2. What was Australian wealth founded on?
3. Which branches of industry is Australia developing?
Text 28
Developing in English
The combination of oil riches and foreign influence has changed the Gulf States from tribal kingdoms, with camels as the only form of transport, to modern slates with six-lane highways, in less than 50 years.
These countries did not have the technological expertise to exploit their new-found resource by themselves and largely depended on overseas companies. As a result, large numbers of skilled foreign workers are needed in the oilfields and for the many development projects. In Bahrain 60 per cent of working people are foreigners. They are from many countries, including Britain, the USA, India, Pakistan and the Philippines. Few speak Arabic, but all of them speak English as a first or second language. As a result, English is the daily working language of shops, offices and the oil industry. This may not be a permanent situation. Most foreigners are guest workers, useful only while the local people prepare to take over.
Arabic is the language of schools in the Arab Gulf States, but everyone in the region knows that they need English at the state universities, where courses like medicine and science are taught in English. Gulf governments provide scholarships for students to go to the USA or Britain.
Now satellites, cable TV and the Internet are spreading English throughout the Middle East. Not everyone is pleased at this. Many people complain that these programmes bring the corruption of the West into their homes.
Ответьте на вопросы:
1. What are the Gulf States famous for?
2. Why are skilled foreign workers needed in the oilfields of the Gulf States?
3. Why do Gulf governments provide scholarships for students?
Text 29
Banking and Finance
Banking and financial market operations in Britain involve a number of special institutions and financial markets which, as a result of deregulation and new legislative frameworks, are increasingly integrating. Many banking and financial institutions are unique to Britain and offer highly specialized services to individuls, companies and sovereign bodies all over the world.
The Bank of England
The Bank of England in the heart of the City of London is Britain's central bank. It is banker to the commercial banks and to the Government; manager of the National Debt; “lender of last resort”; regulator of monetary and credit conditions; and, not least supervisor of the banking system.
Commercial Banks
This is the broad title for institutions authorized under the Banking Act 1987 as deposit-taking institutions involved in the classic banking business of tailing deposits and lending money, both in the retail and wholesale markets. In Britain, they include the retail banks and institutions which offer banking services. In June 1994 there were 518 authorized banks including retail banks, merchant banks, branches of overseas banks, discount houses and banking subsidiaries of both banking and non-banking institutions from Britain and overseas.
Retail Banks
Retail banks primarily serve individuals and small to medium-sized businesses. The major retail banks operate through more than 12,148 branches offering cash deposit and withdrawal facilities and systems for transferring funds. They provide current account facilities, including interest-bearing accounts; deposit accounts; various types of loan arrangement; and offer an extending range of financial services.
Building Societies
Building societies started in the late 18th century to pool money to build houses and to buy land. They currently compete with the retail banks to attract savings from and provide mortgage finance for the personal sector. Today, they hold more savings than the other deposit-taking institutions. Building societies are “mutual” institutions, owned by their savers and borrowers. Since the Building Societies Act 1986 the societies have been able to provide a wider range of services.
International Banks
In March 1994, there were 255 branches of foreign banks in Britain which, together with firms dealing in foreign securities, employ over 60,000 British people. The majority are based in London, including Moscow Norodny Bank, Bank of China and 38 Japanese banks. Citibank of the US is the largest of the 42 banks from the US based in Britain and has extended its activities into the retail banking market and joined the clearing system.
Merchant Banks
Merchant Banks are so called because they originate from large merchants engaging in banking activity. Their traditionally important roles were helping foreign governments to raise loans and accepting Bills of Exchange but they are today involved in a range of activities including corporate finance, foreign exchange dealings and securities trading.
National Savings
National Savings aids government borrowing via a range of savings instruments. These include fixed interest and index-linked Savings Certificates, First Option Bonds and Premium Bonds among others. Part of National Savings, the National Savings Bank, formerly the Post Office Savings Bank until 1969, was set up in 1861 offering deposit services to customers through some 20,000 Post office branches. It does not operate in the same way as a retail bank or building society. The National Savings Bank had 20.7 million Ordinary and Investment accounts in June 1994. These amount to some 10.6 billion pounds of the National Savings total which was over 49.4 billion pounds in June 1994.
Discount Houses
The discount houses are unique to Britan and occupy a central position in the British monetary system. They act as intermediaries between the Bank of England and the rest of the banking sector promoting an orderly flow of funds between the authorities and the banks.
Investing Institutions
The investing institutions collect savings drawn from the personal sector and invest them in securities and other assets. The main investment institutions are insurance companies (providing general and life policies) together with insurance broking firms, pension funds, unit trusts and investment trusts. Together, they represent a massive pool of funds for investment.
Special Financing Institutions
Operating in both the public and private sectors, there are a number of different special financial institutions offering loan finance and equity capital. In the private sector they include finance houses; specialist leasing houses; factoring companies and venture capital companies, each providing an alternative to retail bank funding.
The Financial Markets
The city of London has long been the nexus of international activity in a number of highly organized financial markets. These include the London Stock Exchange, the sterling money and bond markets; the foreign exchange markets; eurocurrency markets; financial futures; bullion; commodities; shipping and freight.
Пояснения к тексту:
Bank of England — Банк Англии (Центральный банк Великобритании);
Commercial bank — коммерческий банк,
Retail bank — розничный банк (банк, занимающийся обслуживанием мелкой клиентуры);
Merchant Bank — торговый банк;
National Savings — национальный сберегательный банк;
Discount House — учетный банк;
Premium boud — облигация выигрышного займа;
Option boud — облигация с правом досрочного погашения.
Building society — жилищно-строительный кооператив, выполняющий функции сберегательного учреждения: прием вкладов и выдача ссуд на приобретение домов;
International bank — международный банк.
Ответьте на вопросы:
1. What do you know about the Bank of England?
2. What do you know about Commercial banks?
3. What do you know about Retail banks?
4. What do you know about Building Societies?
5. What can you say about International Banks?
6. What can you say about Merchant Banks?
7. What can you say about National Savings'?
8. What can you say about Discount Houses?
9. What can you say about Investing Institutions?
10. What can you say about the Financial Markets?
Text 30
What is Accounting?
Accounting has been called «the language of business». Perhaps a better term is «the language of financial decisions». The better you understand the language, the better you can manage the financial aspects of living. Personal financial planning, investments, loans, car payments, income taxes, and many other aspects of daily life are based on accounting. A recent survey indicates that business managers believe it is more important for college students to learn accounting than any other subject. Other surveys show that persons trained in accounting and finance make it to the top of their organizations in greater numbers than persons trained in any other field. Indeed, accounting is an important subject.
Accounting is the system that measures business activities, processes that information into reports and communicates these findings to decision makers. Financial statements are the documents that report on an individual's or an organization's business in monetary amounts.
Is our business making a profit? Should we start up a new line of women's clothing? Are sales strong enough to warrant opening a new branch outlet? The most intelligent answers to business questions like these use accounting information. Decision makers use the information to develop sound business plans. As new programs affect the business's activities, accounting takes the company's financial pulse beat. The cycle continues as the accounting system measures the results of activities and reports the results to decision makers.
Bookkeeping is a procedural element of accounting as arithmetic is a procedural element of mathematics. Increasingly, people are using computers to do much of the detailed bookkeeping work at all levels — in households, business, and organizations of all types.
Users of Accounting Information
Individuals. People use accounting information in day-to-day affairs to manage their bank accounts, to evaluate job prospects, to make investments, and to decide whether to rent or to buy a house.
Businesses. Managers of businesses use accounting information to set goals for their organizations, to evaluate their progress toward those goals, and to take corrective action if necessary. Decisions based on accounting information may include which building and equipment to purchase, how much merchandise inventory to keep on hand, and how much cash to borrow.
Investors and Creditors. Investors provide the money that businesses need to begin operations. To decide whether to help start a new venture, potential investors evaluate what income they can reasonably expect on their investment. This means analyzing the financial statements of the new business. Those people who do invest monitor the progress of the business by analyzing the company's financial statements and by keeping up with its developments in the business press, for example, The Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Forbes, and Fortune.
Text 31
The Development of Accounting Thought
Accounting has a long history. Some scholars claim that writing arose in order to record accounting information. Account records date back to the ancient civilizations of China, Babylonia, Greece, and Egypt. The rulers of these civilizations used accounting to keep track of the cost of labour and materials used in building structures like the great pyramids.
Accounting developed further as a result of the information needs of merchants in the city-states of Italy during the 1400s. In commercial climate the monk Luca Pacioli, a mathematician and friend of Leonardo da Vinci, published the first known description of double-entry bookkeeping in 1494.
The pace of accounting development increased during the Industrial Revolution as the economies of developed countries began to mass-produce goods. Until that time, merchandise had been priced based on managers hunches about cost, but increased competition required merchants to adopt more sophisticated accounting systems.
In the nineteenth century, the growth of corporations, especially those in the railroad and steel industries, spurred the development of accounting. Corporation owners — the stockholders — were no longer necessarily the managers of their business. Managers had to create accounting systems to report to the owners how well their businesses were doing.
The role of government has led to still more accounting developments. When the federal government started the income tax, accounting supplied the concept of «income», Also, government at all levels has assumed expanded roles in health, education, labour, and economic planning. To ensure that the information that it uses to make decisions is reliable, the government has required strict accountability in the business community.
Раздел 2
Английский язык (для юристов)
Text l
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
1. Britain is a parliamentary democracy with a constitutional monarch as head of State. Its formal title is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
2. «Great Britain» (England, Wales, and Scotland) came into existence when the English and Scottish crowns were united at the beginning of the seventeenth century and their parliaments a century later. Wales had come under the sway of the English crown in medieval times.
3. So, too, had Ireland, but the British and Irish parliaments were not united until 1801. In 1922 the southern part of Ireland, predominantly Roman Catholic, became a separate state.
4. Northern Ireland, with its Protestant majority, chose to continue as part of the United Kingdom and had its own parliament between 1921 and 1972. The deeply rooted historical divisions between the majority Protestant and the minority Roman Catholic Communities remain a major factor in the continuing civil disturbances in Northern Ireland; the Government's aim is to restore peace and stability and to find ways of giving back to the people more control over their own affairs.
5. Political stability owes much to the monarchy, the continuity of which has been broken only once (during the brief republic in the seventeenth century) in over a thousand years. Democratic government has developed from the establishment of Parliament over 700 years ago. As a constitutional monarch, the Sovereign now performs the functions of an impartial head of State.
I. Прочитайте и устно переведите весь текст. Перепишите и письменно переведите абзацы 1, 2, 3.
II. Выпишите из абзацев 4, 5 предложения со словами, оформленными окончаниями -s, и переведите их на русский язык.
III. Прочитайте следующие предложения, перепишите и переведите письменно предложение, которое правильно передает содержание текста.
1. The deeply rooted historical divisions between the minority Protestant and the majority Roman Catholic communities remain a major factor in the continuing civil disturbances in Northern Ireland.
2. The deeply rooted historical divisions between the majority Protestant and the minority Roman Catholic communities remain a major factor in the continuing civil disturbances in Northern Ireland.
Text 2
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
1. Britain is a parliamentary democracy with a constitutional monarch as head of State. Its formal title is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
2. Parliament comprises the House of Lords and the House of Commons, together with the Queen in her constitutional role. The Lords is made up of hereditary and life peers and peeresses and the two archbishops and 24 most senior bishops of the established Church of England. The Commons is the elected House, consisting of 635 members of Parliament (MPs), each representing a local constituency area.