Five provinces in Canada raised their minimum wage on Thursday, Oct 1st. Ryhs’s blog commented on this. According to him, this government plan is reckless and unachievable. He mainly pointed out that small businesses would be seriously affected. As a result, they would be forced to either raise the price of products or lay off the workers.

Nevertheless, I strongly agree with the minimum wage raise. Firstly, as the Alberta Federation of Labour’s acting president, Siobhan Vipond said, the increases are actually good for Albertans and good for local business. Because people in this wage level tend to spend their money locally, raising the minimum wages just means giving them a larger budget to put into the local economy. Similarly, to raise the minimum wage actually helps offset the inequity of Canadian income. Moreover, improving the minimum wage is a necessary step to enhance public welfare and people’s standard of living.  Also, the “fight for $15” is demonstrated to be achievable. For example, San Francisco, Seattle and Los Angeles have already passed 15 dollar minimum wage laws. Besides, to strengthen and assure work efficiency, all businesses should guarantee that their employees are the best. This means that their employees are able to support themselves by working for this specific company.

Reference:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/five-provinces-hike-minimum-wage/article26618941/

(Source)

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/03/12/bc-raises-minimum-wage-_n_6857768.html

In October 2nd, 2015, an Ikea-themed art exhibition was launched in England. This is clear proof of how successful Ikea is in the UK. There was another report posted on October 30th, 2012, saying that Ikea had changed the Warrington’s life in 25 years. It had suggested that one in five people sleep on an Ikea mattress, and more shockingly, one in 10 babies are conceived in Ikea beds. Indubitably, a huge success in business is always inseparable with a genius marketing strategy. Ikea is selling similar products with other furniture companies but in a completely different way.

Firstly, the Ikea company itself runs hundreds of research projects in order to learn about people’s lifestyle in different places. Through this process, Ikea researchers are able to understand people’s working habits, traveling habits, and even eating habits, in a specific area. Accordingly, Ikea would sell products that are most convenient for the locals.

Secondly, Ikea employees, which include both the artisan and the designer have tried their best to lower the cost through the productive progress.  Consequentially, Ikea is able to provide customers their  “breath-taking items” at an extremely low price. For example, instead of explaining the instruction in words, the brand designer draws it in several easy to understanding pictures in order to save the cost in the translating process.

Thirdly, Ikea helps consumers save the delivery cost of furnitures by offering compact cardboard packages. The packages are so convenient that customers could easily carry it in their cars and take it home by themselves.

References:

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-20123362

http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-34423028

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windsor/ikea-to-open-its-first-pick-up-point-store-in-london-ont-1.3072258

(Source)

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ikea-Brooklyn-Warehouse-Aisles.jpg

http://www.steveharvey.com/news/ikea-raises-minimum-pay-again/

In response to the increasing quality and quantity demands of food worldwide, a long-term effort have been made by food manufactures. Companies started to introduce chemical ingredients into their food products, known as food additives. However, with the addition of countless types of food additives, serious food safety problems, or business ethical problem, eventually came out.

In 2008 July 16th, Sanlu, which is a powdered milk company in China, was revealed to have been adding a poisonous ingredient in their powdered milk, which is melamine. It could cause kidney stones and other kidney damages to human.

In my own perspective, the melamine contamination event happened due to two  factors—external and internal. Internally, Sanlu did break the unspoken rule in business world, which is to “increase its profit so long as it stays within the rules of game, which is to say, engage in open and free competition without deception or fraud.” They focus on making more  profit and failed to take all their effort to guarantee the safety of their product.  To test the product comprehensively to ensure it is safe.  Externally, the government should also take responsibilities for their failure in strengthening the system of business law (the company didn’t put in effort to guarantee the safety of their products due to the loose enforcement of business law) and made it strict enough that company would abide by it. Besides, it generated a trust issue in Chinese powdered milk market. Especially, the people who believed in this brand of milk powder and bought it for their baby began to buy all food with imported brand rather than the domestic brands.

References ：

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7701477.stm

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0924224409001551

(Source)

https://www.google.ca/search?espv=2&tbm=isch&q=%E4%B8%89%E9%B9%BF%E5%A5%B6%E7%B2%89%E5%A9%B4%E5%84%BF&revid=605281761&sa=X&ved=0CB4Q1QIoBGoVChMI7qKR-rr9xwIVkaWICh1jUwFW&dpr=1&biw=1440&bih=731#imgrc=7OGkhWNcfpJUqM%3A

In the recent decade, many so-called illegal taxi services appeared in cities. Not only developed countries such as America and France began to have this kind of service, but also China, which is a developing country, has a taxi-calling service. On 25th June 2015, Uber, which is a taxi service company, had been banned by the French government due to its legal eligibility and the riots of rebellion it caused. Nevertheless, I think we have to admit the rationality of the appearance of the illegal taxi service. 

To delve into the essence of the illegal taxi issue, we cannot deny that the legally existing taxi service, namely the yellow cab, fails to satisfy everyone’s need.

For the yellow cab itself, there are some reason why people did not like and use it. Firstly, the unaffordable price and the long waiting time of those taxi services in the developed country are the obstacles of the taxi service. Secondly, unfriendly attitudes and untidy environment of the taxi in developing country made people always feel disappointed about the service.

For the government and sectors that control over the legitimate taxi industry, they should have done a better job to make taxi more accessible, more convenient and more affordable. Rather than spending time to ban the illegal taxi companies off their country, the government should strengthen the traditional taxi industry in order to make it more competitive amongst all taxi services.

References:

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/03/revving-up

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-34404692

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33281896

(Source)

http://bbs.kafan.cn/thread-1837087-1-1.html