Please review the following below and provide , one-page reaction to this budget proposal.

1. Budget

The President’s Budget and Health Care

While the president’s budget is not likely to be acted upon by Congress, it does signal what the administration’s priorities are—as well as what policy initiatives they might push.

Repeal the Affordable Care Act: The administration’s budget includes a plan that is based upon the plan put forward by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) last fall which relies on block grants for state-based programs. It also would have placed a per-person spending cap in Medicaid. The Graham-Cassidy plan was projected to save $215 billion in federal health spending over 10 years and would have led to 20 million fewer individuals’ having health insurance in 2026 than under the Affordable Care Act. The administration’s proposal creates deeper cuts for Medicaid by using the Consumer Price Index instead of the medical CPI for the block grants. In the president’s budget the result is a spending cut of $675 billion by 2028.  

Ironically, the proposed HHS budget would spend $812 million in fiscal 2019 to fully fund the risk corridors, which has drawn criticism from conservative members of Congress. Some believe that this proposal likely reflects the costs of exempting the program from sequestration.

Medicaid Cuts: The budget contains substantial Medicaid cuts including:

·         Deny benefits to people who cannot prove their immigration status ($2.2 billion in cuts over 10 years)

·         Increase beneficiaries’ copayments for improper use of the emergency room ($1.3 billion in cuts over 10 years)

·         Allow asset testing, which adds up all the value of a person’s property and belongings, in addition to income as a test of Medicaid eligibility ($2 billion in cuts over 10 years)

Overall, the budget reduces federal Medicaid spending by 22 percent.

Drug Prices and Federal Programs: The budget contains several proposals on lowering drug prices. Some have been proposed before. However, there are a few new proposals.

Medicaid programs would be allowed to establish drug formularies. Massachusetts has a waiver pending before CMS to establish a formulary. However, Congress would need to act to permit such a change.  

The budget proposes changes in Medicare Part D that include:

·         Create an out-of-pocket maximum; above a certain threshold, seniors would not have to pay any more of their drug costs

·         Require private Medicare Part D plans to share the rebates they receive from manufacturers with beneficiaries

·         Give Medicare Part D plans more flexibility to set their formularies, which should give them more negotiating leverage with drug makers

·         Allow for certain drugs to be moved from Medicare Part B, where there is a set formula for drug payments, to Medicare Part D, where there are some negotiations between private Part D plans and drug companies

·         Move drugs from Part B to Part D

·         Create more expansive Part D formularies

These proposals save approximately $6 billion.

There are an additional $266 billion in Medicare cuts proposed though they are largely cuts in provider payments rather than cuts in eligibility or benefits.  

The president’s budget also proposes $16 million in user fees to help the Health Resources and Services Administration administer the 340B drug discount program. The budget proposes to tie Part B payment for 340B drugs to charity care. Nonprofit hospitals and other facilities that purchase 340B drugs would pay the user fees under the proposal, which amount to 0.1 percent of each 340B drug purchase. User fees would more than double HRSA’s budget for the program.

Opioids: The budget provides $10 billion for efforts to prevent opioid abuse and expand treatment, however there is not much detail in the budget.

Reducing Key Parts of the Health Care Establishment: The budget would reduce the size of the Department of Health and Human Services and key programs, saying they are duplicative of other functions or programs of the government including:  

·         Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, which is tasked with evaluating best health care practices

·         Community Services Block Grant, $700 million in annual grants for health care, food and workforce programs

·         Health care workforce programs, which help train medical students and fund their education, etc.

FDA: Should the president’s budget increase for FDA get ratified, FDA would spend the extra $400 million on:

·         Creating Centers of Excellence for compounding and digital health,

·         Researching continuous manufacturing,

·         Standing up third-party certification of medical device quality,

·         Advancing near-real-time evaluation of real-world evidence,

·         Expanding the digital health precertification program,

·         Conducting natural history studies for rare disease, and

·         Creating new internal agency systems for knowledge management and generic drug submission.

2. Congress

House

Ways and Means Committee Holds Hearing on Budget  

On Feb. 14, HHS Secretary Alex Azar testified before the House Ways and Means Committee concerning the president’s budget. Democratic members of the committee attacked HHS Secretary Alex Azar for the administration’s nearly $2 trillion in proposed budget cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, while Republicans promoted increased funding to fight opioid addiction and cuts to regulations. The lawmakers also discussed predictive modeling, the ban on new doctor-owned hospitals, telehealth, durable medical equipment reimbursement, biosimilars and Idaho’s plan to allow exchange plans that violate federal insurance rules.

The hearing was Azar’s first appearance before Congress as HHS secretary.

The secretary also defended the administration’s proposal to use bids to determine pay rates for durable medical equipment in rural parts of the country. Rep. Adrian Smith (R-NE) said the proposal worries him and asked if CMS is prepared to sufficiently pay the higher cost of delivering medical equipment in rural areas. Azar promised to make the program work in rural areas and said he supports paying equipment suppliers what they bid, instead of paying the median price, which can cause problems when the median price is lower than prices that suppliers bid.

To view the hearing, click here.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee also held a hearing on Feb. 15 with Secretary Azaar as the sole witness.  

At the hearing HHS Secretary Alex Azar seemed to open the door to expanding federal gun violence research. Azar said that a provision passed two decades ago limiting the CDC’s work on gun violence only prevents it from taking an advocacy position—not from doing research.

The CDC’s ability to study gun violence has been limited by a 1996 amendment that prevented the agency from collecting data to advocate for gun control. President Barack Obama signed an order in 2013 directing the CDC to resume its research, but its work has remained limited.

“My understanding is that the rider does not in any way impede our ability to conduct our research mission,” he said. “We’re in the science business and the evidence-generating business, and so I will have our agency certainly working in this field, as they do across the broad spectrum of disease control and prevention.”

Azar committed to encouraging the study of gun violence within the department, when pressed by Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL).

To view the Energy and Commerce hearing, click here.

Senate

Azar Goes Before Senate Finance Hearing

Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on the president’s health care budget on Feb. 15. At the hearing—as in others—Azar was asked about the governor of Idaho’s permitting plans to be sold that are not compliant with the Affordable Care Act.

Secretary Alex Azar agreed to look into the legality of Idaho’s plan to significantly change the Affordable Care Act’s marketplace after Democratic lawmakers pushed the secretary on the issue. While Azar said he did not want to take enforcement action before officially receiving notice of Blue Cross of Idaho’s non-ACA compliant plans, he pledged to closely monitor the situation and report back to the Finance Committee in 30 days.

Azar’s comments came one day after he was questioned by Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI) about the issue at the Ways and Means budget hearing, and Azar signaled there has been little HHS oversight of the state’s policy, since the state had not made a request. But Democrats continued to press the question in the HHS budget hearings.

During the Senate Finance hearing, ranking Democrat Ron Wyden (OR) asked Azar if he would approve Blue Cross of Idaho’s recently announced (Feb. 14) five new state-based plan options in response to GOP Gov. Butch Otter’s controversial executive order. Wyden noted that numerous health care experts and organizations say this move would be a violation of federal law and puts the company at risk of federal penalties. He encouraged Azar to crack down on such activity and requested Azar to report back to the committee in 10 days with a plan.

Wyden and Azar eventually agreed to a 30-day time frame for the secretary to get back to the Finance Committee about his plans to deal with Idaho’s marketplaces. In contrast, Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo (R) defended Blue Cross Idaho’s move and the governor’s executive order, arguing that the plan deviations allowed for state autonomy and consumer choice.

Azar agreed with Crapo, noting that the rising cost of premiums has led states to explore all options.

“I think what we are seeing here is a cry for help,” Azar said. “It’s saying that where we are right now with our individual market because of the structure we have is not serving enough of our citizens. There are too many Americans who simply cannot afford the insurance packages we have in our program because of the way the statute is designed and the way it has been implemented.”

Finance and Judiciary Chairs Ask IRS About Oversight of Nonprofit Hospitals

On Feb. 15, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sent Acting IRS Commissioner David Kautter a letter today asking, among other things, how the IRS reviews information hospitals submit on their charitable giving and what guidance the IRS has given hospitals on their obligation to aid their communities. The senators cite reports from Politico to raise questions about whether the hospitals are fulfilling their requirements as a nonprofit.

“Given the importance of these institutions to their communities, and the forgone federal revenue associated with their tax-exempt status, it is important that both Congress and the IRS conduct oversight to ensure their activities are in line with the benefits they enjoy under the Internal Revenue Code,” the senators wrote.

These issues have been longstanding ones for Grassley who has since 2005 been reviewing the charitable giving of the nation’s nonprofit hospitals.

Please review the following below and provide a short, one-page reaction to this budget proposal.

1. Budget

The President’s Budget and Health Care

While the president’s budget is not likely to be acted upon by Congress, it does signal what the administration’s priorities are—as well as what policy initiatives they might push.

Repeal the Affordable Care Act: The administration’s budget includes a plan that is based upon the plan put forward by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Bill Cassidy (R-LA) last fall which relies on block grants for state-based programs. It also would have placed a per-person spending cap in Medicaid. The Graham-Cassidy plan was projected to save $215 billion in federal health spending over 10 years and would have led to 20 million fewer individuals’ having health insurance in 2026 than under the Affordable Care Act. The administration’s proposal creates deeper cuts for Medicaid by using the Consumer Price Index instead of the medical CPI for the block grants. In the president’s budget the result is a spending cut of $675 billion by 2028.  

Ironically, the proposed HHS budget would spend $812 million in fiscal 2019 to fully fund the risk corridors, which has drawn criticism from conservative members of Congress. Some believe that this proposal likely reflects the costs of exempting the program from sequestration.

Medicaid Cuts: The budget contains substantial Medicaid cuts including:

·         Deny benefits to people who cannot prove their immigration status ($2.2 billion in cuts over 10 years)

·         Increase beneficiaries’ copayments for improper use of the emergency room ($1.3 billion in cuts over 10 years)

·         Allow asset testing, which adds up all the value of a person’s property and belongings, in addition to income as a test of Medicaid eligibility ($2 billion in cuts over 10 years)

Overall, the budget reduces federal Medicaid spending by 22 percent.

Drug Prices and Federal Programs: The budget contains several proposals on lowering drug prices. Some have been proposed before. However, there are a few new proposals.

Medicaid programs would be allowed to establish drug formularies. Massachusetts has a waiver pending before CMS to establish a formulary. However, Congress would need to act to permit such a change.  

The budget proposes changes in Medicare Part D that include:

·         Create an out-of-pocket maximum; above a certain threshold, seniors would not have to pay any more of their drug costs

·         Require private Medicare Part D plans to share the rebates they receive from manufacturers with beneficiaries

·         Give Medicare Part D plans more flexibility to set their formularies, which should give them more negotiating leverage with drug makers

·         Allow for certain drugs to be moved from Medicare Part B, where there is a set formula for drug payments, to Medicare Part D, where there are some negotiations between private Part D plans and drug companies

·         Move drugs from Part B to Part D

·         Create more expansive Part D formularies

These proposals save approximately $6 billion.

There are an additional $266 billion in Medicare cuts proposed though they are largely cuts in provider payments rather than cuts in eligibility or benefits.  

The president’s budget also proposes $16 million in user fees to help the Health Resources and Services Administration administer the 340B drug discount program. The budget proposes to tie Part B payment for 340B drugs to charity care. Nonprofit hospitals and other facilities that purchase 340B drugs would pay the user fees under the proposal, which amount to 0.1 percent of each 340B drug purchase. User fees would more than double HRSA’s budget for the program.

Opioids: The budget provides $10 billion for efforts to prevent opioid abuse and expand treatment, however there is not much detail in the budget.

Reducing Key Parts of the Health Care Establishment: The budget would reduce the size of the Department of Health and Human Services and key programs, saying they are duplicative of other functions or programs of the government including:  

·         Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, which is tasked with evaluating best health care practices

·         Community Services Block Grant, $700 million in annual grants for health care, food and workforce programs

·         Health care workforce programs, which help train medical students and fund their education, etc.

FDA: Should the president’s budget increase for FDA get ratified, FDA would spend the extra $400 million on:

·         Creating Centers of Excellence for compounding and digital health,

·         Researching continuous manufacturing,

·         Standing up third-party certification of medical device quality,

·         Advancing near-real-time evaluation of real-world evidence,

·         Expanding the digital health precertification program,

·         Conducting natural history studies for rare disease, and

·         Creating new internal agency systems for knowledge management and generic drug submission.

2. Congress

House

Ways and Means Committee Holds Hearing on Budget  

On Feb. 14, HHS Secretary Alex Azar testified before the House Ways and Means Committee concerning the president’s budget. Democratic members of the committee attacked HHS Secretary Alex Azar for the administration’s nearly $2 trillion in proposed budget cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, while Republicans promoted increased funding to fight opioid addiction and cuts to regulations. The lawmakers also discussed predictive modeling, the ban on new doctor-owned hospitals, telehealth, durable medical equipment reimbursement, biosimilars and Idaho’s plan to allow exchange plans that violate federal insurance rules.

The hearing was Azar’s first appearance before Congress as HHS secretary.

The secretary also defended the administration’s proposal to use bids to determine pay rates for durable medical equipment in rural parts of the country. Rep. Adrian Smith (R-NE) said the proposal worries him and asked if CMS is prepared to sufficiently pay the higher cost of delivering medical equipment in rural areas. Azar promised to make the program work in rural areas and said he supports paying equipment suppliers what they bid, instead of paying the median price, which can cause problems when the median price is lower than prices that suppliers bid.

To view the hearing, click here.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee also held a hearing on Feb. 15 with Secretary Azaar as the sole witness.  

At the hearing HHS Secretary Alex Azar seemed to open the door to expanding federal gun violence research. Azar said that a provision passed two decades ago limiting the CDC’s work on gun violence only prevents it from taking an advocacy position—not from doing research.

The CDC’s ability to study gun violence has been limited by a 1996 amendment that prevented the agency from collecting data to advocate for gun control. President Barack Obama signed an order in 2013 directing the CDC to resume its research, but its work has remained limited.

“My understanding is that the rider does not in any way impede our ability to conduct our research mission,” he said. “We’re in the science business and the evidence-generating business, and so I will have our agency certainly working in this field, as they do across the broad spectrum of disease control and prevention.”

Azar committed to encouraging the study of gun violence within the department, when pressed by Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL).

To view the Energy and Commerce hearing, click here.

Senate

Azar Goes Before Senate Finance Hearing

Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on the president’s health care budget on Feb. 15. At the hearing—as in others—Azar was asked about the governor of Idaho’s permitting plans to be sold that are not compliant with the Affordable Care Act.

Secretary Alex Azar agreed to look into the legality of Idaho’s plan to significantly change the Affordable Care Act’s marketplace after Democratic lawmakers pushed the secretary on the issue. While Azar said he did not want to take enforcement action before officially receiving notice of Blue Cross of Idaho’s non-ACA compliant plans, he pledged to closely monitor the situation and report back to the Finance Committee in 30 days.

Azar’s comments came one day after he was questioned by Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI) about the issue at the Ways and Means budget hearing, and Azar signaled there has been little HHS oversight of the state’s policy, since the state had not made a request. But Democrats continued to press the question in the HHS budget hearings.

During the Senate Finance hearing, ranking Democrat Ron Wyden (OR) asked Azar if he would approve Blue Cross of Idaho’s recently announced (Feb. 14) five new state-based plan options in response to GOP Gov. Butch Otter’s controversial executive order. Wyden noted that numerous health care experts and organizations say this move would be a violation of federal law and puts the company at risk of federal penalties. He encouraged Azar to crack down on such activity and requested Azar to report back to the committee in 10 days with a plan.

Wyden and Azar eventually agreed to a 30-day time frame for the secretary to get back to the Finance Committee about his plans to deal with Idaho’s marketplaces. In contrast, Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo (R) defended Blue Cross Idaho’s move and the governor’s executive order, arguing that the plan deviations allowed for state autonomy and consumer choice.

Azar agreed with Crapo, noting that the rising cost of premiums has led states to explore all options.

“I think what we are seeing here is a cry for help,” Azar said. “It’s saying that where we are right now with our individual market because of the structure we have is not serving enough of our citizens. There are too many Americans who simply cannot afford the insurance packages we have in our program because of the way the statute is designed and the way it has been implemented.”

Finance and Judiciary Chairs Ask IRS About Oversight of Nonprofit Hospitals

On Feb. 15, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sent Acting IRS Commissioner David Kautter a letter today asking, among other things, how the IRS reviews information hospitals submit on their charitable giving and what guidance the IRS has given hospitals on their obligation to aid their communities. The senators cite reports from Politico to raise questions about whether the hospitals are fulfilling their requirements as a nonprofit.

“Given the importance of these institutions to their communities, and the forgone federal revenue associated with their tax-exempt status, it is important that both Congress and the IRS conduct oversight to ensure their activities are in line with the benefits they enjoy under the Internal Revenue Code,” the senators wrote.

These issues have been longstanding ones for Grassley who has since 2005 been reviewing the charitable giving of the nation’s nonprofit hospitals.

Try the following:

• get some stuff:
• • a small ball (or some kind of object that will roll - a golf ball or marble or toy car is great, but an empty soup can will do in a pinch)
  • get a tape measure (a yardstick or a ruler will also work. You can also stretch a piece of string and mark off ruler lengths on the string to get the total length.)
  • around ten coins
• Measure the distance from a tabletop or kitchen countertop down to the floor. Record the height in meters. (If you measured the height in inches then convert to meters by dividing the height by 39.36)
• Calculate the time it would take any object to fall from the edge of the tabletop to the floor. Use the y-direction displacement formula: y = v_yot + 1/2 a_y t² where
  • y = the height you measured DOWN to the ground
  • v_yo = the initial vertical velocity - should be zero since an object that rolls off the tabletop will not initially be moving up or down, but only sideways
  • a_y = the acceleration of gravity DOWN = 9.8 m/s²)
  • t = the time

Your Answer:Question 1 options:

Question 2 (1 point)

Try the following:

• place the small ball on the tabletop, a foot or so from the edge
• get one of the coins
• give the ball a small push so that it rolls off the edge of the table and place the coin about where the ball lands on the floor
• Roll the ball off the tabletop again, this time giving a more forceful push so the ball has more horizontal velocity and again mark its landing spot with a coin
• repeat pushing the ball off the table and marking its landing position several times, each time with a little more force so as to give the ball a higher horizontal velocity when it leaves the tabletop

What is true of each recorded fall? MARK ALL THAT APPLY!

Question 2 options:

Question 3 (1 point)

Try the following:

• gather all the coins off the floor
• On top of the table, make a small ramp out of a thin board or a magazine. Have the bottom edge of the ramp directly on the table about a foot from the edge. Use a couple books to support the top of the ramp closer to the middle of the table
• Place a ball at the top of the ramp and allow it to roll down the ramp, across the foot of tabletop to the edge and go over the edge. Mark where the ball lands with a coin
• Without changing the angle or position of the ramp, repeatedly release the ball from the top of the ramp and mark each landing spot with a coin

What is true of each recorded fall? MARK ALL THAT APPLY!

Question 3 options:

Question 4 (1 point)

• Go to https://phet.colorado.edu/sims/html/projectile-motion/latest/projectile-motion_en.html
• Click the first square that reads "Intro"
• You should see a cannon

Just to make sure you're in the right place, what color is the cannon?

Question 4 options:

Question 5 (1 point)

With all the original default settings (height = 10 m, angle = 0 degrees, vo = 15 m/s), press the red "Fire" button to shoot the cannon. There are three ways to measure the distance the projectile travels in the x-direction. any of the following will work:

• click and drag the red and white target on the ground over to the landing spot so that the center of the target is at the end of the trajectory
• click and drag the tape measure from the toolbox in the top right of the screen. Place the flat leading edge of the tape measure box on the ground directly below the "+" of the cannon and drag the end of the tape to the impact spot
• click and drag the blue time/range/height tool from the toolbox in the top right of the screen. Place the crosshairs over the impact spot and a small yellow dot should appear. This is probably the best tool, since you can also read the time the projectile spent in the air and the range and the height above the ground.

Which of the following is closest to the actual distance the projectile travels in the x-direction?

Question 5 options:

Question 6 (1 point)

• Find the time that it takes a stone to fall 13 m by using the y-displacement formula.
• Set the cannon at 13 m and fire horizontally and use the blue time/range/height gauge to fine the time

How much time does it take to fall 13 m?

Question 6 options:

Question 7 (1 point)

If a cannon shoots a ball horizontally at 8 m/s, and the ball starts out 11 m above the floor, how far away from the gun will the ball land?

• Solve the formula using the y-displacement formula to find the time and the x-displacement formula to find the range
• Sent the cannon height at 11m and the initial speed at 8 m/s. Use the blue time/range/height gauge to find the range

What is the horizontal distance the projectile travels?

Question 7 options:

Question 8 (1 point)

Predict the horizontal distance a cannon on a 15 m cliff will shoot if it's horizontal initial velocity is 140 m/s .

Question 8 options:

Angle Shot

When the cannon is not horizontal, but is aimed either upwards or downwards, several additional considerations have to be made.

• we have to find the x and y components of the inital velocity
  • v_ox = v_o cos θ
  • v_oy = v_o sin θ
• we have to get the signs of the y components of velocity and acceleration and displacement correct. If the gun is angled up and gravity pulls down and the displacement is down. You can pick the y-coordinate sysytem either positive up/negative down OR positive down/negative up. It makes no difference which way you pick, but once you pick everything has to conform to that coordinate system. If we arbitrarily pick positive up
  • the upward initial velocity, v_oy would be up, so it would be a positive number
  • the gravity, a_y pulls down, so it would be a negative number
  • the rock falls down, so the vertical displacement, y points down, so it would be a negative number
• When we use the y-displacement formula to find time, since v_oy is no longer zero, as it was in the horizontal shot, we can't cancel the first right hand term. That means we have to solve the quadratic. Typically using the quadratic formula is the best choice for doing that. The quadratic formula gives two possible solutions - choose the one that makes sense (the positive answer)

For example: A cannonball leaves a cannon at 15 m/s from 10 m above ground, fired at an upward 30 degree angle. Find the time to hit the ground and the horizontal range.

Question 9

Set up the cannon so that

• the height is 10 m
• initial speed is 15 m/s
• the angle is 0 degrees, horizontal
• fire the cannon!

Tilt the barrel upwards to 30 degrees and FIRE!

Now, tilt the barrel downwards to 30 degrees and - 3, 2, 1 - FIRE!!!

You should see all three paths that the projectile took. You might need the blue measuring device, but MARK ALL THE APPLY THINGS:

Question 9

Question 10

A cannonball leaves a cannon at 7 m/s from 4 m above ground, fired at an upward 25 degree angle. Find the time to hit the ground.

Do this by solving the quadratic and by shooting the virtual cannon

Your Answer:

Question 11

A cannonball leaves a cannon at 15 m/s from 5 m above ground, fired at an upward 30 degree angle. Find the horizontal diistance the shot travels.

Do this by solving the quadratic and by shooting the virtual cannon to compare.

Your Answer:

Problem 1: python

For the first problem of this homework, we’re going to try something a little different. I’ve created the start of a file, which you’ll edit to finish the assignment: count_words_in_the_raven.py

The program has three functions in it.

1. I’ve written all of break_into_list_of_words()--DO NOT CHANGE THIS ONE. All it does is break the very long poem into a list of individual words. Some of what it's doing will not make much sense to you until we get to the strings chapter, and that's fine--that's part of why I wrote it for you. :)
2. There’s a main() which you’ll add a little bit to, but it should stay pretty small -- some print statements and some function calls
3. There’s a definition of a function called count_how_many_words(), which takes two arguments. (Don’t change the arguments.) You’ll write the entire block for this.
   1. Note: My return statement is definitely not what you want; it’s just there so that the program runs when I give it to you. You will want to change what the function returns!

I want you to complete the count_how_many_words() function, and then call it (multiple times) inside main() to find out how many times Poe used the word “Raven” (or “raven”) and how many times he used “Nevermore” (or “nevermore”) inside the poem “The Raven.” You may not use list.count().

Don’t add any global variables or constants (besides the one I’ve declared, which could be moved into main() but would be even uglier there).

Example output (with incorrect numbers):

The word "Raven" (or "raven") appears 42 times in Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven."

The word "Nevermore" (or "nevermore") appears 48 times in Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven."

# a constant
THE_RAVEN = '''
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and nothing more.”

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
“’Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—
This it is and nothing more.”

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you”—here I opened wide the door;—
Darkness there and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore?”
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”—
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
“Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;—
’Tis the wind and nothing more!”

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore;
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door—
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as “Nevermore.”

But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered—
Till I scarcely more than muttered “Other friends have flown before—
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.”
Then the bird said “Nevermore.”

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore—
Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore
Of ‘Never—nevermore’.”

But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er,
But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
“Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—
On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—
Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

“Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting—
“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted—nevermore!'''

# this is what quick-and-dirty data cleaning looks like, friends
def break_into_list_of_words(string):
"""takes a long string and returns a list of all of the words in the string"""
# vvv YOU DO NOT HAVE TO CHANGE ANYTHING IN HERE vvv
list_of_words = []
# break by newlines to get a list of lines
list_of_lines = string.split('\n')
# remove the empty lines
while '' in list_of_lines:
list_of_lines.remove('')
# split the line up
for line in list_of_lines:
# we have a few words run together with dashes
# this breaks the line up by dashes (non-ideal, but eh)
maybe_broken_line = line.split('—')
# now we will take the line that might be split, and we'll split again
# but this time on spaces
for a_line in maybe_broken_line:
list_of_words = list_of_words + a_line.split(' ')
# if blank spaces crept in (they did), let's get rid of them
while ' ' in list_of_words:
list_of_words.remove(' ')
while '' in list_of_words:
list_of_words.remove('')
# removing a lot of unnecessary punctuation; gives you more options
# for how to solve this problem
# (you'll get a cleaner way to do this, later in the semester, too)
for index in range(0, len(list_of_words)):
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip(";")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip("?")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip(",")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip("!")
# smart quotes will ruin your LIFE
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip("“")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip("”")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip("‘")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip(".")
list_of_words[index] = list_of_words[index].strip("’")

# all we have now is a list with words without punctuation
# (secretly, some words still have apostrophes and dashes in 'em)
# (but we don't care)
return list_of_words
# ^^^ YOU DO NOT HAVE TO CHANGE ANYTHING IN HERE ^^^

# this is the function you'll add a lot of logic to
def count_how_many_words(word_list, counting_string):
"""takes in a string and a list and returns the number of times that string occurs in the list"""

return None # this is just here so the program still compiles

def main():
count = 0
words = break_into_list_of_words(THE_RAVEN)
# a reasonable first step, to see what you've got:
# for word in words:
# print(word, end = " ")

if __name__ == "__main__":
main()

Forecasting the Income Statement, Balance Sheet, and Statement of Cash Flows
Assume the following are the financial statements of Nike, Inc.

We forecast Nike's income statement using the following forecast assumptions:

Instructions: Forecast Nike's fiscal year 2012 income statement.

Assume no change for: other income and interest expense.

Round forecasts to $ millions.

Do not use negative signs with your answers in the income statement.  

Instructions: Forecast Nike's fiscal year 2012 balance sheet.

Assume no change for: short-term investments, goodwill, notes payable, common stock, capital in excess of stated value and accumulated other comprehensive income.

Round forecasts to $ millions.

We forecast Nike's balance sheet using the following forecast assumptions:

Instructions: Forecast Nike's fiscal year 2012 stastement of cash flows.

Use negative signs with your answers below, when appropriate.

It is a strategic management.

Question: Discuss the business-level and corporate-level strategies of Apple, as discussed in the articles below. Why is Apple pursuing these strategies? Be sure to discuss competitive pressures from Sony as it pursues its strategy. Compel your response with data from the articles.

Article 1:

High-end AirPods and over-ear headphones coming next year

Foxconn to build AirPods; Inventec may lose some HomePod work

Apple Inc. is about to pump up the volume on its audio-device strategy, planning higher-end AirPods, a new HomePod and studio-quality over-ear headphones for as early as next year, according to people familiar with the matter.

The Cupertino, California-based company is working on new AirPods with noise-cancellation and water resistance, the people said. Apple is trying to increase the range that AirPods can work away from an iPhone or iPad, one of the people said. You won’t be swimming in them though: The water resistance is mainly to protect against rain and perspiration, the people said.

Slated for 2019, the earbuds will likely cost more than the existing $159 pair, and that could push Apple to segment the product line like it does with iPhones, one of the people said. Apple is also working on a wireless charging case that’s compatible with the upcoming AirPower charger.

The company has also internally discussed adding biometric sensors to future AirPods, like a heart-rate monitor, to expand its health-related hardware offerings beyond the Apple Watch, another person said. The current AirPods will be refreshed later this year with a new chip and support for hands-free Siri activation, Bloomberg News reported.

There are over-ear headphones coming from Apple, too. Those will compete with pricey models from Bose Corp. and Sennheiser. They will use Apple branding and be a higher-end alternative to the company’s Beats line. Apple originally intended to introduce the headphones by the end of 2018, but has faced development challenges, and is now targeting a launch as early as next year, the people said. They asked not to be identified talking about unreleased products. An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment.

Shares of noise-cancellation component maker Cirrus Logic Inc. rose as much as 10 percent after Susquehanna analyst Christopher Rolland wrote that the company would be working with Apple on the new AirPods.

The consumer-electronics giant uses unique accessories like the AirPods to round out its hardware and software ecosystem. Accessories have become an important revenue source in recent years, helping Apple’s Other Products unit generate sales of $12.9 billion in the 2017 fiscal year. That’s cushioned a slowdown in iPhone unit growth.

Apple's Other Sales Boom

Other Products category has become an increasingly important selling point for Apple devices

Note: Other Products include AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, HomePod, Beats headphones, accessories.

The upcoming audio push builds on Apple’s earlier success in the field. The iPod and iTunes digital music store helped revive the industry and began a transformation that turned the company from a computer maker into a mobile-device giant.

In 2012, Apple declared itself one of the largest shippers of audio speakers because of the earbuds that come bundled with its devices and the built-in speakers in iPhones, Macs and iPads. Two years later, Apple bought headphone maker and streaming-music company Beats for $3 billion, its largest acquisition. An in-house audio-product team is run by Gary Geaves, formerly an engineer from B&W Group Ltd., a maker of speaker systems and headphones.

Apple is shaking up its supply chain in preparation for the latest audio products, expanding a partnership with iPhone manufacturer Foxconn Technology Group and decreasing its reliance on smaller hardware maker Inventec Corp., the people said. Apple plans to ramp up AirPods production by working with Foxconn, people familiar with the arrangement said. So far, it has mostly worked with Inventec, but builds about 30 percent of the units with Luxshare Precision Industry Co. When the earbuds first came out in 2016, they were delayed, and there was limited supply after the product finally went on sale. A Foxconn press official declined to comment.

Apple’s latest music-focused device, the HomePod, was also delayed, and has seen sluggish sales so far -- although reviewers praised the sound quality. It was originally built with Inventec, but Apple has since expanded production to Foxconn. Apple is working on a new version of the HomePod for as early as next year, and it could switch production away from Inventec for the latest model, according to people familiar with the relationship. Inventec executives met with Apple executives in California in recent weeks to discuss future HomePod orders, but a final decision on working with Inventec on the new model hasn’t been made, the people said. An Inventec spokeswoman said the company "will try its best to secure new orders."

For the over-ear headphones, Apple has discussed working with Tymphany, a Primax Electronics Ltd. subsidiary that makes consumer and professional audio systems, according to a person familiar with the situation. Production hasn’t started, and the deal isn’t finalized.

Article 2 - Sony:

Pioneer of Walkman targets premium market dominated by Bose and Beats

TOKYO -- When Ichiro Takagi took over Sony Corp.'s audio business seven years ago, he found the staff took pride in being the global No. 1 in headphones, in terms of units sold. But he was appalled at how many were $10 headphones sold for minimal profit at grocery stores. "What's the point of that? Where's our brand image?" Mr. Takagi recalls telling employees. Fast forward to this fall and the international electronics show in Berlin, where Mr. Takagi was showing off the latest version of his flagship product, a $350 pair of noise-canceling wireless headphones.

The premium-price headphone market has been largely dominated by Bose, the industry pioneer popular with frequent fliers, and Beats, the fashion-savvy brand acquired by Apple Inc. for $3 billion in 2014. All share the challenge of wooing listeners who already get free earbuds with their smartphones.

Sony said in May it has 11% of the headphone market in terms of revenue, the third-largest slice. It didn't name the top two companies.

The audio business -- where Sony has been a player since the 1950s -- is a prime example of how it got back to profitability in recent years, even in a traditional hardware business that once looked like a lost cause. For the year that ended in March, sales for the audio unit rose for the first time in 20 years after having fallen some 80% from the peak.

More important for Chief Executive Kenichiro Yoshida, the home-electronics division, including audio and televisions (another former money loser), posted operating profit of nearly $800 million for the year, helping Sony achieve record overall profit. Mr. Yoshida is hoping roughly to match that record in the current fiscal year: Quarterly earnings coming Tuesday will give a progress report. The rise of Spotify Technology SA and other music services has been good for headphone makers, increasing the time consumers spend listening on the go. Streaming companies such as Spotify and France-based Deezer offer high-resolution services that have expanded the market for higher-quality headphones costing hundreds or even thousands of dollars. Recent product releases by Sony include a $280 pair of earphones; an $8,500 portable music player targeted at audiophiles goes on sale in December, with a gold-plated volume controller and a battery system designed to reduce noise.

In the first generation of portable MP3 music players, "the quality of the music sources was poor," Sony audio executive Yoshinori Matsumoto said. "We couldn't push high-end listening devices because they would highlight the coarseness." Now, better technology has "made high-quality music more accessible both to customers and creators," he said.

Audio has paralleled Sony's highs and lows through its 72-year history. The Walkman in 1979 set off a revolution in portable electronic devices, with Sony in the lead. But in the 2000s, Sony let Apple and the iPod seize the dominant position. By 2011, the Tokyo company was nearly giving up on its old hardware products. "The attitude of management at that time was like, 'If you're so-so, that's fine,' " Mr. Takagi, the audio-unit chief, said. That changed under then Chief Executive Kazuo Hirai, who took over in 2012, and Mr. Yoshida, who was chief financial officer under Mr. Hirai and became CEO this year. They pushed the audio team to drop cheap products and focus on a few high-end models.Mr. Takagi says the new management scrapped an organizational chart that had separate groups of engineers focusing on subcategories like car audio. "I told them to look around the whole industry to come up with products that consumers are willing to pay extra for," he said.

Sony says the $350 headphones can detect the owner's facial shape, hairstyle and presence of glasses, as well as pressure changes in an airplane, all to optimize the noise-canceling feature. "Our latest model is distinctly the best in terms of noise-canceling technology," says Mr. Takagi, who is in the habit of visiting electronics stores to eavesdrop on what customers are saying to salespeople. "It's obvious if you ask your ears."

Another Sony rival, especially for younger customers, is Beats. Mr. Matsumoto says the competition has led Sony to stress fashion as well as sound quality. "In China, headphones have become part of the outfit for young people, and they have to have a style that people want to wear all the time, even when they are not listening," he said.

Mr. Takagi said there is more innovation to come, such as headsets that stream music from the internet on their own without having to be hooked up to a smartphone. "Audio will remain a profitable business so long as we keep listening to music," Mr. Takagi said. "If we remain as a strong and respected player in the industry, then the whole company will be too because audio is the origin of Sony."

What kind of challenges did American housewives face? Why do you agree/disagree with her arguments?

Women Are Household Slaves, 1949

HELP WANTED: DOMESTIC: FEMALE. All cooking, cleaning, laundering, sewing, meal planning, shopping, weekday chauffeuring, social secretarial service, and complete care of three children. Salary at employer’s option. Time off if possible.

No one in her right senses would apply for such a job. No one in his right senses, even a desperate widower, would place such an advertisement. Yet it correctly describes the average wife and mother’s situation, in which most women remain for love, but many because they have no way out.

A nauseating amount of bilge is constantly being spilled all over the public press about the easy, pampered existence of the American woman. Actually, the run of the mill, not gainfully employed female who is blessed with a husband and from two to four children leads a kind of life that theoretically became passé with the Emancipation Proclamation. Its confinement makes her baby’s play pen seem like the great open spaces. Its hours — at least fourteen a day, seven days a week — make the well known sunup to sundown toil of sharecroppers appear, in comparison, like a union standard. Beside the repetitious, heterogeneous mass of chores endlessly bedeviling the housewife, an executive’s memorandum of unfinished business is a virgin sheet.

Housewifery is a complex of housekeeping, household management, housework and childcare. Some of its elements, such as budgeting, dietetics, and above all, the proper upbringing of children, involve the higher brain centers; indeed, home economics has quite as respectable an academic status as engineering, and its own laboratories, dissertations and hierarchy of degrees. Other of its facets, and those the most persistent and time-consuming, can be capably handled by an eight-year-old child. The role of the housewife is, therefore, analogous to that of the president of a corporation who would not only determine policies and make over-all plans but also spend the major part of his time and energy in such activities as sweeping the plant and oiling machines.

Industry, of course, is too thrifty of the capacities of its personnel to waste them in such fashion. Likewise, organized labor and government afford workers certain standardized legal or customary protections. But in terms of enlightened labor practice, the housewife stands out blackly as the Forgotten Worker.

She is covered by no minimum wage law; indeed, she gets no wages at all. Like the bondservant of another day, or the slave, she receives maintenance; but anything beyond that, whether in the form of a regular “allowance” or sporadic largesse, is ruggedly individualistic….

No state or county health and sanitation inspectors invade the privacy of the home, as they do that of the factory; hence kitchens and domestic dwellings may be ill-ventilated, unsanitary and hazardous without penalty. That many more accidents occur in homes than in industry is no coincidence. Furthermore, when a disability is incurred, such as a bone broken in a fall off a ladder or legs scalded by the overturning of a kettle of boiling water, no beneficent legislation provides for the housewife’s compensation.

Rest periods are irregular, about ten to fifteen minutes each, a few times during the long day; night work is frequent and unpredictably occasioned by a wide variety of factors such as the mending basket, the gang gathering for a party, a sick child, or even more pressing, a sick husband. The right to a vacation, thoroughly accepted in business and industry, is non-existent in the domestic sphere. When families go to beach bungalows or shacks in the woods Mom continues on almost the same old treadmill; there are still little garments to be buttoned and unbuttoned, three meals a day to prepare, beds to be made and dishes to be washed. Even on jolly whole-family motor trips with the blessings of life in tourist camps or hotels, she still has the job considered full time by paid nurses and governesses.

Though progressive employers make some sort of provision for advancement, the housewife’s opportunities for advancement are nil; the nature and scope of her job, the routines of keeping a family fed, clothed and housed remain always the same. If the male upon whom her scale of living depends prospers, about all to which she can look forward is a larger house — and more work. Once, under such circumstances, there would have been less, thanks to servants. Currently, however, the jewel of a general houseworker is virtually extinct and even the specialists who smooth life for the wealthy are rarities.

Industry has a kind of tenderness toward its women workers that is totally lacking towards women workers in the home. Let a plant employee be known to be pregnant, and management and foremen, who want to experience no guilt feelings toward unborn innocents, hasten to prevent her doing any kind of work that might be a strain upon her. In the home, however, now as for centuries, a “normal” amount of housework is considered “healthy” — not to mention, since no man wants to do it, unavoidable. There may be a few proscriptions against undue stretching and heavy lifting, but otherwise, pregnant or not, the housewife carries on, turning mattresses, lugging the vacuum cleaner up and down stairs, carrying winter overcoats to the attic in summer and down from it in the fall, scrubbing kitchen and bathroom floors, washing woodwork if that is indicated by the season, and on her feet most of the time performing other such little chores beside which sitting at an assembly line or punching a typewriter are positively restful.

Despite all this, a good many arguments about the joys of housewifery have been advanced, largely by those who have never had to work at it. One much stressed point is that satisfaction every good woman feels in creating a home for her dear ones. Well, probably every good woman does feel it, perhaps because she has had it so drummed into her that if she does not, she is not a good woman; but that satisfaction has very little to do with housewifery and housework. It is derived from intangibles, such as the desirable wife-husband and mother-child relationships she manages to effect, the permeating general home atmosphere of joviality or hospitality or serenity or culture to which she is the key, or the warmth and security she gives to the home by way of her personality, not her broom, stove or dishpan. For a woman to get a rewarding sense of total creation by way of the multiple, monotonous chores that are her daily lot would be as irrational as for an assembly line worker to rejoice that he had created an automobile because he tightens a bolt. It is difficult to see how clearing up after meals three times a day and making out marketing lists (three lemons, two packages of soap powder, a can of soup), getting at the fuzz in the radiators with the hard rubber appliance of the vacuum cleaner, emptying wastebaskets and washing bathroom floors day after day, week after week, year after year, add up to a sum total of anything except minutiae that laid end to end reach nowhere.

According to another line of reasoning, the housewife has the advantage of being “her own boss” and unlike the gainfully employed worker can arrange her own schedules. This is pure balderdash…. If there is anything more inexorable than children’s needs, from an infant’s yowls of hunger and Junior’s shrieks that he has just fallen down the stairs to the subtler need of an adolescent for a good listener during one of his or her frequent emotional crises, it is only the pressure of Dad’s demand for supper as soon as he gets home…. What is more, not her own preferences as to hours, but those set by her husband’s office or plant, by the schools, by pediatricians and dentists, and the children’s homework establish when the housewife rises, when she goes forth, and when she cannot get to bed.

Something else makes a mockery of self-determined routines; interruptions from the outside world. Unprotected by butler or doorman, the housewife is at the mercy of peddlers, plain or fancy Fuller brush; odd-job seekers; gas and electric company men who come to read meters; the Salvation Army in quest of newspapers; school children hawking seeds or tickets or chances; and repair men suggesting that the roof is in a hazardous condition or household machinery needs overhauling. Unblessed with a secretary, she answers telephone calls from insurance and real estate agents who “didn’t want to bother your husband at his office.” … All such invasions have a common denominator: the assumption that the housewife’s time, like that of all slave labor, has no value.

In addition to what housewifery has in common with slavery, there are factors making it even less enviable as a way of life. The jolly gatherings of darkies with their banjos in the Good Old Days Befoh de Wah may be as mythical as the joys of housewifery, but at any rate we can be sure that slaves were not deprived of social intercourse throughout their hours of toil; field hands worked in gangs, house servants in teams. The housewife, however, carries through each complex operation of cooking, cleaning, tidying and laundering solo; almost uniquely among workers since the Industrial Revolution, she does not benefit by division of labor. Lunch time, ordinarily a pleasant break in the working day, for her brings no pleasant sociability with the girls in the cafeteria, the hired men in the shade of the haystack, or even the rest of the household staff in the servants’ dining room. From the time her husband departs for work until he returns, except for an occasional chat across the back fence or a trek to market with some other woman as childbound, housebound, and limited in horizons as herself, she lacks adult company; and even to the most passionately maternal, unbroken hours of childish prattle are no substitute for the conversation of one’s peers, whether that be on a high philosophical plane or on the lower level of neighborhood gossip. The Woman’s Club, happy hunting ground of matrons in their forties, is perhaps a reaction against this enforced solitude during earlier married life.

Something else enjoyed by slaves, but not by housewives, was work in some measure appropriate to their qualifications. The more intelligent were selected as house servants; the huskier as field hands. Such crude vocational placement has been highly refined in industry, with its battery of intelligence and aptitude tests, personnel directors and employment counselors. Nothing of the kind is even attempted for unpaid domestic workers. When a man marries and has children, it is assumed that he will do the best work along lines in which he has been trained or is at least interested. When a woman marries and has children, it is assumed that she will take to housewifery. But whether she takes to it or not, she does it.

Such regimentation, for professional or potentially professional women, is costly both for the individual and society. For the individual, it brings about conflicts and frustrations. The practice of housewifery gives the lie to the theory of almost every objective of higher education. The educated individual should

COMPANY Case: Porsche: Guarding the Old While Bringing in the New

Porsche (pronounced Porsh-uh) is a unique company. It has always been a niche brand that makes cars for a small and distinctive segment of automobile buyers. In 2009, Porsche sold only 27,717 cars in the five models it sells in the United States. Honda sold about 10 times that many Accords alone. But Porsche owners are as rare as their vehicles. For that reason, top managers at Porsche spend a great deal of time thinking about customers. They want to know who their customers are, what they think, and how they feel. They want to know why they buy a Porsche rather then a Jaguar, a Ferrari, or a big Mercedes coupe. These are challenging questions to answer; even Porsche owners themselves don’t know exactly what motivates their buying. But given Porsche’s low volume and the increasingly fragmented auto market, it is imperative that management understands its customers and what gets their motors running.

Since its early days, Porsche has appealed to a very narrow segment of financially successful people. These are achievers who see themselves as entrepreneurial, even if they work for a corporation. They set very high goals for themselves and then work doggedly to meet them. And they expect no less from the clothes they wear, the restaurants they go to, or the cars they drive. These individuals see themselves not as a part of the regular world but as exceptions to it. They buy Porsches because the car mirrors their self-image; it stands for the things owners like to see in themselves and their lives.

Most of us buy what Porsche executives call utility vehicles. That is, we buy cars primarily to go to work, transport children, and run errands. Because we use our cars to accomplish these daily tasks, we base buying decisions on features such as price, size, fuel economy, and other practical considerations. But Porsche is more than a utility car. Its owners see it as a car to be enjoyed, not just used. Most Porsche buyers are not moved by information but by feelings. A Porsche is like a piece of clothing—something the owner “wears” and is seen in. They develop a personal relationship with their cars, one that has more to do with the way the car sounds, vibrates, and feels, rather than the how many cup holders it has or how much cargo it can hold in the trunk. They admire their Porsche because it is a competent performance machine without being flashy or phony.

People buy Porsches because they enjoy driving. If all they needed was something to get them from point A to point B, they could find something much less expensive. And while many Porsche owners are car enthusiasts, some of them are not. One successful businesswoman and owner of a high-end Porsche said, “When I drive this car to the high school to pick up my daughter, I end up with five youngsters in the car. If I drive any other car, I can’t even find her; she doesn’t want to come home.”

For its first few decades, Porsche AG lived by the philosophy of Ferry Porsche, Ferdinand’s son. Ferry created the Porsche 356 because no one else made a car like he wanted. But as the years rolled on, Porsche management became concerned with a significant issue: Were there enough Porsche buyers to keep the company afloat? Granted, the company never had illusions of churning out the numbers of a Chevrolet or a Toyota. But to fund innovation, even a niche manufacturer has to grow a little. And Porsche began to worry that the quirky nature of the people who buy Porsches might just run out on them.

This led Porsche to extend its brand outside the box. In the early 1970s, Porsche introduced the 914, a square-ish, mid-engine, two-seater that was much cheaper than the 911. This meant that a different class of people could afford a Porsche. It was no surprise that the 914 became Porsche’s top selling model. By the late 1970s, Porsche replaced the 914 with a hatchback coupe that had something no other regular Porsche model had ever had: an engine in the front. At less than $20,000, more than $10,000 less than the 911, the 924 and later 944 models were once again Porsche’s pitch to affordability. At one point, Porsche increased its sales goal by nearly 50 percent to 60,000 cars a year.

Although these cars were in many respects sales successes, the Porsche faithful cried foul. They considered these entry-level models to be cheap and underperforming. Most loyalists never really accepted these models as “real” Porsches. In fact, they were not at all happy that they had to share their brand with a customer who didn’t fit the Porsche owner profile. They were turned off by what they saw as a corporate strategy that had focused on mass over class marketing. This tarnished image was compounded by the fact that Nissan, Toyota, BMW, and other car manufacturers had ramped up high-end sports car offerings, creating some fierce competition. In fact, both the Datsun 280-ZX and the Toyota Supra were not only cheaper than Porsche’s 944 but also faster. A struggling economy threw more sand in Porsche’s tank. By 1990, Porsche sales had plummeted, and the company flirted with bankruptcy.

But Porsche wasn’t going down without a fight. It quickly recognized the error of its ways and halted production of the entry-level models. It rebuilt its damaged image by revamping its higher-end model lines with more race-bred technology. In an effort to regain rapport with customers, Porsche once again targeted the high end of the market in both price and performance. It set modest sales goals and decided that moderate growth with higher margins would be more profitable in the long term. Thus, the company set out to make one less Porsche than the public demanded. According to one executive, “We’re not looking for volume; we’re searching for exclusivity.”

Porsche’s efforts had the desired effect. By the late 1990s, the brand was once again favored by the same type of achiever who had so deeply loved the car for decades. The cars were once again exclusive. And the company was once again profitable. But by the early 2000s, Porsche management was again asking itself a familiar question: To have a sustainable future, could Porsche rely on only the Porsche faithful? According to then CEO Wendelin Wiedeking, “For Porsche to remain independent, it can’t be dependent on the most fickle segment in the market. We don’t want to become just a marketing department of some giant. We have to make sure we’re profitable enough to pay for future development ourselves.”

So in 2002, Porsche did the unthinkable. It became one of the last car companies to jump into the insatiable sport utility vehicle (SUV) market. At roughly 5,000 pounds, the new Porsche Cayenne was heavier than anything that Porsche had ever made, with the exception of some prototype tanks it made during WWII. Once again, the new model featured an engine up front. And it was the first Porsche to ever be equipped with seatbelts for five. As news spread about the car’s development, howls could be heard from Porsche’s customer base.

But this time, Porsche did not seem too concerned that the loyalists would be put off. Could it be that the company had already forgotten what happened the last time it deviated from the mold? After driving one of the first Cayenne’s off the assembly line, one journalist stated, “A day at the wheel of the 444 horsepower Cayenne Turbo leaves two overwhelming impressions. First, the Cayenne doesn’t behave or feel like an SUV, and second, it drives like a Porsche.” This was no entry-level car. Porsche had created a two-and-a-half ton beast that could accelerate to 60 miles per hour in just over five seconds, corner like it was on rails, and hit 165 miles per hour, all while coddling five adults in sumptuous leather seats with almost no wind noise from the outside world. On top of that, it could keep up with a Land Rover when the pavement ended. Indeed, Porsche had created the Porsche of SUVs.

Last year, Porsche upped the ante one more time. It unveiled another large vehicle. But this time, it was a low-slung, five-door luxury sedan. The Porsche faithful and the automotive press again gasped in disbelief. But by the time the Panamera hit the pavement, Porsche had proven once again that Porsche customers could have their cake and eat it to. The Panamera is almost as big as the Cayenne but can move four adults down the road at speeds of up to 188 miles per hour and accelerate from a standstill to 60 miles per hour in four seconds flat.

Although some Porsche traditionalists would never be caught dead driving a front engine Porsche that has more than two doors, Porsche insists that two trends will sustain these new models. First, a category of Porsche buyers has moved into life stages that have them facing inescapable needs; they need to haul more people and stuff. This not only applies to certain regular Porsche buyers, but Porsche is again seeing buyers enter its dealerships that otherwise wouldn’t have. Only this time, the price points of the new vehicles are drawing only the well heeled, allowing Porsche to maintain its exclusivity. These buyers also seem to fit the achiever profile of regular Porsche buyers.

The second trend is the growth of emerging economies. Whereas the United States has long been the world’s biggest consumer of Porsches, the company expects China to become its biggest customer before too long. Twenty years ago, the United States accounted for about 50 percent of Porsche’s worldwide sales. Now, it accounts for only about 26 percent. In China, many people who can afford to buy a car as expensive as a Porsche also hire a chauffeur. The Cayenne and the Panamera are perfect for those who want to be driven around in style but who may also want to make a quick getaway if necessary.

The most recent economic downturn has brought down the sales of just about every maker of premium automobiles. When times are tough, buying a car like a Porsche is the ultimate deferrable purchase. But as this downturn turns back up, Porsche is better poised than it has ever been to meet the needs of its customer base. It is also in better shape than ever to maintain its brand image with the Porsche faithful and with others as well. Sure, understanding Porsche buyers is still a difficult task. But a former CEO of Porsche summed it up this way: “If you really want to understand our customers, you have to understand the phrase, ‘If I were going to be a car, I’d be a Porsche.’

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Required Questions

Question 01: You are asked to develop a Mission statement and four Marketing objectives for Porsche for the next ten years (2021- 2025) . Draft an ideal mission statement and outline your four marketing objectives (5 marks

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Question 02: Identify , explain and justify the main consumer behaviour characteristics that influences the Porche buyers.

COMPANY Case: Porsche: Guarding the Old While Bringing in the New

Porsche (pronounced Porsh-uh) is a unique company. It has always been a niche brand that makes cars for a small and distinctive segment of automobile buyers. In 2009, Porsche sold only 27,717 cars in the five models it sells in the United States. Honda sold about 10 times that many Accords alone. But Porsche owners are as rare as their vehicles. For that reason, top managers at Porsche spend a great deal of time thinking about customers. They want to know who their customers are, what they think, and how they feel. They want to know why they buy a Porsche rather then a Jaguar, a Ferrari, or a big Mercedes coupe. These are challenging questions to answer; even Porsche owners themselves don’t know exactly what motivates their buying. But given Porsche’s low volume and the increasingly fragmented auto market, it is imperative that management understands its customers and what gets their motors running.

Since its early days, Porsche has appealed to a very narrow segment of financially successful people. These are achievers who see themselves as entrepreneurial, even if they work for a corporation. They set very high goals for themselves and then work doggedly to meet them. And they expect no less from the clothes they wear, the restaurants they go to, or the cars they drive. These individuals see themselves not as a part of the regular world but as exceptions to it. They buy Porsches because the car mirrors their self-image; it stands for the things owners like to see in themselves and their lives.

Most of us buy what Porsche executives call utility vehicles. That is, we buy cars primarily to go to work, transport children, and run errands. Because we use our cars to accomplish these daily tasks, we base buying decisions on features such as price, size, fuel economy, and other practical considerations. But Porsche is more than a utility car. Its owners see it as a car to be enjoyed, not just used. Most Porsche buyers are not moved by information but by feelings. A Porsche is like a piece of clothing—something the owner “wears” and is seen in. They develop a personal relationship with their cars, one that has more to do with the way the car sounds, vibrates, and feels, rather than the how many cup holders it has or how much cargo it can hold in the trunk. They admire their Porsche because it is a competent performance machine without being flashy or phony.

People buy Porsches because they enjoy driving. If all they needed was something to get them from point A to point B, they could find something much less expensive. And while many Porsche owners are car enthusiasts, some of them are not. One successful businesswoman and owner of a high-end Porsche said, “When I drive this car to the high school to pick up my daughter, I end up with five youngsters in the car. If I drive any other car, I can’t even find her; she doesn’t want to come home.”

For its first few decades, Porsche AG lived by the philosophy of Ferry Porsche, Ferdinand’s son. Ferry created the Porsche 356 because no one else made a car like he wanted. But as the years rolled on, Porsche management became concerned with a significant issue: Were there enough Porsche buyers to keep the company afloat? Granted, the company never had illusions of churning out the numbers of a Chevrolet or a Toyota. But to fund innovation, even a niche manufacturer has to grow a little. And Porsche began to worry that the quirky nature of the people who buy Porsches might just run out on them.

This led Porsche to extend its brand outside the box. In the early 1970s, Porsche introduced the 914, a square-ish, mid-engine, two-seater that was much cheaper than the 911. This meant that a different class of people could afford a Porsche. It was no surprise that the 914 became Porsche’s top selling model. By the late 1970s, Porsche replaced the 914 with a hatchback coupe that had something no other regular Porsche model had ever had: an engine in the front. At less than $20,000, more than $10,000 less than the 911, the 924 and later 944 models were once again Porsche’s pitch to affordability. At one point, Porsche increased its sales goal by nearly 50 percent to 60,000 cars a year.

Although these cars were in many respects sales successes, the Porsche faithful cried foul. They considered these entry-level models to be cheap and underperforming. Most loyalists never really accepted these models as “real” Porsches. In fact, they were not at all happy that they had to share their brand with a customer who didn’t fit the Porsche owner profile. They were turned off by what they saw as a corporate strategy that had focused on mass over class marketing. This tarnished image was compounded by the fact that Nissan, Toyota, BMW, and other car manufacturers had ramped up high-end sports car offerings, creating some fierce competition. In fact, both the Datsun 280-ZX and the Toyota Supra were not only cheaper than Porsche’s 944 but also faster. A struggling economy threw more sand in Porsche’s tank. By 1990, Porsche sales had plummeted, and the company flirted with bankruptcy.

But Porsche wasn’t going down without a fight. It quickly recognized the error of its ways and halted production of the entry-level models. It rebuilt its damaged image by revamping its higher-end model lines with more race-bred technology. In an effort to regain rapport with customers, Porsche once again targeted the high end of the market in both price and performance. It set modest sales goals and decided that moderate growth with higher margins would be more profitable in the long term. Thus, the company set out to make one less Porsche than the public demanded. According to one executive, “We’re not looking for volume; we’re searching for exclusivity.”

Porsche’s efforts had the desired effect. By the late 1990s, the brand was once again favored by the same type of achiever who had so deeply loved the car for decades. The cars were once again exclusive. And the company was once again profitable. But by the early 2000s, Porsche management was again asking itself a familiar question: To have a sustainable future, could Porsche rely on only the Porsche faithful? According to then CEO Wendelin Wiedeking, “For Porsche to remain independent, it can’t be dependent on the most fickle segment in the market. We don’t want to become just a marketing department of some giant. We have to make sure we’re profitable enough to pay for future development ourselves.”

So in 2002, Porsche did the unthinkable. It became one of the last car companies to jump into the insatiable sport utility vehicle (SUV) market. At roughly 5,000 pounds, the new Porsche Cayenne was heavier than anything that Porsche had ever made, with the exception of some prototype tanks it made during WWII. Once again, the new model featured an engine up front. And it was the first Porsche to ever be equipped with seatbelts for five. As news spread about the car’s development, howls could be heard from Porsche’s customer base.

But this time, Porsche did not seem too concerned that the loyalists would be put off. Could it be that the company had already forgotten what happened the last time it deviated from the mold? After driving one of the first Cayenne’s off the assembly line, one journalist stated, “A day at the wheel of the 444 horsepower Cayenne Turbo leaves two overwhelming impressions. First, the Cayenne doesn’t behave or feel like an SUV, and second, it drives like a Porsche.” This was no entry-level car. Porsche had created a two-and-a-half ton beast that could accelerate to 60 miles per hour in just over five seconds, corner like it was on rails, and hit 165 miles per hour, all while coddling five adults in sumptuous leather seats with almost no wind noise from the outside world. On top of that, it could keep up with a Land Rover when the pavement ended. Indeed, Porsche had created the Porsche of SUVs.

Last year, Porsche upped the ante one more time. It unveiled another large vehicle. But this time, it was a low-slung, five-door luxury sedan. The Porsche faithful and the automotive press again gasped in disbelief. But by the time the Panamera hit the pavement, Porsche had proven once again that Porsche customers could have their cake and eat it to. The Panamera is almost as big as the Cayenne but can move four adults down the road at speeds of up to 188 miles per hour and accelerate from a standstill to 60 miles per hour in four seconds flat.

Although some Porsche traditionalists would never be caught dead driving a front engine Porsche that has more than two doors, Porsche insists that two trends will sustain these new models. First, a category of Porsche buyers has moved into life stages that have them facing inescapable needs; they need to haul more people and stuff. This not only applies to certain regular Porsche buyers, but Porsche is again seeing buyers enter its dealerships that otherwise wouldn’t have. Only this time, the price points of the new vehicles are drawing only the well heeled, allowing Porsche to maintain its exclusivity. These buyers also seem to fit the achiever profile of regular Porsche buyers.

The second trend is the growth of emerging economies. Whereas the United States has long been the world’s biggest consumer of Porsches, the company expects China to become its biggest customer before too long. Twenty years ago, the United States accounted for about 50 percent of Porsche’s worldwide sales. Now, it accounts for only about 26 percent. In China, many people who can afford to buy a car as expensive as a Porsche also hire a chauffeur. The Cayenne and the Panamera are perfect for those who want to be driven around in style but who may also want to make a quick getaway if necessary.

The most recent economic downturn has brought down the sales of just about every maker of premium automobiles. When times are tough, buying a car like a Porsche is the ultimate deferrable purchase. But as this downturn turns back up, Porsche is better poised than it has ever been to meet the needs of its customer base. It is also in better shape than ever to maintain its brand image with the Porsche faithful and with others as well. Sure, understanding Porsche buyers is still a difficult task. But a former CEO of Porsche summed it up this way: “If you really want to understand our customers, you have to understand the phrase, ‘If I were going to be a car, I’d be a Porsche.’

4 Questions – Answer all Total Marks: 25

1.   Critically analyze the relevant Porters generic strategies and the growth strategies Porsche is pursuing , justify your answer by referring to the case study (5 marks)

2. Marketing had evolved through five stages, out of this five which concept or concepts is Porsche following , justify your answer. Do you agree with this why or why not (5 marks)