Benjamin Franklin and his contribution to US Essay

Benjamin Franklin and his contribution to US - Essay Example He is favourably considered by many historians as a person who valued personal freedom and fought to see the wishes of the people prevail. This paper is dedicated to the analysis of the contributions of Benjamin Franklin to the country he played a role in founding. Fire was very a dangerous threat to Philadelphians therefore Benjamin Franklin created the Union Fire Company in 1736 to remedy the situation. The company became one of the first volunteer firefighting companies in the United States of America. In 1752, Benjamin created the Philadelphia Contribution for Insurance against Loss by Fire to help those who often suffered irreversible economic loss because of fire damages (Brands 83). Those who had insurance policies were lucky because they could not be wiped out financially by fire damages. In London Benjamin opposed the Stamp Act but failed to prevent its passage. Consequently, he made a political miscalculation by recommending a friend of his to the post of stamp distributor for Pennsylvania. This act annoyed the Pennsylvanians and they threatened to destroy his home in Philadelphia because they believed he had been supporting the measure that they were against all along. However, Benjamin soon realized the extent to which the colonies were resistant to the Stamp Act and gave a testimony before the House of Commons that led to its repeal as noted by Brands (56). In his testimony he said that the Americans would not pay taxes if the Stamp Act was adopted. This made Benjamin the leading American spokesman for American interests in England. He wrote famous essays on behalf of the colonies and was appointed by as an agent of many other colonies to the crown. In 1773, Benjamin wrote two essays that were his most celebrated pro American satirical writings. His essays were An Edict by the King of Prussia and Rules by Which a Great Empire May Be Reduced to a Small One (Houston 312). After the return of Benjamin to Pennsylvania, in 1963, the western frontier

Economic policy and global environment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 1

Economic policy and global environment - Essay Example The reduction in the government spending in 2012 has resulted in falling growth rates over the last three quarters. The shutdown of the government has greatly impacted the government spending. Though these workers will be paid their salaries retroactively, their better halves in the private sector cannot expect the same and this will lower consumption spending in the festive season. The uncertainty in the political environment is likely to affect the investments in the country, which will further result in the weaker growth. Governments Fiscal Policy: Past and Present perspective Historically, the fiscal policies, adopted by the government at state, local or federal levels, have mostly been tailwind for the economy. This implies that it has tried to boost the economy (International Monetary Fund, 2013). This has drawn references from the history that whenever the economy is in recession, the government follows an expansionary fiscal policy. This can be explained with the help of the following graph. Figure 1: Expansionary Monetary Policy (Source: Burnt Hills-Ballstan Lake, n.d.) If the government follows an expansionary policy, either by raising the level of government spending or reducing the level of the taxes, there is an outward expansion of the aggregate demand curve. This is represented by the shift of the curve from AD0 to AD1 (Burnt Hills-Ballstan Lake, n.d.). In this range of the SRAS, there is almost no effect on the rate of inflation which is measured by the price level, measured in the y-axis of the graph. The rationale working here is that during sluggish economic performance, the revenue that can be earned from taxes falls and the level of government spending has... This essay presents a comprehensive economic analysis of the effectiveness of the fiscal policy carried out by American government in 2013 year. Fiscal policy measures are the methods which are applied by the government to adjust the levels of government spending and tax rates that directly influence the growth of an economy. The fiscal policy is used in combination with the monetary policy to control the economic growth. The monetary and fiscal policies can directly affect the rate of inflation and determine whether the country will face conditions of growth or recession In designing the fiscal policies, the government has faced formidable challenges and hence, decided to reduce the level of spending. The rising age of the population, along with rising costs of health care, makes expansionary fiscal policies non-feasible in long run. The rising expenditure by the government would have soon surpassed the revenue earned by government and The analysis has revealed that the government had changed its fiscal policy from expansionary to contractionary for dealing with the recession in the present time. It has been observed that the recent federal shutdown, though for a short period, has slowed down the pace of recovery of the economy. The direct impact was the reduction of the GDP on account of the lay-off of the federal workers. The indirect impact came from the multiplier effects of the government spending cuts. The employment figures were also affected owing to the shutdown and resulted in the loss of investor confidence.