Thứ Hai, 29 tháng 4, 2013

The 10 Best-Paying College Majors - And Why Business Isn't One Of Them

The Top-Paying College Majors

NACE ranks the college majors where students graduate to enjoy the highest starting salaries in the country. The 2012 list sheds new light on what employers are willing to cough up for the most in-demand employees: the tech-savvy engineers startups and blue-chips need to jump-start innovation.


When I recently looked into the skill-sets that startup employers were most looking for in candidates, one thing was clear: engineering chops are by and large the holy grail of small businesses from Silicon Valley to New York’s entrepreneurial Alleys.

But new evidence shows that it isn’t just startups that are clamoring for tech-talent. As more employers scramble to ramp up innovation, a STEM degree could be the fast-track to financial and professional success every new grad is dreaming of.

Not only are computer scientists and computer engineers the most sought after candidates on the market but–fittingly, understandably–they’re among the highest paid entry level hires that we know of—at least according to the latest research from the National Association of College Employers (NACE) which recently published its latest report of the highest-paying college majors and my colleague Susan Adams covered yesterday.

Given the race for innovation—both in the startup economy and in the big businesses looking to compete with them—it’s no wonder that nine out of the 10 listed degrees are in technology. At the top end of the spectrum, computer engineering majors earn an average of $70,400 upon graduation, trailed by chemical engineers at $66,400 and computer scientists at $64,400.

“This is not surprising since the supply of these graduates is low, but the demand for them is so high,” said NACE executive director Marilyn Mackes, pretty much echoing the sentiments of Elli Sharef, the tech recruiter who weighed in on marketable startup skills last week. They’re both spot-on. Employment, like anything is a supply-and-demand marketplace. A general rule is this: the higher the number of new grads with a given degree, the lower the starting salary. Liberal arts majors, take note.

The struggle to find the talent needed to innovate continues to be a pain point for entrepreneurs and business leaders. At a recent Wharton San Francisco event with the Churchill Club, a Silicon Valley tech and business forum, whether technology will power the next job boom dominated conversation, particularly focusing on the growing gap between the number of college graduates and the number of jobs available. In short, while the unfortunate truth for graduates is that the jobs shortage is going to make finding a well-paying job even harder in the coming years, for STEM graduates opportunity abounds. STEM-related jobs are growing 60% faster than other fields.

Even better news, because the number of graduates  can’t keep up with the clamoring demand in the country’s tech hubs, salaries are being driven ever-upwards. Computer science and engineering majors both saw a nearly 4% increase in starting salaries in the past year, underscoring the demand for their skill-sets.

And the news gets even better in the nation’s tech hubs. Case in point: while the average starting salary for a computer science major is $64,400 according to the NACE report, reports on sites like Glassdoor.com show entry-level software engineers on Google’s Mountain View campus earning more—much more: $113,000 at last glance.

To identify the most profitable majors, NACE uses actual starting salaries from over 400,000 U.S. employers and measures an average starting salary for members of the graduating class of 2012 at $44,455, a 3.4% increase from starting salaries in 2011. Among the broad categories of majors, education (5.4%), business (4.2%), and communications (4.1%) experienced the largest increases to their average starting salaries, but for the first time the report looks at specific degree types to better pinpoint the robust demand for tech candidates.

Source: Forbes.com


Thứ Bảy, 27 tháng 4, 2013

Antiquities Looting and the War in Syria

The U.S. Committee of the Blue Shield met earlier this month in Washington, D.C. to discuss the impact on cultural heritage caused by Syria's armed conflict. The Blue Shield is paying close attention to the situation as wartime traffickers spill artifacts onto the black market and looters trade artifacts for guns.

Several news outlets have described the deteriorating situation, including TIME MagazineThe Washington Post, and The New York Times. The April 7, 2013 CNN report below sheds light on how antiquities are exchanged for gun money.



This post is researched, written, and published on the blog Cultural Heritage Lawyer Rick St. Hilaire at culturalheritagelawyer.blogspot.com. Text copyrighted 2010-2013 by Ricardo A. St. Hilaire, Attorney & Counselor at Law, PLLC. Any unauthorized reproduction or retransmission of this post is prohibited. CONTACT INFORMATION: www.culturalheritagelawyer.com

Thứ Sáu, 26 tháng 4, 2013

The High Price of Being Single in America

Over a lifetime, unmarried women can pay as much as a million dollars more than their married counterparts for healthcare, taxes, and more. 

banner chuck larry.jpg

In October 2009, New York Times reporters Tara Siegel Bernard and Ron Lieber compared a hypothetical married couple with an equivalent-earning unmarried gay couple, to see just how much difference those extra privileges made. Here's what they found:
In our worst case, the couple's lifetime cost of being gay was $467,562. But the number fell to $41,196 in the best case for a couple with significantly better health insurance, plus lower taxes and other costs.
This is unfair. The solution? Bernard and Lieber argue that "the federal government [should legalize] same-sex marriage." But in fact, legalizing gay marriage only solves the problem for a few. Many more single people (gay and straight)—more than half of the population—continue to suffer from institutionalized singlism, the discrimination of individuals based on marital status.
U.S. Federal Code Title 5 Part III says: The President may prescribe rules which shall prohibit... discrimination because of marital status. Yet more than 1,000 laws provide overt legal or financial benefits to married couples. Marital privileging marginalizes the 50 percent of Americans who are single. The U.S. government is the main perpetrator, but private companies follow its lead. Thus marital privilege pervades nearly every facet of our lives. Insurance policies—ranging from health, to life, to home, to car—cost more, on average, for unmarried people compared to those who are married. It is not a federal crime for landlords to discriminate against potential renters based on their marital status. And so on.
One reason these policies exist is to encourage people to get married, because being married was—and still is—considered a social good. Some have suggested that marriage makes people healthier and happier, but critics such as Dr. Bella DePaulo have pointed out that most studies show that, in the long term, there is little to no difference between married and single people in terms of health, happiness, or personal responsibility. Additionally, these studies are often poorly designed, consider data sets that are not representative of the general population, or fail to consider alternative hypotheses—for example, people who are already happy might be more likely to become married, or happiness might come from having close interpersonal relationships, which may or may not include a spouse. Whatever the truth might be about marriage's effects, we the authors would like to redraw the lines of discussion and argue that policy-makers need to reject policies that take into consideration an individual's marital status, because such policies are discriminatory.
We decided to determine a person's lifetime cost of being single by paralleling Bernard and Lieber's general approach. So, blissfully unaware of the morass of math awaiting us, we created four characters living in Virginia: two single women and two married women of equivalent means. The single women made $40,000 and $80,000, as did their married counterparts. The two salaries represent relatively middle and high-income levels in Virginia, where 2011 per capita income was $44,700 statewide. So far, so good. Then we broke out the calculator.
Our married women's husbands worked too, earning $51,000 and $103,000 respectively. (The husbands' salaries to reflect the fact that a woman earns 78 cents for every dollar a man earns, although this is the median rate for all women and in fact black and Hispanic women are paid even less.) We assumed the married women filed jointly with their husbands (generally more advantageous than filing separately). We imagined that our characters worked in Virginia from ages 26 to 66 and then lived for another 20 years after retirement. We chose to examine one year in their lives and extrapolate the lifetime impact from their finances for that particular year.
We quickly realized that our experiment could not be comprehensive. Had we looked more closely at a longer time period, we might have seen some fluctuations. Because we didn't have the resources to run 900 income tax returns over 50 years, as Bernard and Lieber did, we left out many complicating factors of the single-versus-married filing-status dynamic. We did not factor in the differences between a married woman with a working husband and a married woman with a stay-at-home husband. Nor did we consider the high probability that our characters would change or lose jobs several times, and/or receive pay increases throughout their lifetimes. And we didn't consider the expenses of children (though for the record single women bear more of a financial burden of raising children, compared to married women). We did not address the high likelihood that our married women would get a divorce or outlive their husbands. A comparison of single versus married men would also likely return different results.
So, what did we examine? The primary areas where government and corporate policies have institutionalized discrimination against single people: income taxes, Social Security, and IRAs. We also looked at discrimination that is not officially institutionalized: housing and health spending. Singles have little choice but to expend more in these areas out of practical necessity.
Here's the breakdown:
Income Taxes
Normally, married couples can save thousands of dollars just by filing jointly instead of separately. Those thousands are largely the direct result of federal and state laws that privilege married people.
First, we wondered how much our characters would spend in one year in income taxes. We figured this out with the help of a tax professional, who focused on the taxes the women paid during their working careers.
In 2010, our single woman earning $40,000 paid $6,181. Her married peer paid more than a thousand dollars less: $5,162. The contrast became more dramatic as our subjects' incomes increased: our single woman earning $80,000 paid $16,125, whereas her married counterpart paid almost four thousand dollars less per year. (The numbers for 2011 were similar: our marrieds paid $963 and $3,875 less.)
Here are the numbers extrapolated from income hypothetically earned over 40 years, based on the 2011 rates:
Our single woman earning $40,000 per year paid $245,000 in income taxes. Our married woman earning $40,000 paid $206,000 in income taxes—a difference of $39,000.
Our single woman earning $80,000 per year paid $645,000 in income taxes. Our married woman earning $80,000 paid $490,000 in income taxes—a difference of $155,000.
At this point in our calculations, we each wanted to run out and get a husband, STAT. And the buttons on our calculator weren't even warm yet. 

Social Security

Perhaps the most pervasive myth about unmarried people is that no one will care for them as they age. This fear is both ridiculous, and not. We ourselves feel it sometimes, even though we know that having a spouse and/or kids is no guarantee you'll die in satin sheets with the ocean breeze blowing through your window as muscular half-clothed but fully oiled young men fan your greying cheeks with palm fronds and place peanut butter cups between your lips (we will not say which of us has this particular fantasy). But being married does in many ways make planning and saving for the future easier—simply because society provides more such options for married couples. Nowhere is this more obvious than in Social Security.
Social Security started in the 1930s and evolved partly as a way to support child-rearing women who couldn't work (which at the time was about 85 percent of women). They received benefits through their husbands. Today, women can of course hold jobs and put money into Social Security. Upon retirement, married women can claim their own Social Security or their husbands'. But they are subsidized in large part by single people. The original rationale for this policy was the belief that single men would marry eventually and then recoup the benefits of Social Security at that time. But the repercussions of this reasoning impact singles to this day.
If a single person dies without children, her money will—must—go into the system to be provided to whomever needs it most, which is good because that was the original intent of Social Security. However, if a married person dies, the money can be routed back to her family. This is good for the married person, but fails to account for the important people in singles' lives.
Social Security privileges marrieds in many ways. For example, our hypothetical married woman could receive up to 50 percent of her husband's benefits while her husband is alive. Spouses can also receive 100 percent of their dead spouse's benefits, if the deceased's benefits are higher than the recipient's would have been.
But wait, there's more! For married couples, the federal government throws in this handy dual-claim option: When our married woman reaches retirement age, she can claim Social Security as a spouse and then later as a worker. For example, she could sign up for spousal benefits at age 66 and then wait four years before claiming her own benefits, because by delaying she accrues credits which increase her benefits by a certain percentage (depending on her date of birth).
With these benefits in mind, and stiff drinks in our hands, we calculated and recalculated—in today's dollars—how much more Social Security our married woman received than our single woman. We used the Social Security Administration's online calculator to estimate benefits for our two women, assuming they were both born in 1974 and that they retired at age 66 or 70 and lived until 86. We assumed their spouses were the same age and also retired at ages 66 or 70. Below are just some of the many permutations that resulted in relatively large sums of money for marrieds, at the expense of unmarrieds:
If both women earning $40,000 retire at age 66, they will collect $333,600 if we assume our characters live for twenty years after retirement. If our characters both retire at 70, they would each collect $357,504 over the next 16 years.
If they retire four years later, both our women earning $40,000 can collect an additional $23,904. But suppose during those additional years, our married woman takes her option to collect on her (now retired) husband's Social Security (in addition to her own income). Because her husband has earned $51,000 per year for the last 40 years, his wife would receive $39,768 for those four years, which is half of his Social Security (and doesn't diminish the amount he receives). That's $39,768 that our single woman did not have the option of receiving from a loved one.
If our women earning $80,000 retire at 66, they will receive $496,080 over the next twenty years. If they can hold out on retiring for another four years, they will get $528,960 over the next 16 years.
But again, our married woman earning $80,000 can defer retirement between ages 66 and 70 and earn an extra $55,896 in addition to her own income, simply by also collecting her husband's Social Security.
That's a lot of money the government (and single contributors to Social Security) gives to people for saying "I do." But perhaps nothing illustrates the power of marital privilege more than this: unmarried people can ride on another person's Social Security benefits if they were previously married to that person for at least ten years and are 62 and not entitled to Social Security based on their own work history.
If marriage benefits can be flexed based on the nature of the marital relationship, logic dictates that they might also be adapted to include relationships outside the marital sphere. Both of us can think of someone whom we might want to help support via our Social Security earnings. 

IRAs

Single people can designate anyone as an IRA beneficiary or an inheritor of property—or be the beneficiary him/herself. Sounds like great news, right? Not once you compare unmarried people with their married counterparts. Married couples enjoy privileges related to IRAs and property taxes that are unavailable to singles.
First, a married couple can put two people on an IRA while a single person can't; this puts the single in a disadvantaged position. For example, a married person (such as our married women) can put away $5,000 for her spouse (the husband) for every year when the husband is not working. In contrast, a single person can't put away that money in support of someone else, nor can someone else put away money for the single person if the single person is unemployed and not contributing to her own IRA.
Second, spouses can withdraw money from an IRA early, for medical or education expenses, without the usual 10-percent penalty (if those expenses are greater than the IRA-holder's adjusted gross income by 7.5 percent). While it's never ideal to withdraw money from an IRA early, single people overburdened by unplanned medical expenses will lose 10 percent of the withdrawal amount even if the expenses are high. In other words, single people are penalized when they make the same choices as their married counterparts.
Just as married people can inherit a spouse's IRA, single people can also inherit IRAs, even from someone who's not a relative. Once again, however, married people enjoy significant privileges when they inherit the IRA: If the spouse died before 70 1/2 years of age, and if the surviving spouse is under 59 1/2, he/she can defer the required minimum distribution (RMD) until the spouse would have reached 70 1/2—meaning he/she won't be taxed for RMDs during those years (if the IRA is a traditional one). Additionally, surviving spouses can withdraw cash from the IRA early for any reason without accruing the usual 10-percent penalty—no questions asked.
In contrast, if a single person inherits an IRA, s/he must take the RMD—and be taxed for it—within a year of inheritance. Moreover, if she wishes to withdraw money early, she'll incur the usual 10-percent penalty for doing so. If the IRA owner was older than 70 1/2, the IRA account must be withdrawn within five years. In either situation, the beneficiary must pay regular income taxes on her inheritance. Compare this to the benefits received from a surviving spouse, and the imbalance is clear.

Health Spending
 
In 2009, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) compared spending habits among single men, single women, and married people. Although many of the categories represent "extraneous" expenses (such as shoes, clothing, entertainment, and dining), the categories of housing and health spending stood out to us as significant, in that these expenses are practical and necessary for all adults.
According to the BLS, couples spent 6.9 percent of their annual income on health on average; single men spent only 3.9 percent (the data doesn't explain why this number is so low); and single women spent 7.9 percent. It's not clear how the BLS broke down these numbers into component parts (ie., did they include insurance premiums?). But we used these numbers to calculate the 60-year lifetime spending on health for each of our women, with the following results:
Our single woman with an income of $40,000 spent $189,600 on health over 60 years; whereas our married woman with the same income spent $165,600—a difference of $24,000.
Our married woman with an income of $80,000 spent $331,200 on health over 60 years, and our unmarried woman with the same income spent $379,200—a difference of $48,000.
Our single women would fall even more behind if they became disabled. Here's why. Disability payments barely provide a livable wage. (We know this because one of us has a chronic illness, and while in the woe-is-me throes of a particularly bad flare-up she researched how much she would make if she went on disability. When she saw the numbers, she sucked it up and went back to work.) Such a system greatly favors married disabled people, because by adding their paltry disability payments to their spouse's wages they can more likely come up with a livable income (although of course spousal support is by no means guaranteed—one's husband may prefer to spend his money on food, shelter, or hobbies). Moreover, our unmarried women's retirement accounts will suffer. Without a job and on a tight disability budget, she would likely struggle to save in an IRA, and as we described above, no one could save for her. However, the husband of a non-working, disabled married woman might manage to afford the yearly $5,000 contributions to the IRA.
Here's the main takeaway for health spending: Singles pay thousands of dollars, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars, more in health spending. This is largely because of discriminatory policies by companies and the U.S. government

Housing

In comparison to health spending, the discrepancies that exist for singles' housing are significant. This happens in part because of the inherent logistical costs of living alone (our single woman would pay more to rent a mountaintop mansion in Hawaii than our married woman would pay, as part of a dual-income married couple), but other factors come into play too, including the biased policies mentioned above.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, on average, couples spent 23.9 percent of their annual income on housing; single men spent 30.3 percent; and single women spent 39.8 percent. We can't say why the disparities exist between unmarried men and women, though we speculate that it may have something to do with the wage gap - but that's another article.
We used these numbers to calculate the 60-year lifetime spending on housing for each of our women:
Our single woman making $40,000 spent $955,200 on housing over 60 years, whereas our married woman making $40,000 spent only $573,600. The married woman saves $381,600 in comparison to her unmarried equivalent.
As one might expect, the difference is even more striking when we analyze the women with higher incomes:
Our single woman making $80,000 spent $1,910,400 on housing over 60 years, whereas our married woman making $80,000 spent only $1,147,200- that's a difference of $763,200.
We did consider that the discrepancy was in part due to the simple logistical fact that two people can split a rent or mortgage. However, other less obvious factors also come into play. As described by social scientist and singles advocate Bella DePaulo, author of Singled Out: How Singles are Stereotyped, Stigmatized, Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After, realtors and landlords regularly discriminate against single home-seekers, thus narrowing the pool of housing options for singles. Worse, governments and housing development companies, influenced by the economics of a single-family-worship culture, do not consistently provide housing options for alternative family structures or collective lifestyles that might benefit singles. Just one example might be a house or condo complex with several private bed/bath areas but a shared kitchen and shared living/dining room (and, while we're brainstorming here, a shared beachside Jacuzzi and infinity pool.) 

So, what were the final totals?

With calloused and bleeding fingertips we reached for the calculator one last time.
Because some of the categories described above were either too variable or overlapped with each other, we calculated the single woman's "best" and "worst" lifetime-cost scenarios using only the following financial categories: Income tax, Social Security, Housing, and Health Spending. We added up the amounts paid (or not received) for each single woman under each category. For Social Security, where the results were more multifaceted, we chose to use the numbers for when our married women delayed their retirement and received half of their living husbands' Social Security for four years (this was largely because we were unwilling to inflict spousal death on even our made-up characters).
In each category, the singles paid or lost more than the marrieds. The single woman earning $40,000 paid less than her counterpart earning $80,000, simply because she had less money to start with.
When we calculated how much money our characters gained or lost altogether, our single women did indeed fare worse—much worse—than the married women. Their lifetime cost of being single?
Our lower-earning woman paid $484,368 for being single. Our higher-earning woman paid $1,022,096: more than a million dollars just for being single.
We anticipate that critics will point out that the numbers could be manipulated in any number of ways. At every stage in the process we, too, thought "these sums are just too crazy; surely we must have miscalculated or reasoned wrong." We have, however, made only the most conservative of estimates and still reached the conclusion that, no matter which way you read the numbers, the final assessment remains the same: Singles get screwed.

Source: The Atlantic
 

Thứ Tư, 24 tháng 4, 2013

Arguments For and Against U.S.-China MoU Renewal Submitted to CPAC

"The import restrictions are intended to reduce the incentive for pillage and illicit trafficking in cultural objects." That was the conclusion of the United States government on January 14, 2009 when it enacted protective import controls over endangered cultural property coming from China. Now the bilateral agreement, or Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), enacted between the two countries is up for renewal. The current MoU, authorized by the Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act (CPIA), protects archaeological material from the Paleolithic Period through the Tang Dynasty as well as monumental sculpture and wall art older than 250 years.

The Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC) meets next month at the U.S. State Department to listen to public comment. In anticipation of the meeting, individuals and groups have submitted written arguments for and against the MoU's renewal.

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts writes that it "endorses the proposal to renew the Memorandum of Understanding and particularly applauds the efforts of the memorandum to enhance collaboration between China and the US in understanding the culture of China and its artifacts of world significance." The museum adds, "Our experience with the Palace Museum [Beijing] has been exceptional – collegial, collaborative, and open."

But Dan Monroe, Immediate Past President of the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) and writing on behalf of the AAMD urges caution. He asks CPAC to
(1) carefully and thoroughly consider the impact of the current import ban on the protection of Chinese art and archaeological material; (2) reject any effort to extend the import ban to material created after the Tang Dynasty; and (3) assure that if the current import ban is extended the Chinese government will assure that it is vastly easier for American museums to arrange short and long-term loans from Chinese museums for purposes of exhibition, cultural exchange, and scholarship.
Monroe questions whether import restrictions have worked. "Speaking from an anecdotal perspective, it seems difficult to argue the current US Chinese import ban has achieved the requirements of the law—to wit, significantly reduced illicit trade or the destruction of archaeological sites." He writes, "The European and other markets for Chinese art and archaeological material covered by the current US import ban remain extremely active. It therefore seems very fair to argue the US import ban has done little or nothing to actually reduce illicit trade or protect Chinese archaeological sites."

Dr. Chen Shen, an archaeologist of Chinese prehistory and a senior curator at Canada's Royal Ontario Museum, disagrees. "I observe that over the past five years, the looting and trafficking of antiquities is slowing down, suggesting clearly the MOU is having an effect," notes Dr. Shen. Writing about his first-hand experiences in the field during the last 15 years, he says:
Over the years during my fieldwork I have observed looting situations. In 2001, during my Palaeolithic archaeology project in Shandong Province I and my team were called to help with a selvage (sic) excavation. A few tombs of Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD) had been looted during a stormy night. When we inspected the site the next day, it appeared to us that these burials had already been looted many times before that night.
...
Ten years later when my team worked in the field in Shanxi province, about 1000 miles away from the location above mentioned, we also encountered looting activities nearby. The tombs that were looted date to 3000 – 2000 years old (the East Zhou period). Local authorities told me that these--if excavated properly--would have been a very important discovery, probably the largest scale ancient noble tombs for that period ever known in this region. Sadly few have survived unlooted. I must say, since I have worked in this region for ten years, that I have seen few significant archaeological objects from this region.... It is clear to me that the objects looted in 2011 could be much more significant given the scale of noble tombs identified from lootings.
Terracotta Warriors (Photo Credit: Steffen82)
AAMD asked the Minneapolis Institute of Art to comment in light of the museum's recent experience with the China Terracotta Warriors exhibition. The MIA explains, "We ... respect the desire of the Chinese government to protect and preserve its cultural heritage, and so support the concept of the MOU, but with changes in Article II ...."  Those changes would include quicker finalization of contracts and object lists, faster processing of passports, assistance with fulfilling the requirements for indemnity insurance, a decrease in premium shipping charges by China Air, simplification of the loan approval process, lengthening exhibition tour times from 52 weeks to up to 60 weeks, and greater availability of First Grade objects.

President Diane Penneys Edelman of the Lawyers' Committee for Cultural Heritage Preservation in her letter of support focuses on "the the ratification of multinational treaties and the creation of bilateral agreements with China as evidence that market countries have joined in a 'concerted international effort' to address the pillage of archaeological sites, both in China and throughout the world."

The Ancient Coin Collectors Guild submitted remarks in opposition to the MoU renewal following the trade organization's three failed court challenges to existing CPIA import restrictions covering ancient Chinese coins. Executive Director Wayne Sayles remarks,
If the provisions of CCPIA had been followed scrupulously and faithfully, the present import restrictions on coins from China would not exist. It might seem expedient for CPAC to look only at the status quo and opt for an extension of the existing MOU as is, but that would merely perpetuate the extremely controversial and highly criticized action of five years ago. Is the committee of today really willing to rubberstamp the actions of that era? Those actions by ECA/CHC [U.S. State Department Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs/Cultural Heritage Center], that have been labeled “extralegal”, “arbitrary”, “capricious”, “secretive”, “disdainful”, “unbearable”, “immoral”, “lawless”, “subversive” and “absolutely unAmerican” ought to be examined under a strong light before they are routinely perpetuated by CPAC.
Private collector Alan F. Wurtzel adds, "I believe that the current restrictions are not protecting the cultural artifacts of China or any other country from being looted." He says that "today by far the biggest market for Chinese tomb sculpture is in China" and argues that "Chinese tomb sculpture is highly repetitive and there are often hundreds if not thousands of examples of essentially the same image, many produced by molds." Wurtzel concludes that "[t]he greatest impact of US import restrictions is to deny US citizens the same opportunities as Chinese collectors and most of the rest of the world from enjoying a marvelous artistic tradition that helps to bind the US and China in a common pursuit of beauty and culture...."

President Elizabeth Bartman on behalf of the Archaeological Institute of America's 110 societies and 225,000+ members, by contrast, supports the MoU renewal because of its protection for archaeological context:
As befits a country of the size and geographic diversity of China, the range of archaeological materials and artifacts is vast and ranges from rare jade jewelry to ordinary bronze cookware, from ceramics to textiles to metalwork to sculptures in terracotta and other materials. Many of these works come from tombs, which are by nature scattered in the rural countryside and not easily policed and protected. Their unauthorized removal by looting—which unrestricted imports encourage--is an incomparable loss for both the Chinese and the rest of the world; without systematic and documented excavation, we lose the context of these works and thus the ability to date them, to chart their typological development, and to understand their meaning. We lose potential information regarding trade, social structure (particularly the expression of status and power), attitudes towards death and burial, and daily life, among other topics.

In recent years, Chinese archaeological works have come to be much better-known in the United States through a number of important exhibitions of newly-discovered works
organized by the Chinese authorities.
CPAC meets between May 14 and May 17 to consider the matter.  The public hearing will take place on May 14.

This post is researched, written, and published on the blog Cultural Heritage Lawyer Rick St. Hilaire at culturalheritagelawyer.blogspot.com. Text copyrighted 2010-2013 by Ricardo A. St. Hilaire, Attorney & Counselor at Law, PLLC. Any unauthorized reproduction or retransmission of this post is prohibited. CONTACT INFORMATION: www.culturalheritagelawyer.com

Selective schools forced to take special ed kids

Instrumental music is one of the programs offered at Talent Unlimited. This year, parentssay that the DOE assigned students to the program even though they didn't audition.
Instrumental music is one of the programs offered at Talent Unlimited. This year,
parentssay that the DOE assigned students to the program even though they didn't audition.

Bard advertised that they are giving accommodations on their exams."

Beacon, one of the most sought after schools in the city, also fell short in accepting special needs students. It has had an ICT class for several years, but when it didn’t meet its target, the DOE assigned them a few students whom Beacon had not ranked although they were “appropriate” for the school, said Parent Coordinator Judy Moore.

The Professional Performing Arts School in Manhattan was assigned a few students who didn’t audition, but Principal Keith Ryan said schools have known for more than a year about the DOE mandates.

“There are absolutely no surprises about this situation,” Ryan said. He explained that the DOE “relaxed the screen” to fill his school’s quota of special needs students. He says PPAS tried to meet Manhattan’s target number but, like Bard and Beacon, the school fell short.

Kids practice for months and compete against thousands of other kids to get into the city’s performing arts schools. Parents say it’s unfair that students who auditioned should be passed by. And they fear students who did not meet audition requirements may struggle in school. “If they’re not confident in their studio, they’re miserable in this school. This is a pre-conservatory program,” Finn said of Frank Sinatra.

Dmytro Fedkowskyj, the Queens representative to the Panel on Education Policy, said the DOE policy “diminishes the achievement of the students who auditioned and earned a seat” at the performing arts schools.

 “It isn't fair to the student or the school community when the DOE creates this type of audition environment, establishes entrance rules and then circumvents these same rules at their leisure,” he said.

Sternberg said Frank Sinatra did not fill it seats with enough students whom the school had ranked, so the DOE assigned more students to increase enrollment.

A number of academically demanding schools, such as NYC Lab School for Collaborative Studies, Millennium High School and NYC iSchool in Manhattan, have long admitted students with special needs and successfully integrated them in regular classes. NYCiSchool Principal Isora Bailey actively recruits students with special needs, who make up 15 percent of her students.

“If we only looked at test scores, we would automatically not list a lot of students with IEPs,” Bailey said, referring to the list of students the school sends the DOE’s office of enrollment to match with high school applications. But the school looks at a variety of factors including grades, attendance and an online admissions activity when selecting incoming students, she said.

Still, schools without experience integrating special needs children say they are ill-prepared to help children with disabilities thrive.  “We do not have an ICT, self-contained or D75 program” said Finn at Frank Sinatra Donna. “This is wrong for all these kids.”

The DOE plans to “have conversations one school at a time to make sure we develop a plan that works,” said Sternberg. “I have a lot of confidence in the principal and faculty to work their magic.”

Tonight, April 23, at 6:30 pm, the PTA at Talent Unlimited is hosting a meeting to talk about the issue. A PTA member said that parents from other performing arts schools are welcome to attend.

Source: InsideSchools.org

Thứ Ba, 23 tháng 4, 2013

Terrorist Financing Risks and the Illegal Trade in Cultural Property

There is sufficient anecdotal evidence to conclude that the illegal trade in cultural property may constitute a source of funding for terrorist networks.* This judgment is tacitly acknowledged by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an independent inter-governmental organization that helps to identify, assess, and understand terrorist financing (TF) and money laundering (ML).

I
n recommendations published earlier this year
, FATF expressly takes into account the illegal cultural property trade. 
Its 2013 guidance report titled "National Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Risk Assessment" describes categories that should be included when authorities assess terror funding and money laundering risks. The report lists illicit trafficking of cultural goods, counterfeiting of antiquities, and the illegal trade of antiquities. The report also identifies art and antique dealers and auction houses as businesses "that may be useful [to include] in building a list of the ML/TF vulnerabilities that can be exploited in regulated entities."

FATF recommends that risk assessments focused on terrorist financing and money laundering "should ultimately allow public authorities to make a judgment on the levels of the risks and priorities for mitigating those risks."

One policy response that authorities might consider is the adoption of record keeping laws that spotlight black market antiquities. Such laws would foster transparency, helping to separate the legal cultural property trade from the illegal trade and serving to identify potential ML/TF crimes. A proposal describing these laws can be found in "Spotlighting Black Market Antiquities with Record Keeping Laws."
____________________
* See e.g., Eti Bonn-Muller, Inside the Israel Antiquities Authority: Interview with Amir Ganor, Archeology.org, 2010, http://www.archaeology.org/israel_antiquities_authority/ganor.html;
Blood Antiques (LinkTV broadcast Oct. 8, 2009); S Fidler, A black art: how the trade in stolen artifacts aids money laundering, organized crime, and terrorism. Financial Times. (May 24, 2003).

Research credit: Jayna Sutherland.  Photo credit: darrendean.

This post is researched, written, and published on the blog Cultural Heritage Lawyer Rick St. Hilaire at culturalheritagelawyer.blogspot.com. Text copyrighted 2010-2013 by Ricardo A. St. Hilaire, Attorney & Counselor at Law, PLLC. Any unauthorized reproduction or retransmission of this post is prohibited. CONTACT INFORMATION: www.culturalheritagelawyer.com

Avoiding Medicaid and Medicare Fraud and Abuse


Thứ Hai, 22 tháng 4, 2013

Robert Freeman, Director of the Committee on Open Government, Answers The Question "How Can I file A FOIL Request of The Public Administrator?"



STATE OF NEW YORK
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
COMMITTEE ON OPEN GOVERNMENT


   
One Commerce Plaza99 Washington Ave.Albany, New York 12231
(518) 474-2518
Fax (518) 474-1927
http://www.dos.state.ny.us/coog/coogwww.html 
May 18, 1993
 Mr. G. Allen Randolph
Ms. Jere Williamson
Columbia University in the City
of New York
Graduate School of Journalism
Journalism Building
New York, NY 10027

The staff of the Committee on Open Government is authorized to issue advisory opinions. The ensuing staff advisory opinion is based solely upon the facts presented in your correspondence, except as otherwise indicated.

Dear Mr. Randolph and Ms. Williamson:

As you are aware, I have received your letter of April 2.

In brief, according to your letter and the correspondence attached to it, you requested records from the Office of the New York County Public Administrator but received no response. Due to the failure to respond, you submitted an appeal to the Office of
the New York City Corporation Counsel. However, you wrote that "some sectors believe the Public Administrator is a New York City agency", while others "believe it is under the auspices of the State of New York". You have asked where, in my view, an appeal
should be filed, and you seek any additional input that I might provide.


In this regard, in an effort to assist you, I have engaged in telephone conversations involving New York City, New York State and Surrogate's Court officials. As you know, Public Administrators are appointed by the Surrogate in their respective counties, and
their salaries are paid by New York City (see Surrogate's Court Procedure Act, §§1102, 1108). Further, §1110(1) of the Surrogate's Court Procedure Act states that:

"The City of New York shall be answerable for the faithful execution by the public
administrator of all the duties of his office and for the application by him of all moneys
and property received by him and for all moneys and securities and the interest,
earnings and dividends actually received by him or which he should have collected or
received."


Nevertheless, a representative of the Office of Corporation Counsel expressed the opinion that the Office of Public Administrator is not a City agency, for the City government has no general authority to oversee the operations of the Public Administrator or compel the
Public Administrator to carry out his or her duties. Similarly, it was advised that Corporation Counsel has no jurisdiction over the Public Administrator concerning the implementation of the Freedom of Information Law. Having discussed the matter with an attorney for the Office of Court Administration, it was contended that the Office of Public Administrator is something of a hybrid, and that it is not an extension or an arm of that agency.

Based upon a review of the law and the discussions described earlier, in my opinion, the Office of Public Administrator is not clearly an agency of either New York City or New York State, but rather is sui generis, a unique entity unto itself. Moreover, I believe that it is an "agency" with an independent responsibility to give effect to the Freedom of Information Law.

The Freedom of Information Law applies to agency records, and §86(3) of that statute defines the term "agency" to include:
"any state or municipal department, board, bureau, division, commission, committee,
public authority, public corporation, council, office or other governmental entity performing a governmental or proprietary function for the state or any one or more municipalities thereof, except the judiciary or the state legislature."


In turn, §86(1) defines "judiciary" to mean:
"the courts of the state, including any municipal or district court, whether or not of
record."


As such, the courts are not subject to the Freedom of Information Law. By means of analogy, however, I point out that it has been held that the Office of Court Administration is an "agency" required to comply with the Freedom of Information Law. The initial decision on the subject, which cited an advisory opinion prepared by this office, included the following discussion of the matter:
"The court must look to the intent of the legislature to determine whether the Office of
Court Administration, in the exercise of a purely administrative and personnel function,
is to be excluded from the applicable provisions of the Freedom of Information Law.
Public Officers Law §84 states in part 'The people's right to know the process of
governmental decisionmaking and to review the documents and statistics leading to
determinations is basic to our society.  Access to such information should not be
thwarted by shrouding it with the cloak of secrecy or confidentiality.'


"In view of the legislative purpose to promote open government, the court is inclined to
construe narrowly any section that would tend to exclude offices of government from the law.  Public Officers Law §86 specifically refer to courts when it defines 'Judiciary.' The
legislature did not include the administrative arm of the court. The Office of Court
Administration does not exercise a judicial function, conduct civil or criminal trials, or
determine pre-trial motions. Respondent is not a 'court.'


"It is significant to note that respondent refers to several sections of the Judiciary
Law that regulate access to judicial records and allegedly perform a function similar to
that of the Freedom of Information Law. None of the sections specified would address access to the information sought by petitioner pertaining to personnel and salaries
exclusively.


"Accordingly, the court rejects respondent's contention that it is in all respects exempt
from the provisions of the Freedom of Information Law." [Babigian v. Evans, 427 NYS
2d 688, 689 (1980) aff'd 97 Ad 2d 992 (1983); Quirk v. Evans, 455 NYS 2d 918, 97 Ad 2d 992 (1983)].


Like the Office of Court Administration, which administers the court system and is an agency subject to the Freedom of Information Law, the Office of Public Administrator, as its title suggests, performs administrative functions relative to Surrogates' Courts inNew York City. Further, the information sought would not constitute court records or pertain to judicial proceedings; on the contrary, it pertains to records involving administrative functions.

Assuming that the Office of Public Administrator is an agency subject to the Freedom of Information Law, it would be required to carry out its duties in accordance with certain procedural rules and regulations. By way of background, §89(1)(b)(iii) of the Freedom of Information Law requires the Committee on Open Government to promulgate regulations concerning the procedural aspects of the Law (see 21 NYCRR Part 1401). In turn, §87(1) of the Law requires each agency to promulgate rules and regulations consistent with the Law and the Committee's regulations.

The initial responsibility to deal with requests is borne by an agency's records access officer, and the Committee's regulations provide direction concerning the designation and duties of a records access officer. Specifically, §1401.2 of the regulations provides in relevant part that:
"(a) The governing body of a public corporation and the head of an executive agency or governing body of other agencies shall be responsible for insuring compliance with the regulations herein, and shall designate one or more persons as records access officer by name or by specific job title and business address, who shall have the duty of  coordinating agency response to public requests for access to records. The designation of one or more records access officers shall not be construed to prohibit officials who have in the past been authorized to make records or information available to the public from continuing to do so."
Section 1401.2(b) of the regulations describes the duties of a records access officer, including the duty to coordinate the agency's response to requests. 

In addition, §1401.7 of the Committee's regulations provide in part that:
"(a) The governing body of a public corporation or the head, chief executive or governing body of other agencies shall hear appeals or shall designate a person or body to hear appeals regarding denial of access to records under the Freedom of Information Law.
(b) Denial of access shall be in writing stating the reason therefore and advising the
person denied access of his or her right to appeal to the person or body established to
hear appeals, and that person or body shall be identified by name, title, business address
and business telephone number. The records access officer shall not be the appeals
officer." 


I point out, too, that the Freedom of Information Law provides direction concerning the time and manner in which agencies must respond to requests and appeals. Specifically, §89(3) of the Freedom of Information Law states in part that:
"Each entity subject to the provisions of this article, within five business days of the
receipt of a written request for a record reasonably described, shall make such record
available to the person requesting it, deny such request in writing or furnish a written
acknowledgement of the receipt of such request and a statement of the approximate date when such request will be granted or denied..."


If neither a response to a request nor an acknowledgement of the receipt of a request is given within five business days, or if an agency delays responding for an unreasonable time after it acknowledges that a request has been received, a request may, in my
opinion, be considered to have been constructively denied. In such a circumstance, I believe that the denial may be appealed in accordance with §89(4)(a) of the Freedom of Information Law. That provision states in relevant part that:

"any person denied access to a record may within thirty days appeal in writing such denial to the head, chief executive, or governing body, who shall within ten business
days of the receipt of such appeal fully explain in writing to the person requesting
the record the reasons for further denial, or provide access to the record sought."


In addition, it has been held that when an appeal is made but a determination is not rendered within ten business days of the receipt of the appeal as required under §89(4)(a) of the Freedom of Information Law, the appellant has exhausted his or her administrative remedies and may initiate a challenge to a constructive denial of access under Article 78 of the Civil Practice Rules [Floyd v. McGuire, 87 AD 2d 388, appeal dismissed 57
NY 2d 774 (1982)].


In sum, as the head of an agency subject to the Freedom of Information Law, the Public Administrator is in my opinion required to promulgate rules for the procedural implementation of that statute, which would include the designation of a records access
officer, as well as an appeals officer. The appeals officer would be the Public Administrator or a person designated to determine appeals by the Public Administrator.


With respect to rights of access, the Freedom of Information Law is based upon a presumption of access. Stated differently, all records of an agency are available, except to the extent that records or portions thereof fall within one or more grounds for denial appearing in section 87(2)(a) through (i) of the Law.

The records that you requested involved those reflective of the "identity of any consultant or consultants and vendor or vendors who provided computer consultation services or equipment to the Office of the Public Administrator, County of New York in the years 1989 through 1993." In my opinion, insofar as the records sought are maintained by the Office of Public Administrator and can be found, they would be available. In short, none of the grounds for denial could properly be asserted to withhold the kinds of records that fall within the scope of your request, such as contracts, bills, vouchers, purchase orders and the like.
Moreover, although you may be students or non-residents, those factors are irrelevant to your rights under the Freedom of Information Law as members of the public. When records are available under the Freedom of Information Law, it has been held that they must be made equally available to any person, without regard to status or interest [see M. Farbman & Sons v. New York City Health & Hosps. Corp., 62 NY 2d 75 (1984); Burke v. Yudelson, 51 AD 2d 673 (1976)].

Finally, it is emphasized that the courts have consistently interpreted the Freedom of Information Law in a manner that fosters maximum access. As stated by the Court of Appeals more than decade ago:
"To be sure, the balance is presumptively struck in favor of disclosure, but in eight
specific, narrowly constructed instances where the governmental agency convincingly
demonstrates its need, disclosure will not be ordered (Public Officers Law, section 87, subd 2). Thus, the agency does not have carte blanche to withhold any information it
pleases. Rather, it is required to articulate particularized and specific justification and,
if necessary, submit the requested materials to the courts for in camera inspection, to
exempt its records from disclosure (see Church of Scientology of N.Y. v. State of New York, 46 NY 2d 906, 908). Only where the material requested falls squarely within the ambit of one of these statutory exemptions may disclosure be withheld" [Fink v. Lefkowitz, 47 NY 2d 567, 571 (1979)]."


In another decision rendered by the Court of Appeals, it was held that:
"Exemptions are to be narrowly construed to provide maximum access, and the agency seeking to prevent disclosure carries the burden of demonstrating that the requested material falls squarely within a FOIL exemption by articulating a particularized and specific justification for denying access" [Capital Newspapers v. Burns, 67 NY 2d 562, 566 (1986); see also, Farbman & Sons v. New York City, 62 NY 2d 75, 80 (1984); and Fink v. Lefkowitz, 47 NY 2d 567, 571 (1979)].

In the same decision, in a statement regarding the intent and utility of the Freedom of Information Law, it was found that:
"The Freedom of Information Law expresses this State's strong commitment to open government and public accountability and imposes a broad standard of disclosure upon the State and its agencies (see, Matter of Farbman & Sons v New York City Health and Hosps. Corp., 62 NY 2d 75, 79). The statute, enacted in furtherance of the public's vested and inherent 'right to know', affords all citizens the means to obtain information concerning the day-to-day functioning of State and local government thus providing the electorate with sufficient information 'to make intelligent, informed choices with respect to both the direction and scope of governmental activities' and with an effective tool for exposing waste, negligence and abuse on the part of government officers" (id., 565-566).

In an effort to enhance compliance with and understanding of the Freedom of Information Law, copies of this opinion will be forwarded to the Public Administrator, as well as others.
I hope that I have been of some assistance. Should any further questions arise, please feel free to contact me.

Sincerely, 
Robert J. Freeman
Executive Director
RJF:pb

cc: Ethel J. Griffin, Public Adminstrator
Hon. Renee R. Roth, Surrogate
Steven Gulden, Assistant Corporation Counsel
Clarence Orsland, Assistant Corporation Counsel


Bài đăng phổ biến