Amazon quietly changed its shipping policy without any press release. Free shipping standard is changed from $25 to $35. This change in shipping policy seems to disappoint customers who only buy some cheap things form Amazon. Some customers may change their mind to consider whether they will buy things from Amazon or from other ways. As estimated, Amazon loses $11 per person by changing this policy. However, in fact, the move will maybe boost Amazon’s sales.

The prime members doubled in lessthan two years. The prime members who pay $79 annual fee have unlimited free two-day shipping. Also, they have attractive prime service of using Kindle lending library and watching videos. Amazon will convince more people to be its prime members since it is lucrative. Changing free shipping standard from $25 to $35 triggers more people to be Amazon prime members. It is because if a person is a prime member, he will buy much more things to achieve his money’s worth with the free shipping.

In the long-term, I believe Amazon will gain more profit than before, since changing the shipping policy aims at stimulating more customers to be Amazon prime members. Amazon takes the advantage of consumer psychology to generate more loyal customers. Tempting services Amazon offers is attractive enough to maintain an increasing numberof customers of longstanding.

Resource:  http://business.time.com/2013/10/22/better-add-more-stuff-to-your-cart-because-amazon-just-made-it-harder-to-get-free-shipping/

Chanel Liu’s post, “Why is Hard to Buy an iPhone 5S These Days?”, indicates that Apple used a strategy called “hunger marketing”(the commodity producer reduces the quantity supplied in order to trigger a higher demand) to gain a much higher profit.

The fact is that iPhone 5S is enough popular so that this marketing strategy is practical and useful. Due to the preference of consumers, iPhone 5S becomes a trend and a large number people desire and have a plan to buy it. As a result, there is an inelastic demand. Even though the price goes up, many people still want to buy it. Now, the shortage emerges because the quantity supplied is noticeably lower than quantity demanded.

However, here comes out a question. Can competitors take any advantage of the shortage of iPhone 5S? Although some buyers such as buyers who are in urgent need of smartphones will give up lining up for iPhone 5S and choose other models of phones, Apple still has a much higher possibility to win the battle. It is because Apple released 5C as the alternative in order to keep its consumers.

Resourse: https://blogs.ubc.ca/chanel111/2013/10/03/why-people-cannot-buy-a-new-iphone-5s-these-days/

Nowadays, although some people are getting employed, their jobs are much more menial than their education. For example, people who are expected to political scientists become bartenders.  According to a report, mal-employment increased by 9.3 percent for college students from 2000 to 2010. The result is partially due to the Great Recession in 2008.

Actually, college graduates did much better than people with a high school degree. Therefore, to this point, the graduate qualification seems to be fairly important. Since companies only have limited jobs released, they prefer more skilled workers.

The mal-employment triggers a noticeable problem that those mal-employed people earn half of what their degree-appropriately peers earn. For people in cool majors such as liberal-art and humanities, they face more serious problems in finding matched jobs. However, it does not means that cool majors are not worth studying. People in cool majors are also supposed to have certain social skills as people in other majors. If those people want to break down the barriers, what they have to do is to have a positive mentality and to learn more practical skills to adjust to the social trend.

Reference: http://business.time.com/2013/10/02/foroohar-forget-unemployment-time-to-worry-about-mal-employment/?iid=biz-main-lead