Fiduciary Duty is the legal obligation that economic agents must act in the best interests of their beneficiaries, however the legal definition is vague. There are two general categories of ways of interpreting Fiduciary Duty. The dominant, so-called narrow interpretation binds an economic fiduciary to act in the best financial interests of their beneficiaries. There are also broader interpretations which attempt to account for the welfare and/or ethical priorities of the beneficiaries. The narrow interpretation favors the sole prioritization of profit motivation while the broad interpretations favor environmental and social considerations above profit. The historical legal favor enjoyed by the narrow view seems to, at least in part, allow and even encourage the unsustainable exploitation of natural and social resources. On the other hand, favoring broad interpretations seems to undermine the pecuniary interest inherent in the act of investment. In this paper, I will formulate an alternative account of fiduciary duty by analyzing the underlying ethical desiderata put forward by both categories of interpretations and suggesting a synthesis of the views considered. Using John Stuart Mill's Harm Principle, I outline where sufficient conditions are met in investment decisions to make profit motivation a secondary consideration. While the primary ethical framework I will adopt is most influenced by Rawls' contractarianism, I will support my view by showing that my account of fiduciary duty is favorable on several ethical perspectives over existing broad and narrow interpretations, namely deontological, utilitarian, and consequentialist points of view. My conclusion suggests a few possible actions for the goals of future legislation surrounding the economic agent's relationship to their beneficiaries. One, that environmental and social considerations by economic agents are both prudent and loyal to their beneficiaries, meeting the criteria outlined in fiduciary duty. Therefore, taking such considerations in business decisions should not be punishable as it currently is in many jurisdictions. Second, regulations should be proposed that either: A. Restricts investments enabling economic agents that are prone to environmental and social abuses, or B. Makes the beneficiary explicitly aware of the agent’s questionable business practices before they make the decision to invest. My proposed revision of fiduciary duty therefore aims to provide a philosophical framework for current market regulators to respond to environmental and social challenges facing our planet that are posed by economic agents.

No description available.

Wireless sensor network (WSN) technology has gained in importance due to its potential support for a wide range of applications. Most of the WSN applications consist of a large number of distributed nodes that work together to achieve common objectives. Running a large number of nodes requires an efficient mechanism to bring them all together in order to form a multi-hop wireless network that can accomplish specific tasks. Even with the recent developments made in WSN technology, a number of important challenges still create vulnerabilities for WSNs, including: energy waste sources; synchronisation leaks; low network capacity; and self-configuration difficulties. However, energy efficiency perhaps remains both the most challenging and highest priority problem due to the scarce energy resources available in sensor nodes. Synchronization by means of scheduling clusters allows the nodes to cooperate and transmit traffic in a scheduled manner under the duty cycle mechanism. This paper aims to make further advances in this area of work by achieving higher accuracy and precision in time synchronisation through controlling the network topology, self-configuration and estimation of the clock errors between the nodes and finally correcting the nodes’ clock to the estimated value. Furthermore, the target in designing energy efficient protocol relies on synchronized duty cycle mechanism and requires a precise synchronisation algorithm that can schedule a group of nodes to cooperate by communicating together in a scheduled manner. These techniques are considered as parameters in the proposed OLS-MAC algorithm. This algorithm has been designed with the objective of ensuring the schedules of the clusters overlap by introducing a small shift in time between the adjacent clusters’ schedules to compensate for the clock drift. The OLS-MAC algorithm is simulated in NS-2 and compared to some S-MAC derived protocols. The simulation results verified that the proposed algorithm outperforms previous protocols in number of performance criterion.

No / The main attributes that have been used to conserve the energy in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are clustering, synchronization and low-duty-cycle operation. Clustering is an energy efficient mechanism that divides sensor nodes into many clusters. Clustering is a standard approach for achieving energy efficient and hence extending the network lifetime. Synchronize the schedules of these clusters is one of the primary challenges in WSNs. Several factors cause the synchronization errors. Among them, clock drift that is accommodated at each hop over the time. Synchronization by means of scheduling allows the nodes to cooperate and transmit data in a scheduled manner under the duty cycle mechanism. Duty cycle is the approach to efficiently utilize the limited energy supplies for the sensors. This concept is used to reduce idle listening. Duty cycle, nodes clustering and schedules synchronization are the main attributes we have considered for designing a new medium access control (MAC) protocol. The proposed OLS-MAC protocol designed with the target of making the schedules of the clusters to be overlapped with introducing a small shift time between the adjacent clusters schedules to compensate the clock drift. The OLS-MAC algorithm is simulated in NS-2 and compared to some S-MAC derived protocols. We verified that our proposed algorithm outperform these protocols in number of performance matrix.

The thesis topic is Duty of pleading and duty of proof in the contentious civil proceedings. The hereby stated obligations belong to the basic concepts of procedural law. If the interested party fulfils both obligations together with bearing the corresponding burdens, it increases its chance of success in a dispute. Supposing it was inactive, its inactivity might be reflected in the dispute result. My thesis aim was to deal with essential obligations in civil proceedings within eight chapters. In chapter one I mention historical excurcus where I introduce how the above stated obligations were adjusted in the previous civil procedural law regulations. It is only an outline of the historical development. Chapter two I briefly devote to the current concept - de lege lata. In the subsequent chapter three I deal with the burden of pleading and burden of proof in both types of declaratory proceedings namely in contentious and non-contentious proceedings. Where the contentious proceedings require higher activity of the interested parties in comparison with the interested parties in the non- contentious proceedings. Chapter four is focused on detailed description of both procedural obligations and to them corresponding burdens. Besides other various theories of burden of proof are stated here. And also...

This thesis analyses the Australian approach to taxation of goodwill and related intangibles. It asks the questions: 'Is the current Australian approach to taxation of goodwill coherent?'; and 'Could a different approach minimise any distortions?' The thesis identifies the increasing importance of goodwill and other intangible property in a modern information-based economy. It identifies benchmarks for a 'good' tax system ??? such as efficiency, simplicity, and equity. It emphasises the criteria of simplicity and efficiency but includes other criteria and specifically considers the issue of alignment of accounting and legal concepts. It concludes that the current misalignment makes it difficult for the tax system to deal with goodwill coherently. The thesis criticises the treatment of goodwill under various Australian taxes, including stamp duty; Goods and Services Tax; taxation of capital gains; and income tax. It specifically considers the treatment of intangible sources of goodwill and their relationship with goodwill itself. The discussion of income tax pays particular attention to the role of goodwill and other intangibles in international transfer pricing. The thesis draws conclusions about the treatment of goodwill in Australia and whether the Australian approach meets the benchmarks established at the outset. The thesis demonstrates that the current Australian approach leads, inter alia, to tax avoidance. The current approach also offends a number of other criteria of a 'good' system. The thesis considers the UK tax treatment of intangibles held by resident companies and considers this model for Australia. It also considers the abandoned 'Tax Value Method' previously proposed for Australia. From this and other material, it suggests possible new directions and an alternative approach to taxing goodwill in Australia. These include a consistent and coherent definition of goodwill for tax that is compatible with law and accounting. The thesis also urges the development of a consistent approach to taxing goodwill at both the state and federal levels; and suggests greater reliance on the existence of goodwill as a means to establish jurisdiction to impose tax in international tax situations.

A rear loading refuse truck was simulated with a conventional and hydraulic hybrid configuration. Models for the hydraulic hybrid components were developed to simulate the system. A control algorithm was developed using a stochastic dynamic programming approach. The results did not match those that are advertised by the commercially available systems, but reasons for this deviation are discussed. The predicted improvement in fuel economy ranged from 1% to 15% depending on variance in drive cycle and vehicle weight. A brief analysis of the cost of the hybrid system was also conducted based on an estimated drive cycle. This analysis showed that, at current fuel prices of about $4.00/gallon, the system may not make financial sense for a 10 year period of ownership. / text

This thesis analyses the Australian approach to taxation of goodwill and related intangibles. It asks the questions: 'Is the current Australian approach to taxation of goodwill coherent?'; and 'Could a different approach minimise any distortions?' The thesis identifies the increasing importance of goodwill and other intangible property in a modern information-based economy. It identifies benchmarks for a 'good' tax system ??? such as efficiency, simplicity, and equity. It emphasises the criteria of simplicity and efficiency but includes other criteria and specifically considers the issue of alignment of accounting and legal concepts. It concludes that the current misalignment makes it difficult for the tax system to deal with goodwill coherently. The thesis criticises the treatment of goodwill under various Australian taxes, including stamp duty; Goods and Services Tax; taxation of capital gains; and income tax. It specifically considers the treatment of intangible sources of goodwill and their relationship with goodwill itself. The discussion of income tax pays particular attention to the role of goodwill and other intangibles in international transfer pricing. The thesis draws conclusions about the treatment of goodwill in Australia and whether the Australian approach meets the benchmarks established at the outset. The thesis demonstrates that the current Australian approach leads, inter alia, to tax avoidance. The current approach also offends a number of other criteria of a 'good' system. The thesis considers the UK tax treatment of intangibles held by resident companies and considers this model for Australia. It also considers the abandoned 'Tax Value Method' previously proposed for Australia. From this and other material, it suggests possible new directions and an alternative approach to taxing goodwill in Australia. These include a consistent and coherent definition of goodwill for tax that is compatible with law and accounting. The thesis also urges the development of a consistent approach to taxing goodwill at both the state and federal levels; and suggests greater reliance on the existence of goodwill as a means to establish jurisdiction to impose tax in international tax situations.

This thesis deals with the duties of the parties to a litigation (contentious civil procedure). There are two such duties in a litigation: the duty to prove and the duty to assert. The aim of the thesis is to analyze these procedural institutes, to explain both their historical context and their relation to other related institutes such as the burden of proof or the burden of proof assertion. Concurrently, duties of the court itself regarding this matter are dealt with as well as imperfections of current legislation. In the last chapter, proposals de lege ferenda are made. This thesis is divided into six basic sections. The first one focuses on the historical perspectives, the second one deals with theoretical fundamentals and basic concepts, the third one addresses the duties of the court itself related to this subject matter, the fourth one focuses on the judicature of both the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court of the Czech republic, the fifth one describes and compares related current legislation of Slovakia and, as mentioned, the last chapter contains several proposals de lege ferenda.

From all over the globe the inequality between the rich and the poor is a topic that is debated politically and socially. Wealth tax is often mentioned as an easy solution to reduce this inequality effectively. Even in South Africa cries for a wealth tax have been heard following Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu’s comments that such a tax can help reduce the effect of past injustices. The imposition of a wealth tax has various advantages and disadvantages that are strongly debated by the proponents and opponents of the tax. The impact of these advantages and disadvantages has however not been measured and quantified up to date. Although the disadvantages seem to outweigh the advantages, it seems that there is some scope for a wealth tax to be politically motivated. The dawning of the modern era has however changed the landscape for tax policies. Global mobility has resulted in individuals being able to choose where they work, live and invest. Taxes have been proved to be a factor that influences these decisions of individuals on where to live and invest. It is therefore becoming increasingly important to have tax policies that are competitive in comparison to peer countries. This study focused on determining how competitive South Africa’s tax policies are, relating to wealthy individuals, compared to the equivalent taxes in other African countries with similar sized economies. The study consists of qualitative, non-empirical research performed in the form of a literature review. The study’s finding is that South Africa has more types of taxes imposed on wealthy individuals than any other of the sampled countries. In addition, the taxes imposed are more often than not substantially higher than the equivalent charged by its peers. This could have a detrimental effect when investors start to realise that they could optimise the resources available to them by choosing not to work and live in South Africa, but would rather select one of its neighbouring countries. Not only will potential new investors be discouraged from investing, but the question also arises at which point South African residents will start to seek their fortune elsewhere. Based on these findings, it seems that there is no scope for imposing yet another wealth tax in South Africa at present. / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / lmchunu2014 / Taxation / unrestricted