Tesco
Tesco is a food grocer devoted to “making what matters better”. Jack Cohen founded Tesco in 1919 from a market stall in London’s East End. Since 1919 Tesco has grown drastically. Tesco is now an international company operating in 12 countries and employing more than 530,000 people. In addition, Tesco is no longer a family run private equity company; they are now a public limited company (PLC). This means that members of the public are able to purchase shares in Tesco. Although its shareholders own Tesco, there is limited liability. Limited liability means that shareholder’s personal assets are separate from that of the business. If the business goes bankrupt then the shareholder’s personal assets cannot be seized to compensate, only the capital invested.
Tesco’s operates in the tertiary sector. The tertiary sector is the sector, which deals mainly with the sale of products and services. Tesco offer many products and services, such as electronics, groceries, petrol and car insurance. Although these products and services often have the Tesco brand label on them, they do not produce them themselves. When it comes to cultivation and manufacturing, (primary & secondary), Tesco tend to outsource.
Tesco is a Private for Profit business, but also a PLC. This means that Tesco is a Shareholder owned business that operates in the private sector of the market. The Private Sector consists of organisations that are owned and funded by individuals or groups of individuals. Tesco is a PLC because it has taken on investors. Tesco most likely needed more capital in order for the business to grow and expand. Investors who buy shares become shareholders and they jointly own the company. These investors receive dividends periodically, and the amount depends on the amount of shares owned. Dividends are returns made by shareholders, which are paid as a percentage of the profits the business makes.
According to Tesco, their core purpose is “We make what matters better, together”. Tesco has changed their core purpose in an effort to seem more concerned with the customer than profits. In reality their main goal is profit as we can see with the numerous store closures due to lack of profitability. Tesco’s market share has fallen from 30.1% to 28.8%. Furthermore, Tesco says that society has changed, stating that there is more scepticism about corporations, and more desire to see business demonstrate it has a purpose beyond profit. Tesco’s new “core purpose” is merely a strategic marketing move. http://www.tescoplc.com/index.asp?pageid=10 NHS
The National Health Service (NHS) is a health care system that was founded in 1948. The NHS is available to all social classes, ethnicities and genders. They provide a great deal of health care completely free, with the exemption of prescriptions and optical and dental care. In order to be eligible for free health care you must be a legal UK resident. These services include treatments for long-term conditions, health checks, emergency treatment, end of life care and many more. The NHS treats over 1,000,000 patients every 36 hours.
The NHS is a public not for profit organisation. This means they are funded by government through government taxation and have no shareholders. There is no group of individuals that has invested into the NHS; instead a portion of the taxes paid by each working citizen is used to fund it. If the NHS were to be come privatised it would then be sold in chunks (shares) to shareholders.
The NHS operates in the tertiary sector. The tertiary sector primarily deals with the sale of products and services. The NHS offers many products and services, such as health care and the medicine to treat illnesses, however they do not produce these products themselves. They outsource from pharmaceutical and medical equipment companies to gain drugs and treatment equipment. The companies and organisations responsible for developing, cultivating and manufacturing are known as the Primary and Secondary.
The UK government is responsible for the NHS. It falls under the Department of Health, headed by the Secretary of State for Health. The Secretary of State for Health is a UK cabinet position responsible for the Department of Health. Although the NHS is also active in Scotland and Wales, the Department of Health in those countries are responsible for the NHS there. The government issues the D.O.H. a budget with most of it being used to fund the NHS.
The NHS employs more than 1.6 million people, making it one of the world’s largest workforces. The NHS in England caters to a population of 53.9 million and employing more than 1.3 million people. The staffs includes 40,236 general practitioners, 351,446 nurses, 18,576 ambulance staff, and 111,963 hospital and community health service medical and dental staff. The NHS in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland employs 159,748, 84,817 and 62,603 people respectively.
The NHS aim is to “improve the quality and length of life”. When the NHS was founded in 1948, the life expectancy for men was 66, and for women, 71. Today those figures are 77.2 and 81.5.
The liability for debt is rather complex. This is because many of the hospitals, such as Alder Hey in Liverpool, operate as independent trusts. The hospital is given a budget, and is responsible for how it is spent. If the hospital runs into financial trouble, the board members may be held accountable, not financially, but they run the risk of being fired. The government is the most likely to step in and bail the hospital out. They may then simply appoint all new executives or the hospital may become privatised. Privatised is when the