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Business Administration

Business Administration

Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a tertiary degree in business management. Originally designed to provide engineers with management skills, today's MBA draws applicants from a range of disciplines. An MBA is considered a professional Master's degree as well as a traditional or academic Master's degree. However, completion of a professional MBA does not usually preclude admission to a Ph.D. (program for research-oriented engagements) although it could be helpful. Schools that offer the MBA are usually known as either management or business schools.

History

The MBA designation originated in the United States, emerging as the country industrialized and companies sought out scientific approaches to management. The first American business school, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, was established in 1891 (initially as an exclusively undergraduate institution). Tuck School of Business, part of Dartmouth College, was the first graduate school of management in the world. Founded in 1900, it was the first institution to confer advanced degrees (masters) in commercial sciences, the forebearer of the modern MBA. In 1881 the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Paris founded École des Hautes Études Commerciales (HEC) as one of the first business schools in France. In 1898 the University of St. Gallen was also founded as one of the first business schools in Europe. As the US MBA model emerged at the turn of the 20th century, Europeans developed centres of excellence in business, such as at the universities of London and Manchester. Elsewhere in Europe, companies started management programs, such as Cass Business School, London, IMD, Instituto de Empresa, INSEAD, Henley Management College and Ashridge to provide management training for promising employees. In 1968, the Asian Institute of Management was founded. In 1969, HEC started the HEC MBA Program. However, unless otherwise specified as Mini MBA program leading to an award and formal alumni status, quality of open-executive programs are not comparable with a formal MBA degree. In the United States, by one estimate, the average cost of earning an MBA via an accredited full-time program (excluding room and board) rose from $124,000 in 1993 to $162,000 in 2001 (see Davies and Cline, 2005). The bulk of the cost is in the form of foregone earnings ($109,000 in 1993 and $139,000 in 2001). Accounting for the decrease in expected unemployment as well as the increase in expected wages and expected wage growth, the financial benefits to holding an MBA degree are the equivalent of an 18% rate of return on the cost of the degree (see Davies and Cline, 2005).

Executive MBA

Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA) programs were first established for senior executives by the University of Chicago in 1943 and are now offered by many school worldwide. An EMBA is essentially a part-time MBA, but the average student profile is slightly different. These programmes are aimed at experienced executives who prefer not to take a career break to take a full-time MBA and typically require significant business experience to gain admission. Unlike their counterparts on full-time MBA programmes, EMBA students are able to implement and practice what they learn in the classroom in their job as they learn and there are greater opportunities to learn from classmates. These programmes may serve as finishing schools for upwardly mobile executives, or as catch-up educational opportunities for technical executives who lack business expertise.

Admissions criteria

Programs usually base admissions on the GMAT test, significant work experience, academic transcripts, essays, references, and personal interviews. Schools are also interested in extracurricular activities and community service activities. The latter is more important for what are considered top-tier full-time MBA programs.

Program content

Breadth

MBA programs expose students to a variety of subjects, including economics, organizational behaviour, marketing, accounting, finance, strategy, international business, information technology management, and government policy. In the traditional US MBA model, students study a wide breadth of courses in the program's first year, then pursue specialization in the second year. In other parts of the world programmes can last for longer or shorter periods. Typically in Europe the duration is between 2-3 years.

Specialization

Many programs allow students to specialize in a particular area, such as organizational behaviour, marketing, accounting, finance, technology management, strategy or international business. Unspecialized MBA programs often focus second-year studies on strategy.

MBAs in Academic advancement

MBAs from universities evaluated by United States National Research Council (USNRC) may equip future scholars and professors. Such MBA category is a milestone for both professional and academic career advancement. Refer to faculty directories of such schools and USNRC ratings.

MBAs in Management consulting

Business schools and leading media announced on regular basis recruitment of MBAs by leading management consulting firms.

International MBA Programs

Today, MBA/DBA designations can be found anywhere and even accessed through on-line, distance learning or e-learning, such as that offered by the Open University Business School of the UK which has students world-wide. Because of the varying standards of MBAs worldwide, many of the elite business schools are accredited by independent bodies, such as the Association of MBAs and the European Foundation for Management Development.

France

France has initiated one-year MBA programs, with INSEAD MBA pioneering this formula in 1959. Most of the Grandes Ecoles also offer respected MBA programs, including ESSEC, HEC, EM-Lyon and EDHEC. University-based French business schools have created since then (mostly in the 1990s) their own 12 to 24-month MBA programs, but with a much lower emphasis on internationalization and diversity.

UK

MBA programs in the UK differ from those in the United States, in that students typically have significantly more work and managerial experience than their American counterparts. Because of this, many full-time MBA programmes in the UK typically last one academic year (as compared with two academic years in the United States, and at older UK MBA programs, such as those at London Business School and Nottingham Business School). The UK Government announced in its April 2004 budget that persons holding an MBA degree from the world's top fifty business schools will be entitled to work in the UK for one year. After this year has elapsed, they are likely to qualify for the UK's Highly Skilled Migrant Programme. This, in effect, means that an MBA from one of the top schools is a ticket to UK residency status. New business schools at Saïd Business School (Oxford) and Judge Business School (Cambridge) joined the London Business School and other UK BAs in the Financial Times league table in 2000, an indication that the MBA degree is proving to be as widely accepted and successful in Europe as in the USA.

External accreditation

Business schools and MBA courses may be accredited by external bodies which provide students and employers with an independent view of their quality. Acceditation may be provided by
- The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) - mostly USA schools
- EQUIS (European Quality Improvement System) - mostly European schools
- Association of MBAs (AMBA) - mostly non-USA schools

See also


- Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA), a bachelor degree in business administration
- Doctor of Business Administration (DBA), a doctorate in business administration
- Business schools, for lists of business schools across the globe

External links


- [http://www.economist.com/globalExecutive/education/mba/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2135907 MBA History from The Economist]
- [http://www.mba.com Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC)]
- Davies, A. and T. Cline, 2005. [http://www.aacsb.edu/publications/archives/JanFeb05/p42-45.pdf The ROI on the MBA], BizEd. Business Administration, Master category:Business ja:MBA

Business management

:Manager redirects to here. For use in sports, see coach (sport). :Enterprise management redirects to here. For use in computer networks, see Network management or Systems management "Management" (from Old French ménagement "the art of conducting, directing", from Latin manu agere "to lead by the hand") characterises the process of leading and directing all or part of an organization, often a business, through the deployment and manipulation of resources (human, financial, material, intellectual or intangible). Early twentieth-century management writer Mary Parker Follett defined management as "the art of getting things done through people." One can also think of management functionally, as the action of measuring a quantity on a regular basis and of adjusting some initial plan, and as the actions taken to reach one's intended goal. This applies even in situations where planning does not take place. From this perspective, there are five management functions: Planning, Organizing, Leading, Co-ordinating and Controlling. Management is also called "Business Administration", and schools that teach management are usually called "Business Schools". The term "management" may also be used to describe the slate of managers of an organization, for example of a corporation. A governing body is a term used to describe a group formed to manage an organization, such as a sports league.

Historical development

Some writers trace the development of management thought back to Sumerian traders and ancient Egyptian pyramid builders. Slave-owners through the centuries faced the problems of exploiting/motivating a dependent but sometimes recalcitrant workforce, but many pre-industrial enterprises, given their small scale, did not feel compelled to face the issues of management systematically. But innovations such as the spread of Hindu-Arabic numerals (5th to 15th centuries) and the codification of double-entry book-keeping (1494) provided tools for management assessment, planning and control.

19th century

Modern management as a discipline began as an off-shoot of economics in the 19th century. Classical economists such as Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill provided a theoretical background to resource allocation, production, and pricing issues. About the same time, innovators like Eli Whitney, James Watt, and Matthew Boulton developed technical production elements such as standardization, quality control procedures, cost accounting, interchangeability of parts, and work planning. By the middle of the 19th century, Robert Owen, Henry Poor, and M. Laughlin and others introduced the human element with theories of worker training, motivation, organizational structure and span of control. Compare the analyses of Karl Marx and of Friedrich Engels. By the late 19th century, marginal economists Alfred Marshall and Leon Walras and others introduced a new layer of complexity to the theoretical underpinings of management. Joseph Wharton offered the first tertiary-level course in management in 1881.

20th century

By about 1900 we find managers trying to place their theories on a thoroughly scientific basis. Examples include Henry Towne's Science of management in the 1890s, Frederick Winslow Taylor's Scientific management (1911), Frank and Lillian Gilbreth's Applied motion study (1917), and Henry L. Gantt's charts (1910s). J. Duncan wrote the first college management text book in 1911. The first comprehensive theories of management appeared around 1920. People like Henri Fayol and Alexander Church described the various branches of management and their inter-relationships. In the early 20th century, people like Ordwat Tead, Walter Scott and J. Mooney applied the principles of psychology to management, while other writers, such as Elton Mayo, Mary Parker Follett, Chester Barnard, Max Weber, Rensis Likert, and Chris Argyris approached the phenomenon of management from a sociological perspective. Peter Drucker wrote one of the earliest books on applied management: Concept of the Corporation (published in 1946). It resulted from Alfred Sloan (chairman of General Motors until 1956) commissioning a study of the organisation. Drucker has gone on to write 32 books, many in the same vein. H. Dodge, Ronald Fisher, and Thorton C. Fry introduced statistical techniques into management. In the 1940s, Patrick Blackett combined these statistical theories with microeconomic theory and gave birth to the science of operations research. Operations research, sometimes known as "management science", attempts to take a scientific approach to solving management problems, particularly in the areas of logistics and operations. Some of the more recent developments include the theory of constraints, Management by objectives, reengineering, and various information technology driven theories such as agile software development. As the general recognition of managers as a class solidified during the 20th century and gave perceived practitioners of management a certain amount of prestige, so the way opened for popularised systems of management ideas to peddle their wares. In this context many management fads may have had more to do with pop psychology than with scientific management theory. Towards the end of the 20th century, business management came to consist of six separate branches, namely:
- Human resource management
- Operations management or production management
- Strategic management
- Marketing management
- Financial management
- Information Technology management

21st century

In the 21st century we find it increasingly difficult to subdivide management into functional categories in this way. More and more processes simultaneously involve several categories. Instead, we tend to think in terms of the various processes, tasks, and objects subject to management. A list of some of the areas of management can be found later in this article. It is also the case that many of the assumptions made by management have been under attack from business ethics, critical management studies, and anti-corporate activism. One consequence is that workplace democracy has become both more common, and more advocated, in some places distributing all management functions among the workers, each of whom takes on a portion of the work. However, these models predate any current political issue, and may be more natural than command hierarchy. All management is to some degree democratic in that there must be majority support of workers for the management in the long term, or they leave to find other work, or go on strike. Hence management is becoming less about command-and-control, and more about facilitation and support of collaborative activity, utilizing principles such as those of human interaction management to deal with the complexities of human interaction.

Nature of the work

In for-profit work, the primary function of management is satisfy a range of stakeholders. This typically involves making a profit (for the shareholders), creating valued products at a reasonable cost (for customers), and providing rewarding employment opportunities (for employees). In nonprofit work it is also important to keep the faith of donors. In most models of management, shareholders vote for the board of directors, and that board then hires senior management. Some organizations are experimenting with other methods of selecting or reviewing managers senior managers (such as employee voting models) but this is very rare. In the public sector of countries constituted as representative democracies, politicians are elected to public office. They hire many managers and administrators, and in some countries like the United States a great many people lose jobs during a regime change. 2500 people serve "at the pleasure of the President" including all the top US government executives. Public, private and voluntary sectors place different demands on managers, but all must retain the faith of those who select them (if they wish to retain their jobs), retain the faith of those people that fund the organization, and retain the faith of those who work for the organization. If they fail to convince employees that they are better off staying than leaving, the organization will be forced into a downward spiral of hiring, training, firing, and recruiting. Management also has a responsibility to innovate and improve the functioning of the organization. In all but the smallest organizations, achieving these objectives involves a division of management labour. People specialize in a limited range of functions so as to more quickly gain competence and expertice. Even in employee managed workplaces such as a Wobbly Shop, where managers are elected, or where latitude of action is sharply restricted by collective bargaining or unions, managers still take on roughly the same functions and job descriptions as in a more traditional command hierarchy. Chief executive officer (CEO) - The CEO is ultimately responsible for the success or failure of the business. He or she provides overall strategic direction for the firm, often with the assistance of a team of vice presidents. Strategic management decisions like what products to market, what market segments to target, what functions to outsource, what business model to employ, and what geographical areas to operate in are the responsibility of the CEO. The CEO is accountable to the board of directors. Typically a CEO will delegate many responsibilities to one or more executive vice presidents. In small firms, the owner, president, or chief executive officer typically assume many roles and responsibilities. Vice president, Marketing - An executive vice president of marketing might direct overall marketing strategies, advertising, promotions, sales, product management, pricing, and public relations policies. The direct reports of the EVP oversee advertising and promotion. In a small firm, they may serve as a liaison between the firm and the advertising or promotion agency to which many advertising or promotional functions are contracted out. In larger firms, advertising managers oversee in-house account, creative, and media services departments. Marketing managers - Marketing managers develop the firm's detailed marketing plans and procedures. With the help of subordinates, including product development managers and market research managers, they determine the demand for products and services offered by the firm and its competitors. In addition, they identify potential markets—for example, business firms, wholesalers, retailers, government, or the general public. Marketing managers develop pricing strategy with an eye towards maximizing the firm's share of the market and its profits while ensuring that the customers are satisfied. In collaboration with sales, product development, and other managers, they monitor trends that indicate the need for new products and services and oversee product development. Marketing managers work with advertising and promotion managers to promote the firm's products and services and to attract potential users. Promotions managers - Promotions managers supervise sales promotion specialists. They direct promotion programs that combine advertising with purchase incentives to increase sales. In an effort to establish closer contact with purchasers—dealers, distributors, or consumers—promotion programs may involve direct mail, telemarketing, television or radio advertising, catalogs, exhibits, inserts in newspapers, Internet advertisements or Web sites, instore displays or product endorsements, and special events. Purchase incentives may include discounts, samples, gifts, rebates, coupons, sweepstakes, and contests. Public relations managers - Public relations managers supervise public relations specialists. These managers direct publicity programs to a targeted public. They often specialize in a specific area, such as crisis management or in a specific industry, such as healthcare. They use every available communication medium in their effort to maintain the support of the specific group upon whom their organizations success depends, such as consumers, stockholders, or the general public. For example, public relations managers may clarify or justify the firms point of view on health or environmental issues to community or special interest groups. They also evaluate advertising and promotion programs for compatibility with public relations efforts and serve as the eyes and ears of top management. They observe social, economic, and political trends that might ultimately affect the firm and make recommendations to enhance the firm's image based on those trends. They may also may confer with labor relations managers to produce internal company communications—such as newsletters about employee-management relations—and with financial managers to produce company reports. They assist company executives in drafting speeches, arranging interviews, and maintaining other forms of public contact; oversee company archives; and respond to information requests. In addition, some handle special events such as sponsorship of races, parties introducing new products, or other activities the firm supports in order to gain public attention through the press without advertising directly. Sales managers - Sales managers direct the firm's sales program. They assign sales territories, set goals, and establish training programs for the sales representatives. Managers advise the sales representatives on ways to improve their sales performance. In large, multiproduct firms, they oversee regional and local sales managers and their subordinates. Sales managers maintain contact with dealers and distributors. They analyze sales statistics gathered by their staffs to determine sales potential and inventory requirements and monitor the preferences of customers. Such information is vital to develop products and maximize profits. Account executive - The account executive manages the account services department, assesses the need for advertising, and, in advertising agencies, maintains the accounts of clients. Creative director - The creative services department develops the subject matter and presentation of advertising. The creative director oversees the copy chief, art director, and associated staff. Media director - The media director oversees planning groups that select the communication media—for example, radio, television, newspapers, magazines, Internet, or outdoor signs—to disseminate the advertising.

Areas of management


- Administrative management
- Association management
- Change management
- Communication management
- Constraint management
- Cost management
- Crisis management
- Customer relationship management
- Earned value management
- Enterprise management
- Facility management
- Human interaction management
- Integration management
- Knowledge management
- Land management
- Logistics management
- Marketing management
- Operations management
- Pain management
- Perception management
- Procurement management
- Program management
- Project management
- Process management
- Product management
- Quality management
- Resource management
- Risk management
- Skills management
- Spend management
- Stress management
- Supply chain management
- Systems management
- Talent management
- Time management

See also


- Adhocracy
- Administration
- Engineering management
- Management consulting
- Management development
- Management Technology
- Managing upwards
- Micromanagement
- Middle management
- Music management
- Poor management
- Senior management
- Strategic management
- Virtual management
- Peter Drucker's management by objectives
- Eliyahu M. Goldratt's theory of constraints
- Pointy Haired Boss —negative stereotypes of managers

Lists


- list of management topics
- list of marketing topics
- list of human resource management topics
- list of economics topics
- list of finance topics
- list of accounting topics
- list of information technology management topics
- list of production topics
- list of business law topics
- list of business ethics, political economy, and philosophy of business topics
- list of business theorists
- list of economists
- list of corporate leaders
- list of companies Category:Management occupations Category:Organizations ko:경영학 ja:マネジメント

Professional Master's degree

Professional Master's degrees are awarded by a university and require that a candidate already has been awarded a first degree, normally a bachelor's degree to matriculate into the program. The following detailed description applies to the United States and Canada, although the principles are similar in most other English-speaking countries. In England and Wales, bachelors degrees are normally completed in three years, so the timing is rather different. In countries that follow the German or French models of higher education, arrangements are very different: in German-speaking countries, for example, students do not take bachelor's degrees, and the Diplom, which takes a minimum of 4.5 years to achieve and is recognised as equivalent to a master's degree, may be either an academic or a professional qualification. Within the European Union, further standardisation of master's-level qualifications is to be expected in the near future, as a result of the Bologna process. There is an exception to the rule that a candidate must already hold a bachelor's degree in the case of so-called "5th year" professional master's degrees. Candidates in these programs apply to the relevant graduate program while in their junior/third year. They are admitted into the program their senior year, during which they not only complete the requirements for their bachelor's degree but begin taking courses for their professional master's degree program as well. The advantage such programs have for the candidates, is that they only require one extra, or "5th" year to attain a professional master's degree. Generally, most professional master's degree programs require two years of academic study. A second exception arises in relation to mid-career programs, aimed at professionals already working in the field. Such programs typically require one academic year of coursework. The common theme shared by all professional master's degrees is that the education provides a balance between theory and practical skills, so that graduates from these programs are capable of working in the respective fields. Most professional master's degrees are terminal in the sense that they are not generally used as an intermediate step to the doctorate degree in the field, though this is not always the case.

List of professional Master's degrees


- MArch - Master of Architecture
- MBA - Master of Business Administration
- MCA - Master of Computer Applications (India only)
- MDiv - Master of Divinity
- MEd - Master of Education
- MEng - Master of Engineering
- MFA - Master of Fine Arts
- MHA - Master of Health Administration
- MLA - Master of Landscape Architecture
- JD - Juris Doctor
- MMus - Master of Music
- MLIS - Master in Library and Information Science
- MPA - Master of Public Administration/Master of Public Affairs
- MPH - Master of Public Health
- MPP - Master of Public Policy
- MPS - Master of Professional Studies
- MSIT - Master of Science in Information Technology
- MSW - Master of Social Work
- MUP - Master of Urban Planning Category:Master's degrees

Doctor of Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy, or Ph.D. (an abbreviation for the Latin "Philosophiæ Doctor"; or alternatively Doctor philosophiæ, D.Phil.), was originally a degree granted by a university to a learned individual who had achieved the approval of his peers and who had demonstrated a long and productive career in the field of philosophy. The appellation of "Doctor" (from Latin: teacher) was usually awarded only when the individual was in middle age. It indicated a life dedicated to learning, to knowledge, and to the spread of knowledge. The degree was popularised in the 19th century at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin as a degree to be granted to someone who had undertaken original research in the sciences or humanities. From here it spread to the U.S., arriving at Yale University in 1861, and then to the UK in 1921. This displaced the existing Doctor of Philosophy degree in some Universities; for instance, the D.Phil. (higher doctorate in the faculty of philosophy) at the University of St Andrews was discontinued and replaced with the Ph.D. (research doctorate). However some UK universities such as Oxford and Sussex retain the D.Phil. appellation for their research degrees. Some ability to carry out original research must be documented by producing a dissertation or thesis of book length. The degree is often a prerequisite for permanent employment as a university lecturer or as a researcher in some sciences, though this varies on a regional basis. In others such as engineering or geology, a doctoral degree is considered desirable but not essential for employment.

Time

The successful completion of a doctoral program typically takes 3 to 7.5 years depending upon the specific field of study, prior experience and/or training, and the progress made by the doctoral candidate in his or her studies. In some fields such as some specific branches of physics, a doctoral degree is practically essential for employment. In some sciences, a newly-graduated doctoral student is unlikely to find work as a tenure-track professor and must undertake one or a series of postdoctorate positions. The predicted age of the student upon graduation is also considered before admission to a PhD program in the US in many universities in conjunction with the assumption of the time needed to finish the PhD. It is rare for students to be admitted to a PhD program in engineering, mathematics, or in the sciences in the US, if they will be 42 years of age or older upon graduation. The average length of time needed by many engineering students is 6 to 7.5 years in many US colleges within major universities. The thought is that graduates older than 42 years upon graduation will not produce the body of work over their lifetime to be worth the time and effort within the university to justify the student's admission to the PhD program.

Assessment

The doctoral candidate's progress is usually overseen by a thesis advisor, or supervisor, who chairs a thesis committee which supervises the doctoral candidate. In the US, doctoral programs typically require a series of required and optional courses at the beginning of the program, but education in the latter portion of the program tends to consist of informal discussions with the thesis advisor and individual research by the student. Many US universities separate the program into two portions (doctoral student and doctoral candidate) with a required doctoral examination before allowing a student to be formally admitted to a doctoral program. Alternatively, a student may be admitted to the program, but is still required to complete a comprehensive examination on his or her field before progressing to the dissertation state (see the discussion of ABD, below).

Funding

The funding of students varies from field to field, and many graduate students in the sciences and engineering work as teaching assistants or research assistants while they are doctoral students. In Australia, PhD students are quite often offered a scholarship to study their PhD. The most common of these is the Australian Postgraduate Award (APA) scholarship, which provides a living stipend to students of approximately AUD$19,000 a year (tax free). Most universities also offer a similar scholarship that matches the APA amount, but is funded by the university. In recent years, with the tightening of research funding in Australia, these scholarships have become increasingly harder to obtain. In addition to the more common APA and University scholarships, Australian students also have other sources of funding in their PhD. These could include, but are not limited to, scholarships offered by schools, research centres and commercial enterprise. For the latter, the amount is determined between the university and the organisation, but is quite often set at the APA (Industry) rate, roughly AUD$10,000 more than the usual APA rate.

Oral defense

In some countries, a Ph.D. candidate is required to present an oral defense of his thesis, known in the UK as a viva (short for viva voce, Latin for "by live voice") before a committee. In France, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland, before a degree can be granted, the dissertation has to be defended in what is, using a medieval term, called a disputation: an expert in the field, often from another university, is appointed who will present the dissertation, subject it to a critical examination and discuss it with the author. In the context of the disputation, the critical examiner is termed the opponent, and the author of the dissertation the respondent. The dissertation has to be generally available in its final or at least in a preliminary published form a few weeks before the disputation, which is open to the public; after the opponent is finished, anyone present is allowed to ask critical questions (anyone who does is called an "opponent ex auditorio"—an opponent from the auditorium). The final grade is decided after the disputation in a meeting between the opponent and a grading committee of three or (sometimes) four people. In theory, also the points raised by oppenenti ex auditorio affect the grade. It has happened, that such opponent has caused the committee not to pass the respondent, although this would be extremely extraordinary nowadays. In the United States a final oral defense before one's dissertation committee is required although it is rare that at this stage the thesis is not accepted. Nonetheless, there are typically several candidates per decade in each college of each major US university who somehow do fail to defend successfully. Most who fail do not complete the process at a subsequent defense. It is a largely unwritten rule in the US that unqualified candidates are eliminated during the coursework or dissertation research phases, and are never permitted to defend, hence the rarity of failing to pass the final defense in most cases. Minor edits are often (most times) required during the defense by committee members, and must be made prior to the final signing of the committee's recommendation paperwork by all committee members. At the end of the defense, the candidate is excused from the room, and the committee votes in secret whether to grant the degree. Upon successfully voting in the affirmative unanimously, the committee then calls the candidate back in to the room by addressing him or her using the honorific Dr. (with their last name) if successful, or Mr. or Ms. (with their last name) if unsuccessful. Technically, the candidate becomes a Doctor of Philosophy at the instant that all committee members vote in the affirmative. The rare case of not successfully defending is also true in the Netherlands, where the oral defense ("promotie") typically happens after the thesis has already been approved by examiners. The oral defense is ended after a preset amount of time by the University-appointed 'pedel' or custos who is in charge of the protocol and will end the dissertation with the words "Hora est!" (latin for it is time or the hour has come). In contrast, viva voces in British universities are by no means a rubber stamp. Whilst many (perhaps most) theses are passed with some minor corrections or revisions required by the examiners, very few are passed with no corrections whatsoever, and indeed a pass-without-correction is considered a particular honour. Moreover, it is not uncommon for British theses to be failed, as well — in which case, either major re-writes are required, followed by a new viva, or else the thesis may be awarded the lesser degree of M.Phil (Master of Philosophy) instead.

Comparative value

A Ph.D. does not confer commensurate advantage in every sphere. For example, many commercial organizations regard a professional Master's degree, such as an MBA, or professional designation, such as CPA, as the highest level of education that is desirable. It is not uncommon in engineering fields in the US for individuals to omit any mention of an earned Ph.D. in their resume when job hunting, to avoid the stigma of being considered all book learning bound, and unable to accomplish practical engineering tasks successfully. Traditional views of the value of academic study in commerce are changing but scepticism about the commercial value of a Ph.D. prevails. Medical schools may offer research Ph.D. degrees as part of their M.D. programs, although an M.D. by itself is frequently enough to teach medicine.

Criticism

The Ph.D. is often the topic of scholarly debate and criticism, given its almost exclusive concern with research and publication to the alleged neglect of numerous other faculty responsibilities that include teaching, collegial evaluation, collective and individual curricular planning, etc. Solutions have met with varying degrees of success. In the 1960s, the prestigious Carnegie Foundation helped promote and establish the Doctor of Arts degree as an alternative to the Ph.D. The D.A. degree, with its focus on content specialty, curriculum design, and pedagogy, was designed to help prepare expert teachers in various fields. Its well-defined disciplinary focus makes it different from the Ed.D. (Doctor of Education) while still embracing the Ed.D.'s concern for issues in education. The D.A. continues to be offered in many universities across the United States and in other countries, though a few D.A. programs have since been converted to the Ph.D. model. Still, the D.A. has many steadfast supporters. Other solutions include a re-thinking of the Ph.D. in order to address its perceived shortcomings.

Etymology

There are many other doctoral degrees with different designations, e.g. D.A. (Doctor of Arts), D.M.A. (Doctor of Musical Arts), Ed.D. (Doctor of Education), Th.D. (Doctor of Theology), etc. Johns Hopkins University was the first university in the United States to confer doctoral degrees. First Ph.D. in Business was granted by the University of Chicago in 1920s. In the United Kingdom, Ph.D.s are distinguishable from higher doctorates (such as D.Litt. (Doctor of Letters) or D.Sc. (Doctor of Science), which are issued by a committee on the basis of a long record of research and publication). In German speaking countries and most eastern European countries, the corresponding degree is simply called "Doctor" and is further distinguished by subject area with a Latin suffix (e.g. "Dr.med." - doctor medicinæ - which is not equal to a Ph.D., "Dr.rer.nat - doctor rerum naturalium (Doctor of Science), "Dr.phil." - doctor philosophiæ. For a full list of these titles, see the German entry for Doktor). While the Ph.D. is the most common doctoral degree, and even often (mis)understood to be synonymous with the term “doctorate,” the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) recognize numerous doctoral degrees as equivalent, and do not discriminate between them. Sometimes a university grants an honorary Ph.D. or D.A., or other doctoral degree, with the added designation of honoris causa (Latin for for the sake of honor), or Dr.h.c. In recent years, the term Ph.D. (ABD), an abbreviation for "All But Dissertation", has also come into usage. Seen primarily in the US where significant prerequisite coursework is often a part of the doctoral program, the Ph.D. (ABD) is not an official degree. As an unofficial designation, however, it serves to note when a Ph.D. student has completed all graduate coursework for the doctorate, has passed the cumulative and/or qualifying examinations, has been formally advanced to final candidacy and may have conducted original research, but has not submitted a dissertation to satisfy the final requirement for formal conferral of the Ph.D. degree. In some schools a student can write an additional thesis at this point and receive a Master of Philosophy (MPhil) degree; in others, the MPhil (sometimes Candidate in Philosophy, CPhil) is conferred on an ABD student who has been advanced to candicacy for the Ph.D., having completed all requirements except the doctoral thesis or dissertation.

See also


- Doctorate
- Bachelor's degree
- Academic degree
- Graduate student
- Piled Higher and Deeper, a webcomic which satirizes the life of graduate students earning a Ph.D.
- J.D.
- LL.D.
- D.A.
- DBA
- Ed.D.
- Master's degree
- MBA
- M.D.
- D.P.T
- Pharm.D.
- Psy.D.
- Eng.D.
- D.Sc
- EURODOC
- Dottorato di ricerca (Italian equivalent of Ph.D.)
- Dr. univ.

Bibliography


- Estelle M Phillips and Derek.S. Pugh How to Get a PhD: A Handbook for Students and Their Supervisors ISBN 033520550X,
- MacGillivray, Alex; Potts, Gareth; Raymond, Polly. Secrets of Their Success (London: New Economics Foundation, 2002) Philosophy, Doctor of ja:Ph.D.

United States

:For alternative meanings, see the disambiguation page for US, USA, United States, or American. The United States of America is a federal democratic republic situated primarily in central North America. It comprises 50 states and one federal district, and has several territories. It is also referred to, with varying formality, as the United States, the U.S., the U.S.A., the States, or simply and most commonly, America. The official founding date of the United States is July 4, 1776, when the Second Continental Congress—representing thirteen British colonies—adopted the Declaration of Independence. However, the structure of the government was profoundly changed in 1788, when the states replaced the Articles of Confederation with the United States Constitution. The date on which each of the fifty states adopted the Constitution is typically regarded as the date that state "entered the Union" (became part of the United States). Since the mid-20th century, following World War II, the United States has emerged as a dominant global influence in economic, political, military, scientific, technological, and cultural affairs.

Geography and climate

The United States shares land borders with Canada (to the north) and Mexico (to the south), and territorial water boundaries with Canada, Russia, the Bahamas, and numerous smaller nations. It is otherwise bounded by the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea, in the west; the Arctic Ocean, in the northernmost areas; and the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean Sea, in the eastern and southeastern areas. Forty-eight of the states are in the single region between Canada and Mexico; this group is referred to, with varying precision and formality, as the continental or contiguous United States, sometimes abbreviated CONUS, and as the Lower 48. Alaska, which is not included in the term contiguous United States, is at the northwestern end of North America, separated from the Lower 48 by Canada. The archipelago of Hawaii is in the Pacific Ocean. The capital city, Washington, District of Columbia is a federal district located on land donated by the state of Maryland. (Virginia also donated land, but it was returned in 1847.) The United States also has overseas territories with varying levels of independence and organization. When inland water is included in the total area, only Russia and Canada are larger than the United States; if inland water is excluded, China ranks third and the U.S. ranks fourth. The United States' total area is 3,718,711 square miles (9,631,418 km²), of which land makes up 3,537,438 square miles (9,161,923 km²) and water makes up 181,273 square miles (469,495 km²). The United States' landscape is one of the most varied among those of the world's nations: among its many features are temperate forestland and rolling hills, on the east coast; mangrove, in Florida; the Great Plains, in the center of the country; the Mississippi–Missouri river system; the Great Lakes, four of the five of which are shared with Canada; the Rocky Mountains, west of the Great Plains; deserts and temperate coastal zones, west of the Rocky Mountains; and temperate rain forests, in the Pacific northwest. Alaska's tundra, and the volcanic, tropical islands of Hawaii add to the geographic diversity. Hawaii The climate varies along with the landscape, from tropical in Hawaii and southern Florida to tundra in Alaska and atop some of the highest mountains. Most of the North and East experience a temperate continental climate, with warm summers and cold winters. Most of the South experiences a subtropical humid climate with mild winters and long, hot, humid summers. Rainfall decreases markedly from the humid forests of the Eastern Great Plains to the semi-arid shortgrass prairies on the high plains abutting the Rocky Mountains. Arid deserts, including the Mojave, extend through the lowlands and valleys of the southwest, from westernmost Texas to California and northward throughout much of Nevada. Some parts of California have a Mediterranean climate. Rainforests line the windward mountains of the Pacific Northwest from Oregon to Alaska.

History

American history started with the migration of people from Asia across the Bering land bridge approximately 12,000 years ago following large animals that they hunted into the Americas. These Native Americans left evidence of their presence in petroglyphs, burial mounds, and other artifacts. It is estimated that 2-9 million people lived in the territory now occupied by the U.S. before European contact, and the subsequent introduction of foreign diseases such as small pox that greatly diminished the native populations. Some advanced societies were the Anasazi of the southwest, who inhabited Chaco Canyon, and the Woodland Indians, who built Cahokia, located near present-day St Louis, a city with a population of 40,000 at its peak in AD 1200. Vikings first visited North America around 1000, but did not settle permanently. Following the discovery voyages of Christopher Columbus around 1492, other Europeans began to explore and settle there. During the 1500s and 1600s, the Spanish settled parts of the present-day Southwest and Florida, founding St. Augustine, Florida in 1565 and Santa Fe (in what is now New Mexico) in 1607. The first successful English settlement was at Jamestown, Virginia, also in 1607. Within the next two decades, several Dutch settlements, including New Amsterdam (the predecessor to New York City), were established in what are now the states of New York and New Jersey. In 1637, Sweden established a colony at Fort Christina (in what is now Delaware), but lost the settlement to the Dutch in 1655. This was followed by extensive British settlement of the east coast. The British colonists remained relatively undisturbed by their home country until after the French and Indian War, when France ceded Canada and the Great Lakes region to Britain. Britain then imposed taxes on the 13 colonies, widely regarded by the colonists as unfair because they were denied representation in the British Parliament. Tensions between Britain and the colonists increased, and the thirteen colonies eventually rebelled against British rule. British Parliament, George Washington (1789-1797).]] In 1776, the 13 colonies split from Great Britain and formed the United States, the world's first constitutional and democratic federal republic, after their Declaration of Independence of that year, and the Revolutionary War (1775 to 1783). The original political structure was a confederation in 1777, ratified in 1781 as the Articles of Confederation. After long debate, this was supplanted by the Constitution in 1789, forming a more centralized federal government. Prior to all these was the Albany Congress in 1754, in which a union was first seriously proposed. From early colonial times, there was a shortage of labor, which encouraged unfree labor, particularly indentured servitude and slavery. In the mid-19th century, a major division occurred in the United States over the issue of states' rights and the expansion of slavery. The northern states had become opposed to slavery, while the southern states saw it as necessary for the continued success of southern agriculture and wanted it expanded to the territories. Several federal laws were passed in an attempt to settle the dispute, including the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850. The dispute reached a crisis in 1861, when seven southern states seceded1 from the Union and formed the Confederate States of America, leading to the Civil War. Soon after the war began, four more southern states seceded. During the war, Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, mandating the freedom of all slaves in states in rebellion, though full emancipation did not take place until after the end of the war in 1865, the dissolution of the Confederacy, and the Thirteenth Amendment took effect. The Civil War effectively ended the question of a state's right to secede, and is widely accepted as a major turning point after which the federal government became more powerful than state governments. Thirteenth Amendment). The title of the painting, from a 1726 poem by Bishop Berkeley, was a phrase often quoted in the era of Manifest Destiny, expressing a widely held belief that civilization had steadily moved westward throughout history. [http://americanart.si.edu/t2go/1lw/1931.6.1.html (more)] ]] During the 19th century, many new states were added to the original 13 as the nation expanded across the continent. Manifest Destiny was a philosophy that encouraged westward expansion in the United States. As the population of the Eastern states grew and as a steady increase of immigrants entered the country, settlers moved steadily westward across North America. In the process, the U.S. displaced most American Indian nations. This displacement of American Indians continues to be a matter of contention in the U.S. with many tribes attempting to assert their original claims to various lands. In some areas American Indian populations were reduced by foreign diseases contracted through contact with European settlers, and US settlers acquired those emptied lands. In other instances American Indians were removed from their traditional lands by force. Though some would say the U.S. was not a colonial power until the Spanish-American War when it acquired Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines, the dominion exercised over land in North America the United States claimed is essentially colonial. The Philippines became independent in 1946. During this period, the nation also became an industrial power. This continued into the 20th century, which has been termed "the American Century" because of the nation's overriding influence on the world. The US became a center for innovation and technological development; major technologies that America either developed or was greatly involved in improving include the telephone, television, computer, the Internet, nuclear weapons, nuclear power, aviation, and aeronautics. In addition to the Civil War, another major traumatic experience for the nation was the Great Depression (1929 to 1939). The nation has also taken part in several major foreign wars, including World War I and World War II (in both of which the US later joined the Allies). During the Cold War, the US was a major player in the Korean War and Vietnam War, and, along with the Soviet Union, was considered one of the world's two "superpowers". With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US emerged as the world's leading economic and military power. Beginning in the 1990s, the United States became very involved in police actions and peacekeeping, including actions in Kosovo, Haiti, Somalia and Liberia, and the first Persian Gulf War driving Iraq out of Kuwait. After attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, the United States and other allied nations found themselves involved in what has come to be called the "War on Terrorism," which has primarily encompassed military actions in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

Government

Iraq of the United States.]]

Republic and suffrage

The United States is an example of a constitutional republic, with a government composed of and operating through a set of limited powers imposed by its design and enumerated in the United States Constitution. Specifically, the nation operates as a presidential democracy. There are three levels of government: federal, state, and local. Officials of each of these levels are either elected by eligible voters via secret ballot or appointed by other elected officials. Americans enjoy almost universal suffrage from the age of 18 regardless of race, sex, or wealth. There are some limits, however: felons are disenfranchised and in some states former felons are likewise. Furthermore, the national representation of territories and the federal district of Washington, DC in Congress is limited: residents of the District of Columbia are subject to federal laws and federal taxes but their only Congressional representative is a non-voting delegate.

Federal government

The federal government is the national government, comprising the Legislative Branch (led by Congress), the Executive Branch (led by the President), and the Judicial Branch (led by the Supreme Court). These three branches were designed to apply checks and balances on each other. The Constitution limits the powers of the federal government to defense, foreign affairs, the issuing and management of currency, the management of trade and relations between the states, and the protection of human rights. In addition to these explicitly stated powers, the federal government—with the assistance of the Supreme Court—has gradually extended these powers into such areas as welfare and education, on the basis of the "necessary and proper" clause of the Constitution.

The Congress

necessary and proper The Congress of the United States is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, comprising the House of Representatives and the Senate. The House of Representatives consists of 435 members, each of whom represents a congressional district and serves for a two-year term. House seats are apportioned among the states by population; in contrast, each state has two Senators, regardless of population. There are a total of 100 senators, who serve six-year terms. The powers of Congress are limited to those enumerated in the Constitution; all other powers are reserved to the states and the people. The Constitution also includes the necessary-and-proper clause, which grants Congress the power to "make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers."

The President

necessary-and-proper clause At the top level of the executive branch is the President of the United States. The President and Vice-President are elected as 'running mates' for four-year terms by the Electoral College, for which each state, as well as the District of Columbia, is allocated a number of seats based on its representation (or ostensible representation, in the case of D. C.) in both houses of Congress (see U.S. Electoral College). The relationship between the President and the Congress reflects that between the English monarchy and parliament at the time of the framing of the United States Constitution. Congress can legislate to constrain the President's executive power, even with respect to his or her command of the armed forces; however, this power is used only very rarely—a notable example was the constraint placed on President Richard Nixon's strategy of bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam War. The President cannot directly propose legislation, and must rely on supporters in Congress to promote his or her legislative agenda. The President's signature is required to turn congressional bills into law; in this respect, the President has the power—only occasionally used—to veto congressional legislation. Congress can override a presidential veto with a two-thirds majority vote in both houses. The ultimate power of Congress over the President is that of impeachment or removal of the elected President through a House vote, a Senate trial, and a Senate vote. The threat of using this power has had major political ramifications in the cases of Presidents Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton. The President makes around 2,000 executive appointments, including members of the Cabinet and ambassadors, which must be approved by the Senate; the President can also issue executive orders and pardons, and has other Constitutional duties, among them the requirement to give a State of the Union address to Congress once a year. Although the President's constitutional role may appear to be constrained, in practice, the office carries enormous prestige that typically eclipses the power of Congress: the Presidency has justifiably been referred to as 'the most powerful office in the world'. The Vice President is first in the line of succession, and is the President of the Senate ex officio, with the ability to cast a tie-breaking vote. The members of the President's Cabinet are responsible for administering the various departments of state, including the Department of Defense, the Justice Department, and the State Department. These departments and department heads have considerable regulatory and political power, and it is they who are responsible for executing federal laws and regulations. George W. Bush is the 43rd President, currently serving his second term.

The Courts

George W. Bush The highest court is the Supreme Court, which consists of nine justices. The court deals with federal and constitutional matters, and can declare legislation made at any level of the government as unconstitutional, nullifying the law and creating precedent for future law and decisions. Below the Supreme Court are the courts of appeals, and below them in turn are the district courts, which are the general trial courts for federal law. Separate from, but not entirely independent of, this federal court system are the individual court systems of each state, each dealing with its own laws and having its own judicial rules and procedures. A case may be appealed from a state court to a federal court only if there is a federal question; the supreme court of each state is the final authority on the interpretation of that state's laws and constitution.

State and local governments

supreme court of each state. Note that Alaska and Hawaii are shown at different scales, and that the Aleutian Islands and the uninhabited Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are omitted from this map.]] The state governments have the greatest influence over people's daily lives. Each state has its own written constitution and has different laws. There are sometimes great differences in law and procedure between the different states, concerning issues such as property, crime, health, and education. The highest elected official of each state is the Governor. Each state also has an elected legislature (bicameral in every state except Nebraska), whose members represent the different parts of the state. Of note is the New Hampshire legislature, which is the third-largest legislative body in the English-speaking world, and has one representative for every 3,000 people. Each state maintains its own judiciary, with the lowest level typically being county courts, and culminating in each state supreme court, though sometimes named differently. In some states, supreme and lower court justices are elected by the people; in others, they are appointed, as they are in the federal system. The institutions that are responsible for local government are typically town, city, or county boards, making laws that affect their particular area. These laws concern issues such as traffic, the sale of alcohol, and keeping animals. The highest elected official of a town or city is usually the mayor. In New England, towns operate directly democratically, and in some states, such as Rhode Island and Connecticut, counties have little or no power, existing only as geographic distinctions. In other areas, county governments have more power, such as to collect taxes and maintain law enforcement agencies.

Political divisions

With the Declaration of Independence, the thirteen colonies proclaimed themselves to be nation states modeled after the European states of the time. Although considered as sovereigns initially, under the Articles of Confederation of 1781 they entered into a "Perpetual Union" and created a fully sovereign federal state, delegating certain powers to the national Congress, including the right to engage in diplomatic relations and to levy war, while each retaining their individual sovereignty, freedom and independence. But the national government proved too ineffective, so the administrative structure of the government was vastly reorganized with the United States Constitution of 1789. Under this new union, the continued status of the individual states as sovereign nation states fell into dispute in 1861, as several states attempted to secede from the union; in response, then-President Abraham Lincoln claimed that such secession was illegal, and the result was the American Civil War. Since the Union victory in 1865, the independent status of the individual states has not been broached again by any state, and the status of each state within the union has been deemed by mainstream officials and academics to be settled as being subordinate to the union as a whole. In subsequent years, the number of states grew steadily due to western expansion, the purchase of lands by the national government from other nation states, and the subdivision of existing states, resulting in the current total of 50. The states are generally divided into smaller administrative regions, including counties, cities and townships. The United States–Canadian border is the longest undefended political boundary in the world. The U.S. is divided into three distinct sections:
- the "continental United States," also known as "the Lower 48" and more accurately termed the conterminous, coterminous or contiguous United States
- Alaska, which is physically connected only to Canada
- the archipelago of Hawaii, in the central Pacific Ocean. The United States also holds several other territories, districts, and possessions, notably the federal district of the District of Columbia, which is the nation's capital, and several overseas insular areas, the most significant of which are American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the United States Virgin Islands. The Palmyra Atoll is the United States' only incorporated territory; it is unorganized and uninhabited. The United States Navy has held a base at a portion of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since 1898. The United States government possesses a lease to this land, which only mutual agreement or United States abandonment of the area can terminate. The present Cuban government of Fidel Castro disputes this arrangement, claiming Cuba was not truly sovereign at the time of the signing. The United States argues this point moot because Cuba apparently ratified the lease post-revolution, and with full sovereignty, when it cashed one rent check in accordance with the disputed treaty.

Foreign relations and military

sovereign] The immense military and economic dominance of the United States has made foreign relations an especially important topic in its politics, with considerable concern about the image of the United States throughout the world. Reactions towards the United States by other nationalities are often strong, ranging from uninhibited admiration and mimicking of all things American to anti-Americanism. US foreign policy has swung about several times over the course of its history between the poles of strict isolationism and imperialism and everywhere in between. Three of the nation's four military branches are administered by the Department of Defense: the Army, the Navy (including the Marine Corps), and the Air Force. The Coast Guard falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security in peacetime, but is placed under the Department of the Navy in time of war. The combined United States armed forces consist of 1.4 million active duty personnel, along with several hundred thousand each in the Reserves and the National Guard. Military conscription ended in 1973. The United States Armed forces are considered to be the most powerful military (of any sort) on Earth and their force projection capabilities are unrivaled by any other nation. The 2005 defense budget amounted to $401.7 billion, which is an increase of 4% over 2004 and of 35% since 2001. Over 50% of that number is spent in research & development. (For comparison, in 2004 the European Union (considered as the second-largest military force) had a combined total of 1.6 million troops, and a defense budget of €160 billion, with less than 10% of that being spent on R&D.)

Largest cities

The United States has dozens of major cities, including 11 of the 55 global cities of all types — with three "alpha" global cities: New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago. The figures expressed below are for populations within city limits. A different ranking is evident when considering U.S. metro area populations, although the top three would be unchanged. Note that some cities not listed (such as Atlanta, Boston, Las Vegas, Miami, Nashville, New Orleans, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.) are still considered important on the basis of other factors and issues, including culture, economics, heritage, and politics. The twenty largest cities, based on the United States Census Bureau's 2004 estimates, are as follows:

Economy

The United States has the largest single-country economy in the world, with a per-capita gross domestic product of $40,100. In this market-oriented economy, private individuals and business firms make most of the decisions, and the federal and state governments buy needed goods and services predominantly in the private marketplace. gross domestic product The largest industry of the U.S. is now service, which employs roughly three quarters of the U.S. work force. The United States has many natural resources, including oil and gas, metals, and such minerals as gold, soda ash, and zinc. In agriculture, the U.S. is a top producer of, among other crops, corn, soy beans, and wheat; the United States is a net exporter of food. The U.S. manufacturing sector produces goods such as, cars, airplanes, steel, and electronics, among many others. Economic activity varies greatly from one part of the country to another, with many industries being largely dependent on a certain city or region; New York City is the center of the American financial, publishing, broadcasting, and advertising industries; Silicon Valley is the country’s primary location for high-technology companies, while Los Angeles is the most important center for film production. The Midwest is known for its reliance on manufacturing and heavy industry, with Detroit, Michigan, serving as the center of the American automotive industry; the Great Plains are known as the "breadbasket" of America for their tremendous agricultural output; the intermountain region serves as a mining hub and natural gas resource; the Pacific Northwest for fish and timber, while Texas is largely associated with the oil industry; the Southeast is a major hub for both medical research and the textiles industry. Several countries continue to link their currency to the dollar or even use it as a currency (such as Ecuador), although this practice has subsided since the collapse of the Bretton Woods system. Many markets are also quoted in dollars, such as those of oil and gold. The dollar is also the predominant reserve currency in the world, and more than half of global reserves are in dollars. The largest trading partner of the United States is Canada (19%), followed by China (12%), Mexico (11%), and Japan (8%). More than 50% of total trade is with these four countries. In 2003, the United States was ranked as the third most visited tourist destination in the world; its 40,400,000 visitors ranked behind France's 75,000,000 and Spain's 52,500,000. Labor unions have existed since the 19th century, and grew large and powerful from the 1930s to the 1950s. See Labor history of the United States. Since 1970 they have shrunk in the private sector and now cover fewer than 8% of the workers. However union membership has grown rapidly in the public sector, especially among teachers, nurses, police, postal workers, and municipal clerks. There have been few strikes in recent years. The United States' imports exceed exports by 80%, leading to an annual trade deficit of $700,000,000,000, or 6% of gross domestic product. It is the largest debtor nation in the world, with total gross foreign debt of over $13,000,000,000,000 (2005 estimate); and it absorbs more than 50% of global savings annually. Since the 1980s, the U.S. has increased the use of neoliberal economic policies that reduce government intervention and reduce the size of the welfare state, backing away from the more interventionist Keynsian economic policies that had been in favor since the Great Depression. As a result, the United States provides fewer government-delivered social welfare services than most industrialized nations, choosing instead to keep its tax burden lower and relying more heavily on the free market and private charities. Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages higher than the national level ($5.15 per-hour), including the highest, Washington State at $7.35. Twenty-six states are the same as the federal level; two--Ohio and Kansas--are below; and six do not have state laws. America's wealth is relatively highly concentrated. The average C.E.O. earns 500 times the typical amount a worker grosses, this is up from 25 times in the late 1970s. In terms of wealth the top 1% of Americans own 40% of all assets and 50.1% of the country's income goes to the top twenty percent of households. Average wages for the majority of employees have been largely stagnating since the 1970s. America's poverty line defined as a family of four earning less than $19,157 is at 12.7% of the general population. Approximately one out of every five children in the United States grows up below the official poverty line. Among racial groups; African Americans have the lowest median income while Asians had the highest. Regionally, the southern states had the lowest median incomes while the West Coast and New England had the highest. The current Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan remarked that the U.S.’s growing income inequality since the 1970s is, "not the type of thing which a democratic society - a capitalist democratic society - can really accept without addressing."[http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0614/p01s03-usec.html?s=itm] However, Greenspan also noted, "...you can look at the system and say it's got a lot of problems to it, and sure it does. It always has. But you can't get around the fact that this is the most extraordinarily successful economy in history."

Transportation

Alan Greenspan ]] Because the United States is a relatively young nation, most of the development of U.S. cities has taken place since the invention of the automobile. To link its vast territory, the United States built a network of high-capacity, high-speed highways, of which the most important element is the Interstate Highway system, commissioned in the 1950s by President Dwight D. Eisenhower and modeled after the German Autobahn. The United States also has a transcontinental rail system, which is used for moving freight across the lower forty-eight states. Passenger rail service is provided by Amtrak, which serves forty-six of the lower forty-eight states. Many cities in the United States have extensive mass-transit systems. New York City operates one of the world's largest and most heavily used subway systems. The regional rail and bus networks that extend into Long Island, New Jersey, Upstate New York, and Connecticut are among the most heavily used in the world. Air travel is often preferred for destinations over 300 miles (500 kilometers) away. In terms of passengers, seventeen of the world's thirty busiest airports in 2004 were in the U.S., including the world's busiest, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport; in terms of cargo, in the same year, twelve of the world's thirty busiest airports were in the U.S., including the world's busiest, Memphis International Airport. There are several major seaports in the United States; the three busiest are the Port of Los Angeles, California; the Port of Long Beach, California; and the Port of New York and New Jersey. Others include Houston, Texas; Charleston, South Carolina; Savannah, Georgia; Miami, Florida; Portland, Oregon; San Francisco, California; Boston, Massachusetts; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Seattle, Washington; plus, outside the contiguous forty-eight states, Anchorage, Alaska, and Honolulu, Hawaii.

Society

Demographics

Hawaii The mean center of the U.S. population continues to drift farther west and south. The fastest growing region is the western United States followed by the southern portion. According to Census 2000, the states that saw the greatest increases from 1990 were: Nevada (66.3%), Arizona (40%), Colorado (30.6%), Utah (29.6%), Idaho (28.5%), Georgia (26.4%), Florida (23.5%), Texas (22.8%), North Carolina (21.4%), and Washington (21.1%). [http://www.census.gov/population/cen2000/phc-t2/tab03.pdf]

Ethnicity and race

:Main article: Racial demographics of the United States The United States is a very racially diverse country. According to the 2000 census, it has 31 ethnic groups with at least one million members each, and numerous others represented in smaller amounts. The majority of Americans descend from white European immigrants who arrived at the establishment of the first colonies (most after Reconstruction). This majority--69.1% in 2000--decreases each year, and is expected to become a plurality within a few decades. The most frequently stated European ancestries are German (15.2%), Irish (10.8%), English (8.7%), Italian (5.6%) and Scandinavian (3.7%). Many immigrants also hail from Slavic countries such as Poland and Russia. Other significant immigrant populations came from eastern and southern Europe and French