated, omitted, it contains error or biasedness. This calls for an auditor to perform an analysis on the financial statements of the reporting firm and as asc ertain whether any information has been misstated or omitted, that is, whether the financial statements presented portray an accurate and fair view of the financial reporting of the firm and does not mislead its users. Application of the Concept of Materiality when Making Decisions about Presentation and Disclosure of Information In preparing the financial statements, the management of the reporting entity ought to consider their objective. The main aim of firms is providing information that is useful to its users to enable them to assess the prospects of the company for its expected cash inflows in the future and to allow them to evaluate the stewardship of the resources of the entity. If a particular information that has been generated by the business affects the decisions of a user, then that information ought to be presented and disclosed in the financial statements. To apply this concept, one must also consider if the financial reporting is pervasive (Hayes, Wallage, Gortemaker, 2014). The information will be ubiquitous if the benefits of using it outweigh the accrued costs. This is a concept that can be used to apply the concept of materiality when making decisions about the presentation and disclosure of financial information. It would be useful in deciding whether to disclose in that any information that is perceived to be pervasive is material to the financial statements and therefore it should be tested for material misstatement to ascertain that it is free from any biasedness or error. Assessment of whether Omissions and Misstatements of Financial Information are Material In assessing the materiality of the financial statements, one must identify that the omissions and distortions could influence the economic decisions of the users of the financial statements. Judgments about whether the omissions and misstatements would be material to the financial statements are based on surrounding circumstances and are affected by the size and nature of the distortion (Ismail, Haron, Nasir Ibrahim, Mohd Isa, 2006). To identify whether the omission or misstatement is material, an auditor must assess the information needs of the users of the financial statements. For instance, an investor would be interested in the financial statements to ascertain whether the money that he lends to a business is being used for the right purpose as stated in their Memorandum of Association. The auditor's determination as to whether the omission or misstatement of financial information is material is dependent on his professional judgment. When an auditor understands this, he will b e able to assess what omission or misstatement is material. Recognition and Measurement Finally, the IFRS Practice Statement states that the IFRS recognition and measurement requirements need to be applied to ascertain that the omission or misstatement of the financial information is material to the financial statements (Porter, Simon, Hatherly, 2014). This would call for the auditor recognizing the material misstatement in his report and the extent to which it affects the users. An auditor is mainly concerned about two issues, namely: Big Data' and End-to-End Software Integration.' Big data describes an extensive portfolio of a firm that contains unstructured and machine-generated data. The point is that big data will have an impact on risk management, which is an area of primary concern to auditors (Rennings, Ziegler, Ankele, Hoffmann, 2006). Ideally, big data and analytics have the potential of enabling auditors to identify errors, fraud, financial reporting, and business risks and to deliver a more consistent audit. The first issue concerning big data is data capture. Many companies strive to invest in protecting their data. This is a matter since it makes it hard for auditors to obtain client's approval on the data. Moreover, auditors encounter companies with different accounting systems and embracing big data would mean extracting the sub-ledger information and thus familiarizing themselves with the various accounting systems used. This, therefore, inc reases the complexity of data extraction. Using data analytics to obtain audit evidence may be difficult, as auditors are required to find a balance between their personal judgment and the results of the analytics. They, therefore, have to consider substantive analytical procedures, validation of the data for analytics purposes, and defining of the audit evidence, which is time-consuming, and thus a primary issue. Another problem that is inherent to auditors is End-to-End Software Integration. End to end software integration in auditing perspective entails ensuring that the user interfaces meet their needs and ensure that there is a smooth flow of information from the company to the user (Rittenberg, Johnstone, Gramling, 2010). Ideally, a perfect end-to-end software integration allows customers limitless capabilities, communication, and dynamic change of business logics. End to end software integration may be an issue to auditors since the audit approach that they use, whether auditing through the computer or auditing around the computer, may leave some loopholes unattended. End to end software integration contains transmission of big data and performing an audit of that big data may be time-consuming. This is because the auditors may be required to have an understanding of the different accounting systems used by the firm and thus retrieve sub-ledger information, which may be complicated for those auditors who are not conversant with the various accounting systems. Ultimately, the audit firms may be necessitated to train their staff on the different accounting systems used by companies thus leading to wastage of time and resources. For the audit committees, time has never been more challenging. Cybersecurity and other technological disruptions, economic volatility, a political and regulatory risk that affect today's corporate boards including oversight of risk have filtered down to the audit committee. The disruptive trends context, in this case, looks at the technological risk, political and economic risk, the evolution of financial reporting, and the increasing complexity of the regulatory landscape (KPMG.com, 2016). Technical Risk The technological risk is a major concern for the audit committees such as the cyber security risk. With the advancement of cyber attacks, cyber security remains a major oversight for the audit committees (Rittenberg, Johnstone, Gramling, 2010). Ideally, they are more concerned with challenges such as data protection, social engineering, auditing of third parties, cyber insurance, and remediation procedures. Political and Economic Risk Second, the political, and economic risk is also a major disruptive trend for the audit committees. With the fall in the prices of oil, a weak dollar, and an increase in political uncertainty around the globe, exercising an oversight on the political and economic risk has to become a priority (Wang, Chow, Wang, Ren, Lou, 2013). It is a disruptive trend since as companies seek to enter the emerging markets, they have to balance between the exposure to bad and good risks given the current economic challenges. For instance, in some industries such as the oil and gas sector, the fundamental question of disruption and risk such as corporate survival and operational problems becomes a more pressing issue. The audit committees, therefore, have to narrow down their agenda to the going concern level that can enable these companies to sustain in the worse economic period. Evolution of Financial Reporting The development of financial reporting is a third disruptive trend that the audit committees need to include in their agenda. With the ongoing changes in the corporate world, companies are mandated to ensure strategic reporting (Wang, Wang, Ren, Lou, 2010). Here, the board of directors is required to discuss the main trends and factors that are likely to affect future development, financial position, and performance of their company. Ideally, the board is required to use financial and non-financial metrics such as the balanced scorecard and the Strategic Performance Measurement System (SPMS) to highlight the trends and factors (Zadek, Evans, Pruzan, 2013). This is a disruptive trend since it requires the audit committees to ensure that companies present and disclose Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in their annual reports. The Increasing Complexity of the Regulatory Landscape Lastly, the increasing complexity of the regulatory landscape has proved to have a disruptive trend or effect of companies as well as their audit committees (William Jr, Glover, Prawitt, 2016). The main aim of this increasing complexity of regulations is to prevent the occurrence of another global financial crisis like the one that occurred in 2008. Some emerging regulatory issues include aligning of classification and measurement of financial instruments with risk management, recognition of revenue from contracts, accounting for leases, re-classifying of insurance contracts, anti-money laundering, and privacy legislations (Yang, Jia, 2013). As a result, the audit committees ought to equip themselves with knowledge on these emerging and disruptive trends of the regulatory landscape. References American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. Auditing Standards Executive Committee. (2006).Codification of Statements on Auditing Standards. Commerce Clearing House. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Arens, A. A., Elder, R. J., Mark, B. (2012).Auditing and Assurance services: an integrated approach. Boston: Prentice Hall. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Arens, A. A., Best, P., Shailer, G., Fiedler, B., Elder, R. J., Beasley, M. (2007).Auditing and assurance services in Australia: an integrated approach. Pearson Education Australia. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Boynton, W. C., Johnson, R. N. (2006).Modern Auditing: Assurance services and the integrity of financial reporting. Wiley. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Cosserat, G. W., Rodda, N. (2009).Modern auditing. Wiley. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. 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Rittenberg, L. E., Johnstone, K. M., Gramling, A. A. (2010). Auditing: A business Risk Approach. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Wang, C., Chow, S. S., Wang, Q., Ren, K., Lou, W. (2013). Privacy-preserving public auditing for secure cloud storage.IEEE Transactions on Computers,62(2), 362-375. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Wang, C., Wang, Q., Ren, K., Lou, W. (2010, March). Privacy-preserving public auditing for data storage security in cloud computing. InInfocom, 2010 Proceedings IEEE(pp. 1-9). IEEE. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. William Jr, M., Glover, S., Prawitt, D. (2016).Auditing and Assurance services: A systematic approach. McGraw-Hill Education. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Yang, K., Jia, X. (2013). An efficient and secure dynamic auditing protocol for data storage in cloud computing.IEEE transactions on parallel and distributed systems,24(9), 1717-1726. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017. Zadek, S., Evans, R., Pruzan, P. (2013).Building corporate accountability: Emerging practice in social and ethical accounting and auditing. Routledge. Retrieved on 23rd January 2017.