The impact of events on annual reporting disclosures

Burchell, Club and Hopwood (1985) considered that “little is known of how...wider social forces can impinge upon and change accounting” (p.382). This study identifies six political forces that may have instigated changes in accounting practice and annual reporting of a New Zealand electricity entity. Based on the literature (Hopwood, 1983, 1990; Napier, 1989; Gray and Haslam, 1990; Thomson, 1993) it is expected that significant changes in the environment in which the entity operates will effect changes in reporting. The study compares the annual report disclosures of an Electricity Supply Authority on a yearly basis from 1970 to 2001 - a 18 year period with little significant environmental impact in the electricity industry with a period of intense activity in the following 14 years. The study found considerable evidence that the change from a local body accountable to electors/consumers to a public company accountable to shareholders, led to a greater emphasis on profits and earnings per share as a means of measuring performance. It identifies specific changes in accounting practice that support this view as well as a period of “big bath” accounting, decreasing disclosure of commercially sensitive information, and the increasing use of dramatic presentation in the annual report

Charities’ new non-financial reporting requirements: preparers’ insights

The purpose of this paper is to obtain insights from preparers on the new Performance Report requirements for New Zealand charities, in particular the non-financial information included in the ‘Entity Information’ section and the ‘Statement of Service Performance’ for Tier 3 and 4 charities. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 interviewees, each involved with governance and reporting of one or more Tier 3 or Tier 4 charities. These interviews were analysed in terms of accountability and legitimacy objectives, which motivated the regulators to introduce the new reporting regime. Key findings are summarised under three themes. Manageability relates to perceptions and suggestions regarding implementation of the new requirements. Scepticism concerns some doubts raised by interviewees regarding the motivations for performance reports and the extent to which they will be used. Effects include concerns about potentially losing good charities and volunteers due to new requirements making their work ‘too hard’, although increased focus on outcomes creates the potential for continuous improvement. The subjectivity that is inherent in thematic analysis is acknowledged and also that multiple themes may sometimes be present in the sentences and paragraphs analysed. We acknowledge too that early viewpoints may change over time. Themes identified may assist regulators, professional bodies and support groups to respond to the views of preparers. Findings will also be of interest to parties in other jurisdictions who are considering the implementation of similar initiatives. This paper provides early insights on new reporting requirements entailing significant changes for New Zealand charities for financial periods beginning on or after April 2015. The focus is on small charities (97% of all New Zealand charities) and key aspects of the Performance Report: Entity information and the Statement of Service Performance.fals

The Painful Long Head of the Biceps Brachii: Nonoperative Treatment Approaches

Pain associated with the long head of the biceps (LHB) brachii seems to be increasingly recognized in the past 4 to 5 years. The LHB has long been considered a troublesome pain generator in the shoulder. Abnormality involving the LHB brachii has long been an area of debate, with Codman in 1934 even questioning the specificity of the diagnosis of biceps tendinitis. Biceps tendon abnormality is often associated with rotator cuff impingement. Shoulder pain originating from the biceps tendon can be debilitating, causing a severe decrease in shoulder function. As a result of the frequent clinical presentation of biceps pain, there is currently a great deal of interest regarding the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of biceps abnormality. This article describes a classification system of LHB pain and discusses nonoperative treatment concepts and techniques for the painful LHB

The Essential Facilities Doctrine Under United States Antitrust Law

The issue of essential facilities has attracted renewed attention in Europe in recent years because of the controversy between IMS Health Inc. and NDC Health Corporation, two competitors in pharmaceutical data services in Germany . . . After an extensive investigation, the European Commission (EC) ordered that IMS grant access to the 1860 brick structure on commercially reasonable terms, and the EC decision is now on appeal in the Court of First Instance in Luxembourg. One issue that emerged in that litigation is whether a decision by European authorities to grant access to the alleged essential facility, especially one whose market power derived in part from a copyright, would open a gap between European and U.S. antitrust law. In response to that contention, the authors of this piece filed a statement in the Court of First Instance describing U.S. law on the subject. We argued that the EC\u27s ruling is consistent with U.S. jurisprudence on the subject of essential facilities. The remainder of this article consists of a revised version of the Court of First Instance filing

The corporatisation of local body entities: A study of financial performance

The New Zealand electricity industry provides us with a unique opportunity to examine how entities responded to major restructuring of the industry. This research studies the financial performance of three entities, each with a different ownership structure, over a 15 year period from 1988 to 2002. The aim is to examine the possible influence of ownership type and corporatisation on the development and financial performance of the entities by examining the changes that took place from the pre-corporatisation period to the post-corporatisation period and comparing and contrasting the performance and funding of the three entities over that time. In this way an assessment is made of the possible influence of ownership type on financial performance. This research can be framed to some extent by agency theory aspects of positive accounting theory. In addition legitimacy theory has been used to explain the behaviour of managers and the process of organizations adapting to a changing environment. Both theories acknowledge the interaction of organizations and their environment. The comparison shows that at the end of the study period the council owned company was the smallest, in terms of total assets, of the three companies examined (although it was similar in size to the biggest one at the outset). The council owned company also returned most capital to its shareholders and is the most conservatively financed one of the three with only 10% debt at the end of 2002 compared to 28% for the trust-held company and 87% for the listed company. The listed company ended up being the biggest and the one with the highest gearing, the highest ROA and the highest profit margin. The study concludes that ownership structure did have an influence on financial performance and level of debt funding

Moral hazard and Texas banking in the 1920s.

Using recently collected examination data from a sample of Texas state-chartered banks over the period 1919-26, the role of moral hazard in increasing ex-ante asset risk is analyzed. During this period, a state-run deposit insurance system was in place that was mandatory for all state-chartered banks in Texas. Nationally chartered banks were not allowed to participate in the insurance program. Analyzing individual bank-level data, we find evidence that declines in capitalization were positively correlated with increases in loan concentrations at insured banks. We argue that this is consistent with a moral-hazard effect at work. No such relationship is found between capitalization and risk at uninsured banks.Banks and banking - Texas

Aerodynamic challenges of ALT

The approach and landing test (ALT) of the Space Shuttle Orbiter presented a number of unique challenges in the area of aerodynamics. The purpose of the ALT program was both to confirm the use of the Boeing 747 as a transport vehicle for ferrying the Orbiter across the country and to demonstrate the flight characteristics of the Orbiter in its approach and landing phase. Concerns for structural fatigue and performance dictated a tailcone be attached to the Orbiter for ferry and for the initial landing tests. The Orbiter with a tailcone attached presented additional challenges to the normal aft sting concept of wind tunnel testing. The landing tests required that the Orbiter be separated from the 747 at approximately 20,000 feet using aerodynamic forces to fly the vehicles apart. The concept required a complex test program to determine the relative effects of the two vehicles on each other. Also of concern, and tested, was the vortex wake created by the 747 and the means for the Orbiter to avoid it following separation

The Destruction of The Black Family as a Manifestation of Structural and Epistemic Antiblackness

This thesis aims to analyze how the racialized power that has constituted blackness in the wake of the Middle Passage has violently destroyed the possibility of family as a condition of a black ontology that, in the making of America as a structurally antiblack society, has been rendered an oxymoron. In relation to that structural antiblack violence, African American practices of making family after abolition have been constitutively precarious, always exposed to the obliterating force of the state and civil society, and generally in need, for their very survival, to aim at a broader, collective reconstitution of communities as a radical project of black self-determination. Confronted with the structures owing their very social, epistemic, and psychic stability to its enforced impossibility, the black family is always already a radical practice of critique and fugitivity. This topic is significant because it intends to examine the way whiteness places pressure on blacks to assimilate to Western and Eurocentric values under slavery and after emancipation. It argues that the black family is not only shaped by structural forces but also epistemic violence which posits the white family as virtuous and the embodiment of civilization. The propagation of family values by the state served in fact to criminalize, pathologize, and ultimately destroy black families while hindering the upward mobility of blacks and at white family life as an object of emulation, which required internalized black self-punishment and self-deprecation. It is important to compare the familial values and practices of African-Americans to white Americans in order to understand how oppressive dominant family values may have been on African-Americans. By comparing these values, I intend to investigate the concept of family itself and whether the way white Americans have sought to structure their ideas of the black family according to concepts presented as natural while being shaped by racialized power and anti-black violence.No embargoAcademic Major: African American and African Studie

Centering People in the Economy: Worker Cooperatives and the Solidarity Economy in Barcelona

Are worker cooperatives and the solidarity economy viable tools for revolutionary change in a neoliberal, capitalist system? I approach this question by considering the arguments of utopian socialists, scientific socialists, and anarchists from the Industrial Revolution and the influence of these on the theory of the solidarity economy today. These theoretical perspectives are compared to the reality of members of worker cooperatives in the solidarity economy in Barcelona. The experiences of worker cooperative members are elucidated through focus group discussions and participant produced drawings. A comparison of worker experiences with theory shows worker cooperatives can be spaces for practicing equitable workplace relations but are ineffective in widespread change in isolation. In Barcelona, worker cooperatives have federated with the intention of creating a solidarity economy. Even though there has been significant impact on the local government, it is unclear whether this type of federation will gain enough economic strength to replace capitalism. To achieve this goal, worker cooperatives should unite with broader worker struggles in order to build political power for the working class

Theory as Liberatory Practice

Let me begin by saying that I came to theory because I was hurting-the pain within me was so intense that I could not go on living. I came to theory desperate, wanting to comprehend-to grasp what was happening around and within me. Most importantly, I wanted to make the hurt go away. I saw in theory then a location for healing