Malvina Maska  Week 2 Discussion COLLAPSE Top of Form What has happened to the income share of the richest fifth of the U.S. population over the past 40 years? A result that happened to the income share of the richest fifth is that they became more rich than they were. According to the book average income in 2006  richest fifth of the U.S households is $149,963. About 15 times as much income as the poorest fifth. From 1970- 2014 more unequal distribution.  What groups in the U.S. population are most likely to live in poverty? The group may vary because that depends since the federal government has set up calculations that depend on the family size and gets adjusted every year depending on the changes in the level of prices.  When gauging the amount of inequality, why do transitory and life cycle variations in income cause difficulties?  While trying to distribute  benefits in order to reduce poverty there are some difficulties dealing while dealing with improving society such as Welfare people take advantage  of the options that are available so they can adjust with the requirements to apply for welfare such as they get encouraged to break up or encouraged to have babies in order to be qualified to gets those benefits by the government. Or instead of curing their illness that prevented them from working they exaggerate so they can keep benefit from those programs.  How would a utilitarian, a liberal, and a libertarian each determine how much income inequality is permissible? In utilitarian cases the government tried to have more utility for the poor that way to rich people that way to avoid an inefficient use of resources.  Liberals insist on having policies available in order to protect people against the risk of lawsuit or other events.  Libertarians want to enforce more restricted laws that protect individuals and provide equal opportunities.  What are the pros and cons of in-kind (rather than cash) transfers to the poor? The  pros on in-kind process is that they provide them with a supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program SNAP so they can provide them to buy food on the store and Medicate Government tent to help poor people from surviving but do not encourage them to work.  Describe how antipoverty programs can discourage the poor from working. How might you reduce this disincentive? What are the disadvantages of your proposed policy? The disadvantage of providing them benefits is that people get discouraged and aimed not to work. Some of them they are not 100% dissabled they still have some skills and availability to do certain things that will help the society, before providing full benefits to poor people they should test their percentage of abilities. Or at least reduce benefits when their income start to raise or provide benefits for limited period of time the verify who really needs it. Yanjun Chen  Yanjun Chen COLLAPSE Top of Form 1. What has happened to the income share of the richest fifth of the U.S. population over th.

1. Malvina Maska
Week 2 Discussion
COLLAPSE
Top of Form
What has happened to the income share of the richest fifth of
the U.S. population over the past 40 years?
A result that happened to the income share of the richest fifth is
that they became more rich than they were. According to the
book average income in 2006 richest fifth of the U.S
households is $149,963. About 15 times as much income as the
poorest fifth. From 1970- 2014 more unequal distribution.
What groups in the U.S. population are most likely to live in
poverty?
The group may vary because that depends since the federal
government has set up calculations that depend on the family
size and gets adjusted every year depending on the changes in
the level of prices.
When gauging the amount of inequality, why do transitory and
life cycle variations in income cause difficulties?
While trying to distribute benefits in order to reduce poverty
there are some difficulties dealing while dealing with improving
society such as Welfare people take advantage of the options
that are available so they can adjust with the requirements to
apply for welfare such as they get encouraged to break up or
encouraged to have babies in order to be qualified to gets those
benefits by the government. Or instead of curing their illness
that prevented them from working they exaggerate so they can
keep benefit from those programs.
How would a utilitarian, a liberal, and a libertarian each
determine how much income inequality is permissible?
In utilitarian cases the government tried to have more utility for

2. the poor that way to rich people that way to avoid an inefficient
use of resources.
Liberals insist on having policies available in order to protect
people against the risk of lawsuit or other events.
Libertarians want to enforce more restricted laws that protect
individuals and provide equal opportunities.
What are the pros and cons of in-kind (rather than cash)
transfers to the poor?
The pros on in-kind process is that they provide them with a
supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program SNAP so they can
provide them to buy food on the store and Medicate Government
tent to help poor people from surviving but do not encourage
them to work.
Describe how antipoverty programs can discourage the poor
from working. How might you reduce this disincentive? What
are the disadvantages of your proposed policy?
The disadvantage of providing them benefits is that people get
discouraged and aimed not to work. Some of them they are not
100% dissabled they still have some skills and availability to do
certain things that will help the society, before providing full
benefits to poor people they should test their percentage of
abilities. Or at least reduce benefits when their income start to
raise or provide benefits for limited period of time the verify
who really needs it.
Yanjun Chen
Yanjun Chen
COLLAPSE
Top of Form
1. What has happened to the income share of the richest fifth of
the U.S. population over the past 40 years?

3. Over the past four decades, the proportion of the national
income share of the wealthiest Americans, who account for one-
fifth of the total population of the United States, has increased
from 10% to 20%, which has doubled.
1. What groups in the U.S. population are most likely to live in
poverty?
Accoring to Sauter (2018), we know poverty is an economic
illness that affects all population groups, but the impact on each
population group is different. In the United States, the
following population groups are most likely to live in poverty:
black and Hispanic people, children, and families headed by
women without husbands.
(1) Poverty is related to race. Blacks and Hispanics are about
three times more likely to live in poverty than whites.
(2) Poverty is related to age. Children are more likely to be
members of poor families than ordinary people, while elderly
people are less likely to be poor than ordinary people.
(3) Poverty is related to family structure. Families headed by
women without husbands are more than five times more likely
to live in poverty than ordinary families.
1. When gauging the amount of inequality, why do transitory
and life cycle variations in income cause difficulties?
The distribution of current and long-term income is more
important than the distribution of annual income. Permanent
income is harder to measure because it does not include
temporary changes in income; However, it is more evenly
distributed than lifecycle income
1. How would a utilitarian, a liberal, and a libertarian each
determine how much income inequality is permissible?
Utilitarian argues that if government income redistribution
policies fail to balance the benefits of greater equality with the
costs of distorting incentives, then income inequality is as high
as is permissible. Liberals argue that income inequality is as
high as it can go if government policies to redistribute income
make things worse for the least fortunate. Liberal supremacists
believe that any level of income inequality is permissible so

4. long as the process of determining income distribution is fair.
1. What are the pros and cons of in-kind (rather than cash)
transfers to the poor?
Advantage: I think the advantage of in-kind transfers to the
poor is that they can get what they need the most, and if you
give them cash, they're probably not going to take the cash to
buy what they need or what they need the most, they're going to
take the cash to buy alcohol or drugs or whatever.
Disadvantage: First, in-kind transfers to the poor is inefficient
and do not replace more valuable goods. Because cash is the
general equivalent, it can be exchanged for whatever kind is
needed (generally speaking) or used for other purposes such as
investment, etc., which is far better than the real equivalent. I
think the poor know what they need better. If the poor can get
cash, they can use it to invest in the stock market and get more
money. If cash is replaced by in-kind transfers, they get the
equivalent of food, so they can only feed themselves.
1. Describe how antipoverty programs can discourage the poor
from working. How might you reduce this disincentive? What
are the disadvantages of your proposed policy?
The anti-poverty program has led to the reluctance of some
people in poverty to get out of poverty. They do not think of
making progress and do not take the initiative to get in touch
with others. They only enjoy the poverty treatment. I think the
best solution is to gradually reduce subsidies to poor families as
their incomes rise.While my Suggestions are useful, the policies
I propose have disadvantages, because they increase the cost of
anti-poverty programs.
Reference:
Sauter, M. B. (2018, October 10). Faces of poverty: What
racial, social groups are more likely to experience it? Retrieved
May 26, 2020, from
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/economy/2018/10/10/fa
ces-poverty-social-racial-factors/37977173/

5. Bottom of Form
Lin Xiang
RE: Week 4 Question
COLLAPSE
Top of Form
Root Cause Analysis (RCA) is popular and often-used a
technique that helps people answer the question of why the
problem occurred in a certain place or a certain situation. For
my final project, our group is going to analyze the intercultural
communication problems that Dolce & Gabbana faced when it
promoted its products to Chinese customers. We used the
specific case that Dolce & Gabbana launched a racist
advertisement. One thing to be aware of in this case is the
information transfer through social media in the intercultural
context. So, we need to know what happened, why it happened,
and what to do to reduce the likelihood that it will happen
again.
In order to perform root cause analyses, I basically have used
two techniques, asking questions and using the “Fishbone
Tool”. Through this week’s reading, we know that the
surprising power of questions. Although this article analyzes the
power of questions more based on the interpersonal
communication context, I think it is also very useful for us to
do root cause analyses. Before I started the analysis, I asked
several questions to myself, like “Why Dolce & Gabbana
released this AD?”, “Who designed this advertisement?”, and
“Is the heroine in the AD Chinese or a foreigner?”. As John and
Brooks (2018) said, asking questions is an unlocking learning
process. By asking questions, I can learn and collect more
information, so that I can know more about this case. At the
same time, it will allow me to ask deeper questions. Step by
step, the analysis will go deeper and deeper. Compared to
“Asking questions”, the “Fishbone Tool” is more effective when
used in a team. “A cause and effect diagram often called a

6. “Fishbone” diagram, can help in brainstorming to identify
possible causes of a problem and in sorting ideas into useful
categories” (API, n.d.). The first and most important thing is to
state the problem and then classify the causes of the problem.
This approach focuses on teamwork, so it requires
brainstorming and discussion to identify all possible causes.
Then, ask again why.
Case analysis is teamwork. In addition to individual analysis
and opinions, the analysis of other team members is equally
important. Therefore, for me personally, I adopted the way of
asking questions. For the group discussion, we used the
“Fishbone Tool”.
API (n.d.), How to Use the Fishbone Toole for Root Cause
Analysis. Retrieved May 2, 2020,
from https://www.cms.gov/medicare/provider-enrollment-
andcertification/qapi/downloads/fishbonerevised.pdf
Brooks, Alison Wood, and Leslie K. John. The Surprising
Power of Questions. Harvard
Business Review 96, no. 3 (May–June 2018): 60–67.
Bottom of Form
Zihan Ren
RE: Week 4 Question
COLLAPSE
Top of Form
Root cause analysis is an approach for identifying the
underlying causes of an incident so that the most effective
solutions can be identified and implemented. It’s typically used
when something goes badly, but can also be used when
something goes well. Implementing RCA will help an
organization to identify barriers and the causes of problems, so
that permanent solutions can be found, to develop a logical
approach to problem-solving, using data that already exists in
the agency and to identify current and future needs for
organizational improvement. (Jelinek, 2019). Establish

7. repeatable, step-by-step processes, in which one process can
confirm the results of another. Within an organization, root
cause analysis is fundamentally connected by three basic
questions. What’s the problem? Why did it happen? What will
be done to prevent it from happening again?
Our final project is to identify the problems within Disney’s
theme park opened in France and to make suggestions and
recommendations to the problems identified. In order to conduct
the RCA, we firstly need to define the problems. Then, our team
will collect the data and information regarding the problems.
Thirdly, we will identify the cause of the problems and
prioritize the causes. Fourthly, we will collect the solutions that
other organizations used to deal with similar problems. Lastly,
we will pick up some possible solutions from other cases,
brainstorm some solutions and customized the solutions to make
sure that they will be suitable for Disney’s problems.
According to this week’s course material, we understand the
power of asking questions. Before we start to analyze the case,
we should have some questions in our mind. For example, why
Disney had done well in its American and Janpanese market?
What did its French customers think about the theme park? With
these questions, our team are better directed when collecting the
data and information.
Reference：
Jelinek, J. (2019). Root Cause Analysis. Washington State
Department of Enterprise Services. Retrieved
from: https://des.wa.gov/services/risk-management/about-risk-
management/enterprise-risk-management/root-cause-analysis
Bottom of Form