John Maynard Keynes Circular Flow Money Modern Macroeconomics Economics Essay

John Maynard Keynes Circular Flow Money Modern Macroeconomics Economics Essay Keynes John Maynard Keynes an economist from Britain. Keynes economic theory was based on circular flow of money. His views and ideas greatly affected modern macroeconomics and social liberalism. In Keynes theory, one persons spending goes towards anothers earnings, and when that person spends her earnings she is, in effect, supporting anothers earnings. This circle continues on and helps support a normal functioning economy. However, the advent of the  global financial crisis  in 2007 has caused a resurgence in Keynesian thought. Keynesian economics has provided the theoretical underpinning for the plans of President  Barack Obama  of the United States, Prime Minister  Gordon Brown  of the United Kingdom, and other global leaders to ease the  economic recession. JMK was given low marks for his views on inflation. His preoccupation with unemployment led him to ignore the issue of inflation completely. Since his death in 1946 his name has been linked to such inflationists slogans as full employment at any cost, and money doesnt matter. It is small wonder that he has been widely perceived as an inflationist and that our present inflation is often described as the legacy of Keynes. Democracy in Deficit : The Political Legacy of Lord Keynes Buchanan and Wagner Lord Keynes himself must bear substantial responsibility for our apparently permanent and perhaps increasing inflation. Without Keynes inflation would not be clear and present danger to the free society that it has surely now become. The legacy or heritage of Lord Keynes is the intellectual legitimacy provided to deficit spending inflation and the growth of government. In reality Keynes deplored inflation warned repeatedly of its evils and recommended restricted demand management policies to prevent it. Keynes strong aversion to inflation is evident in even his earliest work. It appears in his Indian Currency and Finance (1913). There he emphatically rejects the argument that a depreciating currency is advantageous to trade contending that any advantages derived from inflation are only temporary and that they occur largely at the expense of the community and therefore do not profit the country as a whole. In his Economic Consequences of the Peace (1919) he said Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the capitalist system was to debauch the currency. By continuing process of inflation governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method they not only confiscate but they confiscate arbitrarily and while the process impoverishes many it actually enriches some. He then proceeds to specify at least four ways that rapid inflation works to weaken the social fabric and to undermine the foundations of the capitalist free market system. First, unforeseen inflation he says results in a capricious and totally arbitrary rearrangement of riches that violates the principles of distributive justice. Besides its inequities inflation also renders business undertakings riskier and thereby turns the process of wealth getting into a gamble and a lottery. In generating risk and injustice, inflation strikes not only at security, but at confidence in the equity of the existing distribution of wealth. Second inflation violates long term arrangements based on the assumed stability of the value of money. In so doing, inflation disturbs contracts and upsets all permanent relations between debtors and creditors which form the ultimate foundation of capitalism. Third inflation generates social discontent and directs it against businessmen whose windfall profits are wrongly perceived to be the cause rather than the consequence of inflation. This discontent is exploited by governments which being many of them reckless as well as weak seek to direct on to a class known as profiteers the popular indignation against the more obvious consequences of their vicious methods. In other words governments actually responsible for causing inflation seek to shift the blame onto businessmen who consequently lose confidence in their place in society and become the easy victims of intimidation by government of their own making and a press of which they are proprietors. By making business a scapegoat and target of vilification and control inflation reinforces anti business attitudes and weakens support for what Keynes called the active and constructive element in the whole capitalist society. Finally inflation tends to breed such misguided remedies as price regulation and profiteer-hunting that may do more damage than the inflation itself. Keynes was especially critical of the tendency of governments to resort to price controls which in his view lead to resource misallocation and a reduced supply of goods thereby compounding inflationary pressures. Regarding the dis-incentives to real out-put occasioned by controls he said that the preservation of a spurious value for the currency by the force of law expressed in the regulations of prices contains in itself however the seeds of final economic decay and soon dries up the source of ultimate supply. For by freezing prices at what are likely to be disequilibrium levels controls constitute a system of compelling the exchange of commodities at what is not their real relative value and this not only relaxes production but finally leads to the waste and inefficiency of barter. Keynes concern with the dangers of inflation influenced his policy advice in the post war boom of 1920 when an outburst of inflation threatened the British Economy. Nowhere does Keynes express his concern for inflation more strongly that in the TRACT. There his chief fear is that inflation may retart capital formation and inhibit long term economic growth. He specifies at least three ways that this can happen. He notes first the inflationary disincentive to saving. By eroding the real value of past savings inflation diminishes the capacity of the investing class to save and destroy the atmosphere of confidence which is a condition of the willingness to save. With a smaller portion of national income flowing into saving and investment the rate of capital accumulation falls. And since according to Keynes The national capital must grow as fast as the national labour supply for the maintenance of the same standard of life it follows that a fall in capital growth below the required potential rate will lower the living standards. In short by discouraging saving and capital formation inflation may cause a fall in the aggregate capital/labour ratio and a corresponding drop in labour productivity and output per capita. A second factor regarding capital accumulation is the undercharging of the depreciation during inflation and the consequent inadequate provision for the replacement of worn-out capital. This occurs because depreciation charges on capital equipment are computed on the basis of original cost rather than replacements costs. These replacement costs rise with inflation. Thus when prices rise the depreciation charge calculated on the basis of the original cost are too small to replace the worn-out capital. The result may be an unintended depletion of the capital stock. In such condition said Keynes a country can even trench on existing capital or fail to make good its current depreciation. For it is one of the evils of a depreciating currency that it enables a community to live on its capital unawares. The increasing money value of the communitys capital goods obscures temporarily a diminution in the real quantity of stock. Yet a third adverse effect on capital formation, he noted, is the increased business risk resulting from inflation. For inflation adds to ordinary business risk the extra risk directly arising out of instability in the value of money. To compensate for this extra risk, businessmen add a risk premium to the rate at which they discount the future, and the higher discount rate discourages investment. The discouraging effects of inflation on saving, in-vestment, and growth were not the only inflationary evils described by Keynes in the Tract. Others in-cluded (1) the injustice and inequity resulting from inflationary redistributions of income and wealth, (2) the resort to spurious inflation remedies-e.g., price controls, excess profits taxes, profiteer-hunting and the like-remedies that constitute not the least part of the evils, often doing more harm than the inflation they are designed to cure, and (3) the social resentment and discontent produced by inflation. This resentment, when directed against the business class whose windfall profits are wrongly perceived as the cause rather than the consequence of inflation, works to discredit enterprise and to weaken support for the productive element of society-the prop of society and the builder of the future He notes that unanticipated inflation may temporarily stimulate economic activity by raising profits and profit expectations. Profits rise, he said, because wages and other costs lag behind rising prices during inflation. And with nominal wages lagging behind prices, real wages fall, thus inducing producers to step up their employment of labor. Likewise, the lagged adjustment of market interest rates to inflation and the consequent fall in the real cost of borrowing leads producers to expand their operations. Finally, inflation reduces the real burden of fixed charges, thereby giving a temporary fillip to profits and to economic activity. But Keynes insisted that any such stimulus would most likely be small and short-lived. Moreover it would constitute an undesirable overstimulation of industrial activ-ity requiring undue strain on capacity and a corre-sponding over-exertion of labor. For these reasons he judged the overall benefits to be minimal. Consequently, when Keynes weighed the benefits of inflation against the evils, he found the latter to far outweigh the former and accordingly came down heavily in favor of price stability. He summarized his case for price stability best when he declared that, because inflation is unjust and deflation is inexpedient . . . , both are evils to be shunned. The individualistic capitalism of today, precisely because it entrusts saving to the individual investor and production to the individual employer, presumes a stable measuring-rod of value, and cannot be efficient-perhaps can-not survive-without one It follows, he said, that the government should make price stability its primary policy goal. For, if we are to continue to draw the voluntary savings of the community into investments, we must make it a prime object of deliberate State policy that the standard of value, in terms of which they are expressed, should be kept stable Monetarist Aspects of the Tract The analysis of inflation contained in the Tract has much in common with the position taken by todays monetarists. Specifically, inflation is discussed within the context of an analytical-model that is remarkably monetarist in spirit, embodying such standard monetarist ingredients as (1) the quantity theory of money, (2) the concept of inflation as a tax on real money balances, (3) the monetary approach to exchange rate determination, and (4) the Fisherian distinction between real and nominal interest rates. The paragraphs below summarize Keynes views on these elements in order to demonstrate that he was not the stereotype nonmonetarist caricature of the textbooks. Quantity Theory of Money The Keynes of the Tract was an unequivocal ad-herent of the quantity theory. This theory, he said, is fundamental. Its correspondence with fact is not open to question [7; p. 61]. His own version of the theory as elucidated in the Tract is essentially the same as the modern monetarist version and embodies the following monetarist elements : (1) a money supply and demand theory of price level determination, (2) the notion of money stock exogeneity, implying money-to-price causality, (3) the concept of the demand for money as a stable function of a few key variables, and (4) a focus on the special role of price expectations in the money demand function. Regarding the money supply and demand theory of the price level, he said that two elements determine general prices and the value of money. First, the quantity, present and prospective, of [money] in circulation. Second, the amount of purchasing power which it suits the public to hold in that shape [7; p. xviii]. Elsewhere in the Tract he says that the price level depends on the currency policy. of the government and the currency habits of the people, in accordance with the quantity theory of money Finally, Keynes employed the quantity theory in his policy analysis, arguing (1) that inflation is caused by an excess supply of money, (2) that such monetary excess could stem from falls in money demand as well as from rises in money supply, (3) that the central bank possesses the power to prevent the latter and counteract the former, and (4) that it should employ this power to stabilize prices. For price stability he recommended deliberate countercyclical movements in the money supply to offset or nullify the procyclical impact of changes in money demand on prices. He thought that real money demand fluctuated with the state ofbusiness confidence, falling in booms, rising in slumps, and thereby amplifying cyclical movements of prices. The characteristic of the credit cycle, he said, consists in a tendency of [real cash balances] to diminish during the boom and increase during the depression [7; p. 67]. To counteract these he advocated deliberate monetary contraction in booms and monetary expansion in slumps. The time to deflate the supply of cash, he said, is when real balances are falling . . . and . . . the time to inflate the supply of cash is when real balances are rising, and not, as seems to be our present practice, the other way round [7; p. 149]. In so stating, he rejected the monetarist case for a fixed monetary growth rate rule (which he argued is bound to lead to unsteadiness of the price level when money demand fluctuates) in favor of discretionary monetary management [7; p. 69]. In the modern world of paper currency and bank credit, he declared, there is no escape from a managed currency [7; p. 136]. Note, however, that while he rejected the monetarist case for rules instead of discretion in the conduct of monetary policy, he did voice the modern monetarist complaint that discretionary monetary movements frequently tend to be procyclical rather than countcyclical. That is, he complained that the British monetary authorities had perversely engineered monetary expansions in booms when money demand was falling and monetary contraction in slumps when money demand was rising thereby aggravating rather than mitigating inflation and deflation. These -policy errors notwithstanding, however, he remained a strong advocate of discretionary monetary intervention in the pursuit of price stability. The second monetarist ingredient that Keynes enunciates in the Tract is the concept of inflation as a tax on real money balances. As noted by the late Harry Johnson, this inflation tax analysis constitutes an essential part of the quantity theory approach to inflation. Consistent with that approach, Keynes argues that inflation is a method of taxation which the government uses to secure the command over real resources, resources just as real as those obtained by [ordinary] taxation [7; p. 37]. What is raised by printing notes, he writes, is just as much taken from the public as is a beer duty or an income tax [7; p. 52]. Regarding the inflation tax he says that a government can live by this means when it can live by no other. It is the form of taxation which the public find hardest to evade and even the weakest government can enforce, when it can enforce nothing else [7; p. 37]. In discussing the inflation tax, Keynes stresses that it is a tax on cash balances. The burden of the tax, he says, falls on cashholders, i.e., on the holders of the original . . . notes, whose notes [after inflation] are worth . . . less than they were before. The inflation has amounted to a tax . . . on all holders of notes in proportion to their holdings. The burden of the tax is well spread, cannot be evaded, costs nothing to collect, and falls, in a rough sort of way, in proportion to the wealth of the victim. No wonder its superficial advantages have attracted Ministers of Finance [7; p. 39]. He next explains how inflationary money creation transfers rear resources from cashholders to the government. He notes that a given, say, 25 percent inflation rate requires an equivalent rate of rise of cash holdings just to maintain real money balances at desired levels. To accomplish this, cashholders cut expenditures on goods and services and add the unspent proceeds to money balances. The reduced private outlay for goods and services releases re-sources which the government acquires with newly issued money that is then added to private cash balances. In this way inflation enables the government to appropriate real resources from cashholders just as surely as if it had taken part of their earlier money balances and spent the proceeds on goods and services. How much the government gets depends upon the quantity of real balances the public wishes to hold when the inflation rate is 2.5 percent. Assuming the public desires real balances totaling $36 million, the governments tax take is 25 percent of that sum or $9 million. Or, as Keynes himself put it in discussing the effects of the hypothetical 25 percent inflation tax on real balances of $36 million, by the process of printing the additional notes the government has transferred to itself an amount equal to $9 million, just as successfully as if it had raised this sum in taxation [7 ; p. 39]. Keynes discussion of the inflation tax includes a sophisticated analysis of the optimal rate of inflation from the point of view of maximizing tax revenue. In this connection he makes four points. First, from the formula that tax yield equals tax rate times tax base, it follows that the yield of the inflation tax is the multiplicative product of the inflation rate (tax rate) and real cash balances (tax base), respectively. Second, the tax base is not invariant to the tax rate but falls when the latter rises. That is, when the government raises the tax rate the tax base tends to shrink as people seek to avoid the inflation tax by changing their habits and economizing on real money holdings. Were this not so, said Keynes, there would be no limit to the sums which the government could extract from the public by means of inflation [7; p. 42]. Third, because the tax base shrinks with rises in the tax rate, the government will realize more revenue from a tax rate rise only if it causes a less-than-proportionate fall in the base. A government has to remember, he said, that even if a tax is not prohibitive it may be unprofitable, and that a medium, rather than an extreme, imposition will yield the greatest gain [7 ; p. 43]. Fourth, it follows that there is one inflation rate that maximizes tax revenue and that occurs where the percentage increase in the tax rate equals the percentage shrinkage in the tax base, i.e., where the elasticity of real money demand with respect to the inflation rate is unity. Here is the concept of the tax-maximizing rate of inflation, that plays such a key role in the modern monetarist analysis of inflationary finance. A Treatise on Money (1930) If the Tract is famous for its quantity theory-inflation tax analysis, the Treatise is equally famous for its celebrated fundamental equations of prices and the corresponding distinction between income inflation and profit inflation.8 Constituting the central analytical core of the Treatise, the fundamental equations express price level increases as the sum of two components, namely (1) increases in profit per unit of output, and (2) increases in unit costs of production (chiefly labor costs). Of these two components of price change-namely changes in profit and changes in costs, respectively-Keynes labels the former profit inflation and the latter income inflation. Profit inflation occurs when prices are outrunning costs, leaving a large and growing margin for profit. By contrast, income inflation occurs when wages are rising as fast as prices thereby preventing profit growth. It should be noted that Keynes income inflation does not correspond to what today is called cost-push inflation, i.e., an exogenous rise in wages and hence prices caused, for example, by the exercise oftrade union monopoly power. Rather it is the induced endogenous result of an increased demand for labor and other resources generated by prior profit inflation.9 For, according to Keynes, most income inflations do not stem from autonomous (spontaneous) increases in wages caused by the powers and activities of trade unions [8, p. 151]. Instead they stem from profit-induced rises in the demand for (and hence prices of). labor and other factor resources. That is, a profit inflation. stimulates firms to expand output and hence their demand for factors of production. This leads, to a bidding up of factor prices that raises production costs and generates income inflation. This process continues until wages and other factor prices rise sufficiently to eliminate excess profits.10 Seen this way, income inflations. possess three distinctive features. They occur at the expense of profit inflations, eventually annihilating the latter. They need not cause a rise in prices since they are largely offset by compensating falls in profit inflation. Finally, they are a crucial part of the process that transforms inflation-engendered profits into costs and thereby terminates the. temporary stimulus to economic activity. Having developed the distinction between profit and income inflation, Keynes used it to analyze the effect of inflation on output and economic growth. Regarding these effects he reached two main conclusions. For a recent exposition of the fundamental equations and the corresponding concepts of income and profit inflation, see Patinkin [11; pp. 33-8]. What follows draws heavily from Patinkin. This point is stressed by Patinkin [11; p. 37]. 10 See Keynes [8; pp. 241-2] and Patinkin [11; pp. 37, 45]. First, only profit inflation has the power to stimulate output and growth. It is the teaching of this treatise, he said, that the wealth of nations is enriched, not during income inflations, but during profit inflations . . . at times, that is to say, when prices are running away from costs [9; p. 137]. More precisely, profit inflation stimulates both current and long-term real output. It stimulates current output by raising prices relative to wages thus lowering real wages and increasing employment. And it stimulates long-term real output by shifting income from wages to profit thereby permitting faster capital accumulation and a higher rate of economic growth. In short, the effects of profit inflation include the spirit of buoyancy and enterprise and the good employment which are engendered; but mainly the-rapid growth of capital wealth and the benefits obtained from this in succeeding years [9; p. 144]. These benefits, however, are possible only when prices are outrunning costs, leaving a substantial margin of profit to finance investment and growth. They cannot occur in income inflations where wages rise as fast as prices and thus annihilate the very profits. that constitute both the means and the inducement to economic growth. It follows that income inflation, unlike profit inflation, is incapable of enhancing growth. Second, what matters for investment and growth is how long it takes for profit inflation to give way to income inflation, and this depends on the speed of adjustment of wages to prices. If the interval is short and wages adjust rapidly to prices, then inflation will have little or no impact on capital formation and growth. But if the interval is long and wages adjust slowly to prices, then the stimulus may be considerable and profit inflation, in Keynes own words, becomes a most potent instrument for the increase of accumulated wealth [8; p. 267]. Regarding the interval, Keynes apparently felt that it had indeed been long in particular historical episodes-quite long enough, he said, to include (and, perhaps to contrive) the rise . . . of the greatness of a nation [9; p. 141]. In this connection he advanced the hypothesis that the early industrialization of England and France had been powered by profit inflation. It is unthinkable, he declared, that the difference between the amount of wealth in France and England in 1700 and the amount in 1500 could ever have been built up by thrift alone. The intervening profit inflation which created the modern world was surely worth while if we take the long view [9; p. 145]. Lest one wrongly conclude from the foregoing that Keynes of the Treatise was an out-and-out inflationist, three cautionary observations should be made. First, he was referring to gently rising prices and not to the rapid double-digit inflation that is unfortunately so common today. More precisely, he was referring to slow creeping secular inflation of no more than 1 to 2 percent per year. Today such mild inflation would be viewed as constituting virtual price stability. Second, his analysis of beneficial inflation refers chiefly to capital-poor preindustrial societies and not to wealthy modern capitalist economies.11 Most of his historical examples are taken from the pre-capitalist or early-capitalist era when western Europe was very poor in accumulated wealth and greatly in need of a rapid accumulation of capital [9; p. 145 and 8; p. 268]. Under these conditions it is conceivable that slowly-creeping profit inflation might indeed have spurred industrialization not only by diverting resources from consumption to capital formation, but also by breaking feudal bonds, stimulating enterprise, encouraging market-oriented activity, and widening the scope of the market. These latter benefits, however, are no longer available to wealthy, market-oriented modern capitalist economies that are more likely to find secular inflation a curse rather than a blessing. For this reason Keynes refrained from recommending even slightly inflationary policies for modern economies. Finally, it should be remembered that Keynes was referring to profit inflation characterized by prices persistently rising faster than wages and not to modern inflations in which wages sometimes rise ahead of prices or at least follow them without delay thereby wiping out the profits generated by the price increases.12 As previously mentioned, Keynes held that inflation stimulates growth only if wages lag substantially behind prices leaving a large and persistent margin of profit to finance capital formation. This wage lag, however, is hardly characteristic of modern inflations in which wages rise swiftly not only to restore real earnings eroded by past inflation but also to protect real earnings from expected future inflation. The clear implication is that Keynes would have opposed these modern inflations, which according to his analysis are income rather than profit inflations. Accordingly, it is not surprising that Keynes, at the end of a long passage extolling the historical accomplishments of profit inflation, nevertheless declared, I am not yet converted, taking everything into ac-11 On this point see Haberler [2; pp. 98-100]. 12 See Haberler [2; p. 99]. count, from a preference for a policy today which, whilst avoiding deflation at all costs, aims at the stability of purchasing power as its ideal objective [9; p. 145]. There is no reason to believe that he ever changed that position. On the contrary,. there is strong evidence that he remained a determined foe of inflation and an adamant proponent of price stability even to the extent of warning of the potential danger of inflation in 1937 when the unemployment rate was in excess of 10 percent of the labor force. Articles in The Times (1937) The most convincing evidence of his continuing strong opposition to inflation in the 1930s even after the publication of his celebrated General Theory, appears in four articles he wrote for The Times in early 1937.13 There, in discussing policies for dealing with unemployment at the business cycle peak of 1937, he made it abundantly clear that his primary concern was preventing inflation. In particular, he argued that the 1937 unemployment rate, although very high (indeed, as high as 12 ½ percent), was nevertheless at its minimum noninflationary level at which demand pressure must be curtailed to prevent inflation. Accordingly, he recommended a sharp cutback in government expenditure on the grounds that the economy was rapidly approaching the point where further increases in aggregate demand would be purely inflationary. I believe, he said,. that we are approaching, or have reached, the point where there is not much advantage in applying a further general stimulus at the centre [4; pp. 11, 44, 65]. In so stating, he identified the noninflationary full employment rate of unemployment (NIFERU) below which industrial bottlenecks frustrate the intended output and employment effects of aggregate demand expansion policy so that mainly prices rise.14 Beyond that point, he said, noninflationary reductions in joblessness could only be achieved by specific structural policies designed to lower the full employment rate of unemployment itself. As for the existing high level of that unemployment rate, he attributed it to structural rigidities in the 1. These articles are reprinted and discussed in Hutchison [4]. Unless otherwise noted, all references in this section are to Hutchison. 14 The NIFERU concept also appears in the General Theory where Keynes asserts that! beyond a certain point, structural impediments (a series of bottle-necks) would prevent the noninflationary expansion of output and employment long before full capacity is reached. At the bottleneck point any further increase in aggregate demand would, in his words, largely spend itself in raising prices, as distinct from employment [10; pp. 300-l]. British economy, in particular to a substantial mismatch between the location and skill mix of the labor force and the location and composition of demand. As he put it, the economic structure is unfortunately rigid and this rigidity prevented output and employment from responding to increases in aggregate demand so that only prices rise [4; pp. 11, 65-6]. It follows, he said, that to achieve noninflationary reductions in unemployment we are more in need today of a rightly distributed demand than of a greater aggregate demand [4 ; pp. 11, 66]. In other words, noninflationary reductions in unemployment cannot be obtained by expansionary aggregate demand-management policies but rather require a different technique [4; pp. 11, 14, 44, 66]. To this end he advocated specific structural policies to reduce unemployment on the grounds that noninflationary reductions in unemployment could only be achieved via measures that eradicate structural rigidities and lower the equilibrium unemployment rate itself. In so arguing, he foreshadowed by 30 years the modern monetarist concept of the natural rate of unemployment. He also refuted the popular contention that he was an inflationist who advocated full employment at any cost. That is, his 1937 articles amply demonstrate that, far from being an inflationist, his main consideration was preventing inflation-even at a time when the u

Concepts And Definitions Of Disability Essay

The contemporary conception of disability proposed in the WHO International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) views disability as an umbrella term for impairments, activity limitations and participation restrictions. Disability is the interaction between individuals with a health condition (e.g. cerebral palsy, Down syndrome or depression) and personal and environmental factors (e.g. negative attitudes, inaccessible transportation, or limited social supports). Long ago there was great confusion over the meaning of terms such as impairment, handicap, or disability. Then, in 1980, the WHO provided great service by offering a clear way of thinking about it all in a little book called â€Å"International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities and Handicaps†. All these terms refer to the consequences of disease, but consider the consequences at different levels. The disease produces some form of pathology, and then the individual may become aware of th is: they experience symptoms. Later, the performance or behaviour of the person may be affected, and because of this the person may suffer consequences such as being unable to work. In this general scenario, Impairment was defined as â€Å"any loss or abnormality of psychological, physiological, or anatomical structure or function.† Impairment is a deviation from normal organ function; it may be visible or invisible (screening tests generally seek to identify impairments). Disability was defined as â€Å"any restriction or lack (resulting from an impairment) of ability to perform an activity in the manner or within the range considered normal for a human being.† Impairment does not necessarily lead to a disability, for the impairment may be corrected. I am, for example, wearing eye glasses, but do not perceive that any disability arises from my impaired vision. A disability refers to the function of the individual (rather than of an organ, as with impairment). In turn, Handicap was defined as â€Å"a disadvantage for a given individual, resulting from impairment or a disability that limits or prevents the fulfillment of a role that is normal (depending on age, sex, and social and cultural factors) for that individual.† Handicap considers the person’s participation in their social context. For example, if there is a wheel-chair access ramp at work, a disabled person may not be handicapped in coming to work there. Here are some examples: Impairment – Speech production; Disability – Speaking clearly enough to be understood; Handicap – Communication I – Hearing; D – Understanding; H – Communication I – Vision; D – Seeing; H – Orientation I – Motor control, balance, joint stiffness; D – Dressing, feeding, walking; H – Independence, mobility I – Affective, cognitive limitations; D – Behaving, interacting, supporting; H – Social interaction, reasonableness Here is a diagram that suggests possible parallels between the impairment, disability & handicap triad, and the disease, illness and sickness triad. (The squiggly arrows are intended to indicate a rough correspondence) â€Å"Patients do not come to their physicians to find out what ICD code they have, they come to get help for what is bothering them.† A Positive Perspective? Quality of Life and the International Classification of Function The focus on disability takes a somewhat negative approach to health, perhaps not unreasonable since doctors are supposed to cure diseases. But starting in the 1980s clinicians began to set goals to achieve when the disease could not be cured, beyong merely controlling symptoms. The notion of Quality of Life gained prominence as a way to emphasize a positive perspective on health – health as a capacity to function and to live, even if the patient has a chronic condition. A central aim of care was to enhance the quality of the patient’s function, and hence their ability to life as normal a life as possible, even if the disorder could not be cured. This notion was a further extension of handicap, covering maintenance of normal function, but adding psychological well-being and, if possible, positive feelings of engagement. Measurements of quality of life extend the disability focus beyond the ability to perform â€Å"activities of daily living† to include a broad range of functioning (work, home, play) and also the person’s feelings of satisfaction and well-being. This is necessarily a qualitative and subjective concept, judged by the patient in terms of the extent to which they are able to do the things they wish to do. In this medical context, quality of life is distinct from wealth or possessions, and to amke this clear you may see the term â€Å"health-related quality of life.† Reflecting these evolving ideas, the WHO revised its  Impairment, Disability and Handicap triad in 2001, re-naming it the International Classification of Function (ICF). This classification system provides codes for the complete range of functional states; codes cover body structures and functions, impairments, activities and participation in society. The ICF also considers contextual factors that may influence activity levels, so function is viewed as an interaction between health conditions (a disease or injury) and the context in which the person lives (both physical environment and cultural norms relevant to the disease). It establishes a common language for describing functional states that can be used in comparing across diseases and countries. The ICF therefore uses positive language, so that â€Å"activity† and â€Å"participation† replace â€Å"disability† and â€Å"handicap.† The ICF is described on the WHO web site. Impairment, Disability and Handicap Sheena L. Carter, Ph.D. The words â€Å"impairment,† â€Å"disability,† and â€Å"handicap,† are often used interchangeably. They have very different meanings, however. The differences in meaning are important for understanding the effects of neurological injury on development. The most commonly cited definitions are those provided by the World Health Organization (1980) in The International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities, and Handicaps: Impairment: any loss or abnormality of psychological, physiological or anatomical structure or function. Disability: any restriction or lack (resulting from an impairment) of ability to perform an activity in the manner or within the range considered normal for a human being. Handicap: a disadvantage for a given individual that limits or prevents the fulfillment of a role that is normal As traditionally used, impairment refers to a problem with a structure or  organ of the body; disability is a functional limitation with regard to a particular activity; and handicap refers to a disadvantage in filling a role in life relative to a peer group. Examples to illustrate the differences among the terms â€Å"impairment,† â€Å"disability,† and â€Å"handicap.† 1. CP example: David is a 4-yr.-old who has a form of cerebral palsy (CP) called spastic diplegia. David’s CP causes his legs to be stiff, tight, and difficult to move. He cannot stand or walk. Impairment: The inability to move the legs easily at the joints and inability to bear weight on the feet is an impairment. Without orthotics and surgery to release abnormally contracted muscles, David’s level of impairment may increase as imbalanced muscle contraction over a period of time can cause hip dislocation and deformed bone growth. No treatment may be currently available to lessen David’s impairment. Disability: David’s inability to walk is a disability. His level of disability can be improved with physical therapy and special equipment. For example, if he learns to use a walker, with braces, his level of disability will improve considerably. Handicap: David’s cerebral palsy is handicapping to the extent that it prevents him from fulfilling a normal role at home, in preschool, and in the community. His level of handicap has been only very mild in the early years as he has been well-supported to be able to play with other children, interact normally with family members and participate fully in family and community activities. As he gets older, his handicap will increase where certain sports and physical activities are considered â€Å"normal† activities for children of the same age. He has little handicap in his preschool classroom, though he needs some assistance to move about the classroom and from one activity to another outside the classroom. Appropriate services and equipment can reduce the extent to which cerebral palsy prevents David from fulfilling a normal role in the home, school and community as he grows. 2. LD example: Cindy is an 8-year-old who has extreme difficulty with reading (severe dyslexia). She has good vision and hearing and scores well on tests of intelligence. She went to an excellent preschool and several different special reading programs have been tried since early in kindergarten. Impairment: While no brain injury or malformation has been identified, some impairment is presumed to exist in how Cindy’s brain puts together visual and auditory information. The impairment may be inability to associate sounds with symbols, for example. Disability: In Cindy’s case, the inability to read is a disability. The disability can probably be improved by trying different teaching methods and using those that seem most effective with Cindy. If the impairment can be explained, it may be possible to dramatically improve the disability by using a method of teaching that does not require skills that are impaired (That is, if the difficulty involves learning sounds for letters, a sight-reading approach can improve her level of disability). Handicap: Cindy already experiences a handicap as compared with other children in her class at school, and she may fail third grade. Her condition will become more handicapping as she gets older if an effective approach is not found to improve her reading or to teach her to compensate for her reading difficulties. Even if the level of disability stays severe (that is, she never learns to read well), this will be less handicapping if she learns to tape lectures and â€Å"read† books on audiotapes. Using such approaches, even in elementary school, can prevent her reading disability from interfering with her progress in other academic areas (increasing her handicap). Gale Encyclopedia of Education: History of Special Education Top Home > Library > History, Politics & Society > Education Encyclopedia Special education, as its name suggests, is a specialized branch of education. Claiming lineage to such persons as Jean-Marc-Gaspard Itard (1775 – 1838), the physician who â€Å"tamed† the â€Å"wild boy of Aveyron,† and Anne Sullivan Macy (1866 – 1936), the teacher who â€Å"worked miracles† with Helen Keller, special educators teach those students who have physical, cognitive, language, learning, sensory, and/or emotional abilities that deviate from those of the general population. Special educators provide instruction specifically tailored to meet individualized needs, making education available to students who otherwise would have limited access to education. In 2001, special education in the United States was serving over five million students. Although federally mandated special education is relatively new in the United States, students with disabilities have been present in every era and in every society. Historical records have consistently documented the most severe disabilities – those that transcend task and setting. Itard’s description of the wild boy of Aveyron documents a variety of behaviors consistent with both mental retardation and behavioral disorders. Nineteenth-century reports of deviant behavior describe conditions that could easily be interpreted as severe mental retardation, autism, or schizophrenia. Milder forms of disability became apparent only after the advent of universal public education. When literacy became a goal for all children, teachers began observing disabilities specific to task and setting – that is, less severe disabilities. After decades of research and legislation, special education now provides services to students with varying degrees and forms of disabilities, including mental retardation, emotional disturbance, learning disabilities, speech-language (communication) disabilities, impaired hearing and deafness, low vision and blindness, autism, traumatic brain injury, other health impairments, and severe and multiple disabilities. Development of the Field of Special Education At its inception in the early nineteenth century, leaders of social change set out to cure many ills of society. Physicians and clergy, including Itard, Edouard O. Seguin (1812 – 1880), Samuel Gridley Howe (1801 – 1876), and Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet (1787 – 1851), wanted to ameliorate the neglectful, often abusive treatment of individuals with disabilities. A rich  literature describes the treatment provided to individuals with disabilities in the 1800s: They were often confined in jails and almshouses without decent food, clothing, personal hygiene, and exercise. During much of the nineteenth century, and early in the twentieth, professionals believed individuals with disabilities were best treated in residential facilities in rural environments. Advocates of these institutions argued that environmental conditions such as urban poverty and vices induced behavioral problems. Reformers such as Dorothea Dix (1802 – 1887) prevailed upon state governments to provide funds for bigger and more specialized institutions. These facilities focused more on a particular disability, such as mental retardation, then known as â€Å"feeble-mindedness† or â€Å"idiocy†; mental illness, then labeled â€Å"insanity† or â€Å"madness†; sensory impairment such as deafness or blindness; and behavioral disorders such as criminality and juvenile delinquency. Children who were judged to be delinquent or aggressive, but not insane, were sent to houses ofrefuge or reform schools, whereas children and adults judged to be â€Å"mad† were admitted to psychiatric hospitals. Dix and her followers believed that institutionalization of individuals with disabilities would end their abuse (confinement without treatment in jails and poorhouses) and provide effective treatment. Moral treatment was the dominant approach of the early nineteenth century in psychiatric hospitals, the aim being cure. Moral treatment employed methods analogous to today’s occupational therapy, systematic instruction, and positive reinforcement. Evidence suggests this approach was humane and effective in some cases, but the treatment was generally abandoned by the late nineteenth century, due largely to the failure of moral therapists to train others in their techniques and the rise of the belief that mental illness was always a result of brain disease. By the e nd of the nineteenth century, pessimism about cure and emphasis on physiological causes led to a change in orientation that would later bring about the â€Å"warehouse-like† institutions that have become a symbol for abuse and neglect of society’s most vulnerable citizens. The practice of moral treatment was replaced by the belief that most disabilities were incurable. This led to keeping individuals with disabilities ininstitutions both for their own protection and for the betterment of society. Although the transformation took many years, by the end of the nineteenth century the size of institutions had increased so  dramatically that the goal of rehabilitation was no longer possible. Institutions became instruments for permanent segregation. Many special education professionals became critics of institutions. Howe, one of the first to argue for in stitutions for people with disabilities, began advocating placing out residents into families. Unfortunately this practice became a logistical and pragmatic problem before it could become a viable alternative to institutionalization. At the close of the nineteenth century, state governments established juvenile courts and social welfare programs, including foster homes, for children and adolescents. The child study movement became prominent in the early twentieth century. Using the approach pioneered by G. Stanley Hall (1844 – 1924; considered the founder of child psychology), researchers attempted to study child development scientifically in relation to education and in so doing established a place for psychology within public schools. In 1931, the Bradley Home, the first psychiatric hospital for children in the United States, was established in East Providence, Rhode Island. The treatment offered in this hospital, as well as most of the other hospitals of the early twentieth century, was psychodynamic. Psychodynamic ideas fanned interest in the diagnosis and classification of disabili ties. In 1951 the first institution for research on exceptional children opened at the University of Illinois and began what was to become the newest focus of the field of special education: the slow learner and, eventually, what we know today as learning disability. The Development of Special Education in Institutions and Schools Although Itard failed to normalize Victor, the wild boy of Averyon, he did produce dramatic changes in Victor’s behavior through education. Modern special education practices can be traced to Itard, and his work marks the beginning of widespread attempts to instruct students with disabilities. In 1817 the first special education school in the United States, the American Asylum for the Education and Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb (now called the American School for the Deaf), was established in Hartford, Connecticut, by Gallaudet. By the middle of the nineteenth century, special educational programs were being provided in many asylums. Education was a prominent part of moral therapy. By the close of the nineteenth century, special classes within regular public schools had been launched in major cities. These special classes were initially established for immigrant students who were  not proficient in English a nd students who had mild mental retardation or behavioral disorders. Descriptions of these children included terms such as steamer children, backward, truant, and incorrigible. Procedures for identifying â€Å"defectives† were included in the World’s Fair of 1904. By the 1920s special classes for students judged unsuitable for regular classes had become common in major cities. In 1840 Rhode Island passed a law mandating compulsory education for children, but not all states had compulsory education until 1918. With compulsory schooling and the swelling tide of anti-institution sentiment in the twentieth century, many children with disabilities were moved out of institutional settings and into public schools. However, by the mid-twentieth century children with disabilities were still often excluded from public schools and kept at home if not institutionalized. In order to respond to the new population of students with special needs entering schools, school officials created still more special classes in public schools. The number of specia l classes and complementary support services (assistance given to teachers in managing behavior and learning problems) increased dramatically after World War II. During the early 1900s there was also an increased attention to mental health and a consequent interest in establishing child guidance clinics. By 1930 child guidance clinics and counseling services were relatively common features of major cities, and by 1950 special education had become an identifiable part of urban public education in nearly every school district. By 1960 special educators were instructing their students in a continuum of settings that included hospital schools for those with the most severe disabilities, specialized day schools for students with severe disabilities who were able to live at home, and special classes in regular public schools for students whose disabilities could be managed in small groups. During this period special educators also began to take on the role of consultant, assisting other teachers in instructing students with disabilities. Thus, by 1970 the field of special education was offering a variety of educational placements to students with varying disabilities and needs; however, public schools were not yet required to educate all students regardless of their disabilities. During the middle decades of the twentieth century, instruction of children with disabilities often was based on process training – which involves attempts to improve children’s academic  performance by teaching them cognitive or motor processes, such as perceptualmotor skills, visual memory, auditory memory, or auditory-vocal processing. These are ancient ideas that found twentieth-century proponents. Process training enthusiasts taught children various perceptual skills (e.g., identifying different sounds or objects by touch) or perceptual motor skills (e.g., balancing) with the notion that fluency in these skills would generalize to reading, writing, arithmetic, and other basic academic tasks. After many years of research, however, such training was shown not to be effective in improving academic skills. Many of these same ideas were recycled in the late twentieth century as learning styles, multiple intelligences, and other notions that the underlying process of learning varies with gender, ethnicity, or other physiological differences. None of these theories has found much support in reliable research, although direct instruction, mnemonic (memory) devices, and a few other instructional strategies have been supported reliably by research. The History of Legislation in Special Education Although many contend that special education was born with the passage of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (EAHCA) in 1975, it is clear that special educators were beginning to respond to the needs of children with disabilities in public schools nearly a century earlier. It is also clear that EAHCA did not spring from a vacuum. This landmark law naturally evolved from events in both special education and the larger society and came about in large part due to the work of grass roots organizations composed of both parents and professionals. These groups dated back to the 1870s, when the American Association of Instructors of the Blind and the American Association on Mental Deficiency (the latter is now the American Association on Mental Retardation) were formed. In 1922 the Council for Exceptional Children, now the major professional organization of special educators, was organized. In the 1930s and 1940s parent groups began to band together on a national level. These groups worked to make changes in their own communities and, consequently, set the stage for changes on a national level. Two of the most influential parent advocacy groups were the National Association for Retarded Citizens (now ARC/USA), organized in 1950, and the Association for Children with Learning Disabilities, organized in 1963. Throughout the first  half of the twentieth century, advocacy groups were securing local ordinances that would protect and serve individuals with disabilities in their communities. For example, in 1930, in Peoria, Illinois, the first white cane ordinance gave individuals with blindness the right-of-way when crossing the street. By mid-century all states had legislation providing for education of students with disabilities. However, legislation was still noncompulsory. In the late 1950s federal money was allocated for educating children with disabilities and for the training of special educators. Thus the federal government became formally involved in research and in training special education professionals, but limited its involvement to these functions until the 1970s. In 1971, this support was reinforced and extended to the state level when the Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Children (PARC) filed a class action suit against their Commonwealth. This suit, resolved by consent agreement, specified that all children age six through twenty-one were to be provided free public education in the least restrictive alternative (LRA, which would later become the least restrictive environment [LRE] clause in EAHCA). In 1973 the Rehabilitation Act prohibited discriminatory practices in programs receiving federal financial assistance but imposed no affirmative obligations with respect to special education. In 1975 the legal action begun under the Kennedy and Johnson administrations resulted in EAHCA, which was signed into law by President Gerald Ford. EAHCA reached full implementation in 1977 and required school districts to provide free and appropriate education to all of their students with disabilities. In return for federal funding, each state was to ensure that students with disabilities received non-discriminatory testing, evaluation, and placement; the right to due process; education in the least restrictive environment; and a fre e and appropriate education. The centerpiece of this public law (known since 1990 as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA) was, and is, a free appropriate public education (FAPE). To ensure FAPE, the law mandated that each student receiving special education receive an Individualized Education Program (IEP). Under EAHCA, students with identified disabilities were to receive FAPE and an IEP that included relevant instructional goals and objectives, specifications as to length of school year, determination of the most appropriate educational placement, and descriptions of criteria to be used  in evaluation and measurement. The IEP was designed to ensure that all students with disabilities received educational programs specific to their â€Å"unique† needs. Thus, the education of students with disabilities became federally controlled. In the 1982 case of Board of Education of the Hendrick Hudson Central School District v. Rowley, the U.S. Supreme Court clarified the level of services to be afforded students with special needs and ruled that special education services need only provide some â€Å"educational benefit† to students – public schools were not required to maximize the educational progress of students with disabilities. In so doing the Supreme Court further defined what was meant by a free and appropriate education. In 1990 EAHCA was amended to include a change to person-first language, replacing the term handicapped student with student with disabilities. The 1990 amendments also added new classification categories for students with autism and traumatic brain injury and transition plans within IEPs for students age fourteen or older. In 1997, IDEA was reauthorized under President Clinton and amended to require the inclusion of students with disabilities in statewide and districtwide assessments, measurable IEP goals and objectives, and functional behavioral assessment and behavior intervention plans for students with emotional or behavioral needs. Because IDEA is amended and reauthorized every few years, it is impossible to predict the future of this law. It is possible that it will be repealed or altered dramatically by a future Congress. The special education story, both past and future, can be written in many different ways.

Consistently Developing Knowledge, Skills, and Values

Consistently Developing Knowledge, Skills and Values An integral part of human is his continual development and his productivity towards excellence. It is said that knowledge is power. Yes, it is; but it should go along with one’s abilities and attitude in his life-long endeavour. Each of us should be honed to become a better citizen of our society—a true asset and a good leader who contributes to the betterment of our nation, but how?The big question lies on how we could open our eyes to the big changing world as we advance ourselves in every aspect of our lives. We have to be aware of the call for self-sustainability that will bring about mutual benefits to others. Let us take the influence of our good leaders like Mahatma Ghandi and Jawaharlal Neru as peace leaders. How about Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln as America’s pride towards unification? Here, our national hero Dr.Jose Rizal exerted a lot of influence to us and they left an unwavering legacy. A ll these were a product of their consistent productivity that touched the lives of our people. Now you, as an ordinary citizen of our nation, could make a difference by stepping out to become a part of a successful country and by keeping yourself well directed and focused on your perceived goals towards continuous development for you and of what you could do to others.Remember that the hunger to learn, in varied levels, has always been part of your existence. The questions you encounter spring out from your intention and motivation to learn. With positive regard on every challenge thrown along your way, you must muster a needed degree of expertise and fuse it with an ample amount of experience to have the edge in acquiring and consistently developing knowledge, skills and values essential to progress in a rate that will quantify a person’s development.Therefore, whether you are teachers or students at schools, doctors or nurses in hospitals, and even organizers or judges in t his oratorical competition, 1) develop knowledge by welcoming and adding new pieces of information from all possible resources. Let it grow with an open yet analytical mind synthesizing old and new data along with current trends not allowing any room for stagnation. 2) Develop skills through constant practice aiming at accomplishing significant levels of precision and excellence. ) Align these ripening knowledge and advancing skills with values essential to the realities in life while keeping motivated. This is the very core of this subject. Without motivation that steers a person to achieve greater knowledge, information and ideas are insignificant. Guidance will point an individual to the right information, hence, feeding the soul strive to search for something of great essence to the society. His passion to learn and to grow makes him invest in developing knowledge, skills and values while harnessing his understanding on a culture that tends to evolve for greater good.One’ s thought process is the key factor followed by his interest in the subject on why and how he would retain information. An individual gathers ideas and confines the relevant and the ones with utmost value to their development. Once ideas have been proven effective in ways, he will deduct or resort to other processes in addressing future conflicts while tuning ways to consistently develop knowledge, skills and values.

What Is Digital Printing - Definition

Modern printing methods such as laser and ink-jet printing are known as digital printing. Digital printing consists of an image being sent directly to the printer using digital files such as PDFs and those from graphics software such as Illustrator and InDesign. This eliminates the need for printing plates, commonly used in offset printing, which can save money and time. While offset printing still often results in slightly better quality prints, digital methods are being worked on at a fast rate to improve quality and lower costs.