Blogroll

Pages

This is default featured slide 1 title

Go to Blogger edit html and find these sentences.Now replace these sentences with your own descriptions.

This is default featured slide 2 title

Go to Blogger edit html and find these sentences.Now replace these sentences with your own descriptions.

This is default featured slide 3 title

Go to Blogger edit html and find these sentences.Now replace these sentences with your own descriptions.

This is default featured slide 4 title

Go to Blogger edit html and find these sentences.Now replace these sentences with your own descriptions.

This is default featured slide 5 title

Go to Blogger edit html and find these sentences.Now replace these sentences with your own descriptions.

Sabtu, 13 April 2013

Economic



A Manifesto for Economic Sense


More than four years after the financial crisis began, the world's major advanced economies remain deeply depressed, in a scene all too reminiscent of the 1930s. And the reason is simple: we are relying on the same ideas that governed policy in the 1930s. These ideas, long since disproved, involve profound errors both about the causes of the crisis, its nature, and the appropriate response.
These errors have taken deep root in public consciousness and provide the public support for the excessive austerity of current fiscal policies in many countries. So the time is ripe for a Manifesto in which mainstream economists offer the public a more evidence-based analysis of our problems.
  • The causes. Many policy makers insist that the crisis was caused by irresponsible public borrowing. With very few exceptions - other than Greece - this is false. Instead, the conditions for crisis were created by excessive private sector borrowing and lending, including by over-leveraged banks. The collapse of this bubble led to massive falls in output and thus in tax revenue. So the large government deficits we see today are a consequence of the crisis, not its cause.
  • The nature of the crisis. When real estate bubbles on both sides of the Atlantic burst, many parts of the private sector slashed spending in an attempt to pay down past debts. This was a rational response on the part of individuals, but - just like the similar response of debtors in the 1930s - it has proved collectively self-defeating, because one person's spending is another person's income. The result of the spending collapse has been an economic depression that has worsened the public debt.
  • The appropriate response. At a time when the private sector is engaged in a collective effort to spend less, public policy should act as a stabilizing force, attempting to sustain spending. At the very least we should not be making things worse by big cuts in government spending or big increases in tax rates on ordinary people. Unfortunately, that's exactly what many governments are now doing.
  • The big mistake. After responding well in the first, acute phase of the economic crisis, conventional policy wisdom took a wrong turn - focusing on government deficits, which are mainly the result of a crisis-induced plunge in revenue, and arguing that the public sector should attempt to reduce its debts in tandem with the private sector. As a result, instead of playing a stabilizing role, fiscal policy has ended up reinforcing and exacerbating the dampening effects of private-sector spending cuts.
In the face of a less severe shock, monetary policy could take up the slack. But with interest rates close to zero, monetary policy - while it should do all it can - cannot do the whole job. There must of course be a medium-term plan for reducing the government deficit. But if this is too front-loaded it can easily be self-defeating by aborting the recovery. A key priority now is to reduce unemployment, before it becomes endemic, making recovery and future deficit reduction even more difficult.
How do those who support present policies answer the argument we have just made? They use two quite different arguments in support of their case.
The confidence argument. Their first argument is that government deficits will raise interest rates and thus prevent recovery. By contrast, they argue, austerity will increase confidence and thus encourage recovery.
But there is no evidence at all in favour of this argument. First, despite exceptionally high deficits, interest rates today are unprecedentedly low in all major countries where there is a normally functioning central bank. This is true even in Japan where the government debt now exceeds 200% of annual GDP; and past downgrades by the rating agencies here have had no effect on Japanese interest rates. Interest rates are only high in some Euro countries, because the ECB is not allowed to act as lender of last resort to the government. Elsewhere the central bank can always, if needed, fund the deficit, leaving the bond market unaffected.
Moreover past experience includes no relevant case where budget cuts have actually generated increased economic activity. The IMF has studied 173 cases of budget cuts in individual countries and found that the consistent result is economic contraction. In the handful of cases in which fiscal consolidation was followed by growth, the main channels were a currency depreciation against a strong world market, not a current possibility. The lesson of the IMF's study is clear - budget cuts retard recovery. And that is what is happening now - the countries with the biggest budget cuts have experienced the biggest falls in output.
For the truth is, as we can now see, that budget cuts do not inspire business confidence. Companies will only invest when they can foresee enough customers with enough income to spend. Austerity discourages investment.
So there is massive evidence against the confidence argument; all the alleged evidence in favor of the doctrine has evaporated on closer examination. 
The structural argument. A second argument against expanding demand is that output is in fact constrained on the supply side - by structural imbalances. If this theory were right, however, at least some parts of our economies ought to be at full stretch, and so should some occupations. But in most countries that is just not the case. Every major sector of our economies is struggling, and every occupation has higher unemployment than usual. So the problem must be a general lack of spending and demand.
In the 1930s the same structural argument was used against proactive spending policies in the U.S. But as spending rose between 1940 and 1942, output rose by 20%. So the problem in the 1930s, as now, was a shortage of demand not of supply.
As a result of their mistaken ideas, many Western policy-makers are inflicting massive suffering on their peoples. But the ideas they espouse about how to handle recessions were rejected by nearly all economists after the disasters of the 1930s, and for the following forty years or so the West enjoyed an unparalleled period of economic stability and low unemployment. It is tragic that in recent years the old ideas have again taken root. But we can no longer accept a situation where mistaken fears of higher interest rates weigh more highly with policy-makers than the horrors of mass unemployment. 
Better policies will differ between countries and need detailed debate. But they must be based on a correct analysis of the problem. We therefore urge all economists and others who agree with the broad thrust of this Manifesto to register their agreement at www.manifestoforeconomicsense.org, and to publically argue the case for a sounder approach. The whole world suffers when men and women are silent about what they know is wrong.




Jumat, 12 April 2013

CLAUSE



TYPE OF CLAUSE

Like a phrase, a clause is a group of related words; but unlike a phrase, a clause has a subject and verb. An independent clause, along with having a subject and verb, expresses a complete thought and can stand alone as a coherent sentence. In contrast, a subordinate or dependent clause does not express a complete thought and therefore is not a sentence. A subordinate clause standing alone is a common error known as a sentence fragment.

Independent clauses
He saw her. The Washingtons hurried home. Free speech has a price. Grammatically complete statements like these are sentences and can stand alone. When they are part of longer sentences, they are referred to as independent (or main) clauses.
Two or more independent clauses can be joined by using coordinating conjunctions ( and, but, for, nor, or, so, and yet) or by using semicolons. The most important thing to remember is that an independent clause can stand alone as a complete sentence.
In the following example, the independent clause is a simple sentence.
  • Erica brushed her long, black hair.
Next, the coordinating conjunction and joins two independent clauses.
  • Fernando left, and Erica brushed her long, black hair.
Next, a semicolon joins two independent clauses.
  • Fernando left; Erica brushed her long, black hair.
All sentences must include at least one independent clause.
  • After she told Fernando to leave, Erica brushed her long, black hair.
In the previous sentence, the independent clause is preceded by a clause that can't stand alone: After she told Fernando to leave.
  • Erica brushed her long, black hair while she waited for Fernando to leave.
Here, the independent clause is followed by a clause that can't stand alone: while she waited for Fernando to leave.

Beginning sentences with coordinating conjunctions
Any of the coordinating conjunctions ( and, but, for, nor, or, so, and yet) can be used to join an independent clause to another independent clause. Can you begin a sentence with one of these conjunctions?
  • No one knew what to do. But everyone agreed that something should be done.
An old rule says that you shouldn't. But beginning a sentence with a coordinating conjunction is acceptable today. (Notice the preceding sentence, for example.) Sometimes beginning a sentence this way creates exactly the effect you want. It separates the clause and yet draws attention to its relationship with the previous clause.

Subordinate clauses

A subordinate clause has a subject and verb but, unlike an independent clause, cannot stand by itself. It depends on something else in the sentence to express a complete thought, which is why it's also called a dependent clause. Some subordinate clauses are introduced by relative pronouns ( who, whom, that, which, what, whose) and some by subordinating conjunctions ( although, because, if, unless, when, etc.). Subordinate clauses function in sentences as adjectives, nouns, and adverbs.

Relative clauses
A relative clause begins with a relative pronoun and functions as an adjective.
In the following sentence, the relative pronoun that is the subject of its clause and won the Pulitzer Prize is the predicate. This clause couldn't stand by itself. Its role in the complete sentence is to modify novel, the subject of the independent clause.
  • The novel that won the Pulitzer Prize didn't sell well when it was first published.
In the next example , which is the relative pronoun that begins the subordinate clause. Celebrities is the subject of the clause and attended is the verb. In the complete sentence, this clause functions as an adjective describing ceremony.
  • The ceremony, which several celebrities attended, received widespread media coverage.
Note that in a relative clause, the relative pronoun is sometimes the subject of the clause, as in the following sentence, and sometimes the object, as in the next sentence.
  • Arthur, who comes to the games every week, offered to be scorekeeper.
Who is the subject of the clause and comes to the games every week is the predicate. The clause modifies Arthur.
In the following sentence , mothers is the subject of the clause, adored is the verb, and whom is the direct object of adored. Again, the clause modifies Arthur.
  • Arthur, whom the team mothers adored, was asked to be scorekeeper.

Noun clauses
A noun clause functions as a noun in a sentence.
  • What I want for dinner is a hamburger. (subject of the verb is)
    The host told us how he escaped. (direct object of the verb told)
    A vacation is what I need most. (complement of the linking verb is)
    Give it to whoever arrives first. (object of the preposition to)

Pronoun case in subordinate clauses
Who, whom, whoever, whomever. In deciding which case of who you should use in a clause, remember this important rule: The case of the pronoun is governed by the role it plays in its own clause, not by its relation to the rest of the sentence. Choosing the right case of pronoun can be especially confusing because the pronoun may appear to have more than one function. Look at the following sentence.
  • They gave the money to whoever presented the winning ticket.
At first, you may think whomever is correct rather than whoever, on the assumption that it is the object of the preposition to. But in fact the entire clause, not whoever, is the object of the preposition. Refer to the basic rule: The case should be based on the pronoun's role within its own clause. In this clause, whoever is the subject of the verb presented.
A good way to determine the right pronoun case is to forget everything but the clause itself: whoever presented the winning ticket is correct; whomever presented the winning ticket is not.
The following two sentences show how you must focus on the clause rather than the complete sentence in choosing the right pronoun case.
  • We asked whomever we saw for a reaction to the play.
    We asked whoever called us to call back later.
In each sentence the clause is the direct object of asked. But in the first sentence, whomever is correct because within its clause, it is the object of saw. In the second sentence, whoever is correct because it is the subject of called.

Adverbial clauses
Many subordinate clauses begin with subordinating conjunctions. Examples of these conjunctions are because, unless, if, when, and although. What these conjunctions have in common is that they make the clauses that follow them unable to stand alone. The clauses act as adverbs, answering questions like how, when, where, why, to what extent, and under what conditions.
  • When Mauna Loa began erupting and spewing lava into the air, we drove away as quickly as we could.
In the preceding sentence , when is a subordinating conjunction introducing the adverbial clause. The subject of the clause is Mauna Loa and the predicate is began erupting and spewing lava into the air. This clause is dependent because it is an incomplete thought. What happened when the volcano began erupting? The independent clause we drove away as quickly as we could completes the thought. The adverbial clause answers the question “When did we drive?”
In the following sentence, because introduces the adverbial clause in which van is the subject and needed the verb. This clause is an incomplete thought. What happened because the van needed repairs? The independent clause The group of tourists decided to have lunch in the village is necessary to complete the thought. Again, the subordinate clause as a whole acts as an adverb, telling why the tourists decided to have lunch in the village.


Sumber : http://www.cliffsnotes.com/study_guide/Types-of-Clauses.topicArticleId-251364,articleId-251289.html