The Central Bank and Financial Markets
The Central Bank acts as a banker to the government and as a lender to commercial banks. It takes responsibility for the funding of the government’s budget deficit. It also controls money supply which includes currency outside the banking system and the sight deposits of the commercial banks.
A commercial bank borrows money from the public, crediting them with a deposit. In turn the bank lends money to firms and households wishing to borrow. The Central Bank can impose reserve requirements on commercial banks and set discount rate. Thus the Central Bank controls the money market.
Deposits are liabilities of a bank. The two most important kinds of deposits are sight deposits and time deposits. Sight deposits can be withdrawn on sight whenever the depositor wishes and they are not paid interest on. Before time deposits can be withdrawn, the depositor must give a minimum period of notification to the bank. Time deposits are usually paid interest on.
III. Студентам предлагается составить тему о своей будущей профессии, предоставив информацию о своем нынешнем статусе, занятиях, планах.
Примерный рассказ на темуMy Future Profession
My name is … . I am … years old. I study at Belovo Institute (branch) of Kemerovo State University. I am a second-year student at Economics faculty. I am going to be an economist (accountant). At present I don’t work (I work at Company “…”, school, …). I dedicate all my (spare) time to studies.
We study many useful and interesting subjects such as statistics, economics, higher mathematics, computers. Our lecturers teach us to think in terms of production, consumption, allocation, price elasticity demand and so on. We enlarge our theoretical knowledge in order to put it later in practice. We realize that the study of economics is of great importance in a present-day situation of changing economic environment.
ВОПРОСЫ К ЗАЧЕТУ
- Инфинитивная конструкция «сложное дополнение». Особенности перевода.
- Особенности перевода слова due и сочетаний с ним.
- Особенности перевода соединительного союза which.
- Особенности перевода инфинитива в функции определения.
- Особенности перевода предложений с вводящим словом there.
- Особенности перевода инфинитивной конструкции «сложное подлежащее».
КОНТРОЛЬНАЯ РАБОТА №3
Предлагаемаяконтрольная работасодержит 10 вариантов. Номер варианта определяется в соответствии с порядковым номером студента в журнале. Каждый вариант контрольной работы предполагает выполнение следующих семи заданий:
1. Прочитайте и переведите текст.
2. Выпишите из текста предложения, содержащие инфинитивную конструкцию «сложное дополнение». Объясните особенности ее перевода.
3. Выпишите из текста сложноподчиненные предложения, содержащие соединительный союз which. Объясните особенности перевода выписанных Вами предложений.
4. Выпишите из текста предложения с вводящим словом there. Объясните особенности их перевода.
5. Выпишите из текста предложения, содержащие инфинитивную конструкцию «сложное подлежащее». Объясните особенности ее перевода.
6. Подчеркните в тексте все сказуемые и определите их видовременные формы.
Вариант 1
The second of the three economic issues is the question of income, that is, income distribution, the way in which income – that's what people earn – is distributed or shared around.
You, and your family, have an income. You have an annual income, that is, what you earn in a year. This income allows you to enjoy various goods and services. It means you have a certain standard of living. Your standard of living, of course, includes what you think of as necessary to your life, things like food, water, somewhere to live, health and education. But your income doesn't just cover the necessities of life. It also includes recreation, whether that's sport or TV or a holiday. Your income will be less than some of your neighbours', but it will be more than some of your other neighbours'. Your neighbours mean not just people living in your own country, but also people living in other countries.
Just as you and your family have an income, so nations, different countries, also have an income – the national income, it's often called. A national income is not the money the government gets. The national income is the sum total of the incomes of all the people living in that country, in other words, everyone's income added together. In the same way one can think of world income as the total of all the incomes earned by all the people in the world.
Concerning the distribution of national and world income, some questions are to be asked: who, in the world, gets what share of these incomes? The distribution of income, either in the world or in a country, tells us how income is divided between different groups or individuals. Table 1 shows the distribution of world income. There are three headings down the left-hand side of the table: income per head, percentage of world population and percentage of world income. In poor countries, like India, China and the Sudan, the income per head is only one hundred and fifty-five pounds per year. But at the same time, they have fifty point seven per cent of the world's population. These poor countries only have five per cent of the world's income.
In middle-income countries the income per head is eight hundred and forty pounds, that's in countries like Thailand and Brazil. In the major oil countries, like Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, it's seven thousand, six hundred and seventy. In industrial countries it's six thousand, two hundred and seventy.
Turning to middle-income countries again, they have twenty-five point one per cent of world population, with fourteen point two per cent of world income. The major oil countries have point four per cent of population, the industrial countries fifteen point six. The oil countries have one point five per cent of world income, the industrial countries sixty-four point eight.
Вариант 2
The economy comprises millions of people and thousands of firms as well as the government and local authorities, all taking decisions about prices and wages, what to buy, sell, produce, export, import and many other matters. All these organizations and the decisions they take play a prominent part in shaping the business environment in which firms exist and operate.
The economy is complicated and difficult to control and predict, but it is certainly important to all businesses. You should be aware that there are times when businesses and individuals have plenty of funds to spend and there are times when they have to cut back on their spending. This can have enormous implications for business as a whole.
When the economy is enjoying a boom, firms experience high sales and general prosperity. At such times, unemployment is low and many firms will be investing funds to enable them to produce more. They do this because consumers have plenty of money to spend and firms expect high sales. It naturally follows that the state of the economy is a major factor in the success of firms.
However, during periods when people have less to spend many firms face hard times as their sales fall. Thus, the economic environment alters as the economy moves into a recession. At that time, total spending declines as income falls and unemployment rises. Consumers will purchase cheaper items and cut expenditure on luxury items such as televisions and cars.
Changes in the state of the economy affect all types of business, though the extent to which they are affected varies. In the recession of the early 1990s the high street banks suffered badly. Profits declined and, in some cases, losses were incurred. This was because fewer people borrowed money from banks, thus denying them the opportunity to earn interest on loans, and a rising proportion of those who did borrow defaulted on repayment. These so-called "bad debts" cut profit margins substantially. Various forecasters reckoned that the National Westminster Bank's losses in the case of Robert Maxwell's collapsing business empire amounted to over £ 100 million.
No individual firm has the ability to control this aspect of its environment. Rather, it is the outcome of the actions of all the groups who make up society as well as being influenced by the actions of foreigners with whom the nation has dealings.
Вариант 3
In studying economics it is important to distinguish two branches of the subject. The first is known as "positive economics", the second as "normative economics".
Positive economics deals with objective or scientific explanations of the working of the economy. The aim of positive economics is to explain how society makes decisions about consumption, production, and exchange of goods. The purpose of this investigation is twofold: to satisfy our curiosity about why the economy works as it does, and to have some basis for predicting how the economy will respond to changes in circumstances.
Normative economics is very different. Normative economics offers prescriptions or recommendations based on personal value judgements.
In positive economics, we hope to act as detached scientists. Whatever our political persuasion, whatever our view about what we would like to happen or what we would regard as "a good thing", in the first instance we have to be concerned with how the world actually works. At this stage, there is no scope for personal value judgements. We are concerned with propositions of the form: if this is changed then that will happen. In this regard, positive economics is similar to the natural sciences such as physics, geology or astronomy.
Here are some examples of positive economics in action. Economists of widely differing political persuasions would agree that, when the government imposes a tax on a good, the price of that good will rise. The normative question of whether this price rise is desirable is entirely distinct. Similarly, there would be substantial agreement that the following proposition of positive economics is correct: favourable weather conditions will increase wheat output, reduce the price of wheat, and increase the consumption of wheat. Many propositions in positive economics would command widespread agreement among professional economists.
Of course, as in any other science, there are unresolved questions where disagreement remains. These disagreements are at the frontiers of economics. Research in progress will resolve some of the issues but new issues will arise and provide scope for further research.
Although competent and comprehensive research can in principle resolve many of the outstanding issues in positive economics, no corresponding claim can be made about the resolution of disagreement in normative economics.
Вариант 4
Withdrawals (or leakages) are that part of the circular flow, which are not passed on as spending with UK firms. This is income, which individuals, firms or governments take out of the circular flow with the likely result that the level of economic activity in the economy declines. The three forms that withdrawals can take are:
v Savings
v Imports
v Taxation
Savings.
Both businesses and individual citizens can take the decision not to spend all of the income that they receive. A number of factors are thought to determine the level of savings at any one time. Interest rates obviously influence the saver's decision since they represent the return on his or her savings. Many, economists believe that decisions to save are taken in response to periods of economic uncertainty: the more worried people are about interest rates, job security and so on, the more they are likely to save. Alternatively, there is evidence that when money is losing value quickly, as in a period of inflation, people tend to purchase consumer durable goods such as televisions and washing machines.
Another factor is social change. Previous generations placed great store by saving in order to carry out major purchases; this is less common today perhaps due to the ready availability of credit.
Imports.
You will know that expenditure by UK inhabitants on goods and services imported from abroad will remove those funds from the domestic circular flow and will cause a decrease in the level of economic activity. Periodically, the UK has spent too freely on imports and earnings from exports have been insufficient to cover this. Many factors encourage us to purchase imports: some are favourable to the economy in the long term, whilst others are harmful. If imports of raw materials increase due to the growth of a domestic industry, then this indicates an expanding economy, which should sell more exports in the future in order to pay for the increased expenditure. However, if the imports are the consequence of UK citizens preferring foreign goods on grounds of, for example, price or quality, then the impact may be harmful as jobs are lost in domestic industries.
Taxation.
Funds are withdrawn from the circular flow in the form of taxation by the government. It levies two types of tax:
v Direct taxes, such as income tax, corporation tax (on profits) and other taxes on income or wealth;
v Indirect taxes, such as VAT and customs and excise duties, which are levied on spending by all of us
If the authorities withdraw funds through taxation and then fail to spend this tax revenue, the circular flow will reduce the level of activity in the economy.
Taxation policy has been substantially altered by the Conservative government in the 1980s and early 1990s. It has reduced direct taxes because of the belief that taxation of this kind reduces the incentive to work and so dampens the spirit of enterprise in the economy. Indirect taxes, such as VAT, have been increased to make up for some of the revenue lost from direct taxes. The government has thus transferred the tax burden from direct to indirect taxes. The total burden of taxation has hardly altered.
Вариант 5
Inflation is generally defined as a persistent rise in the general price level with no corresponding rise in output, which leads to a corresponding fall in the purchasing power of money.
In this section we shall look briefly at the problems that inflation causes for business and consider whether there are any potential benefits for an enterprise from an inflationary period.
Inflation varies considerably in its extent and severity. Hence, the consequences for the business community differ according to circumstances. Mild inflation of a few per cent each year may pose few difficulties for business. However, hyperinflation, which entails enormously high rates of inflation, can create almost insurmountable problems for the government, business, consumers and workers. In post-war Hungary, the cost of living was published each day and workers were paid daily so as to avoid the value of their earnings falling. Businesses would have experienced great difficulty in costing and pricing their production while the incentive for people to save would have been removed.
Economists argue at length about the causes of, and "cures" for, inflation. They would, however, recognize that two general types of inflation exist:
v Demand-pull inflation
v Cost-push inflation
Demand-pull Inflation.
Demand-putt inflation occurs when demand for a nation's goods and services outstrips that nation's ability to supply these goods and services. This causes prices to rise generally as a means of limiting demand to the available supply.
An alternative way that we can look at this type of inflation is to say that it occurs when injections exceed withdrawals and the economy is already stretched (i.e. little available labour or factory space) and there is little scope to increase further its level of activity.
Cost-push Inflation.
Alternatively, inflation can be of the cost-push variety. This takes place when firms face increasing costs. This could be caused by an increase in wages owing to trade union militancy, the rising costs of imported raw materials and components or companies pushing up prices in order to improve their profit margins.
Вариант 6
Inflation can adversely affect business in a number of ways: