Individual Research Paper Guidelines Fall 2017 – Veleva 20% of your course grade; due on 11/8/2017; submit via Bb You are writing these policy research papers in order to analyze a particular business issue and make policy recommendations. You may want to address your paper to a person or to an agency (e.g., President Trump, the Federal Reserve, Environmental Protection Agency, FDA, whatever) and make your recommendations realistic as to what that person or agency can accomplish. Don’t be vague and say things like “reduce unemployment” or “achieve economic growth”– how would you recommend this be done? The more specific your recommendations, the better. Choose a specific company or industry that faces a pressing environmental, social or economic issue. Since you have been keeping up with your reading and current events, you have (almost) the whole world to choose from. You should structure your paper according to the following format: Section I – Background (1-2pp) Describe the issue and summarize the economic/political/scientific background clearly and succinctly (pretend you are writing for an intelligent layperson). Is this a new issue, or an ongoing problem? Why? What are the causes of the problem, environmental/social/political/economic? Use hard data and statistics to build a convincing argument. Section II – Analysis (3-4 pp) Describe why the issue you have selected is important to the wellbeing of the company, industry or the region? What are the current policies to address it (or the lack of such)? Why should the recipient of your memo address this issue as soon as possible? Provide hard facts, not vague generalizations or predictions of doom. Section III – Options (1-2 pp) What sorts of options does your person/agency/government have in dealing with this issue? (“Do Nothing” may be an option as well.) List the pros and cons of each option, scientific, environmental, economic, and political/social – again, be specific. How would they affect your selected company or industry? Section IV – Recommendation (1 p) Which option do you recommend and why? How would you mitigate that option’s negatives? You need to cite any fact or argument that is not original (footnotes are preferable to endnotes) and you should use academic references like journal articles, books, and newspaper articles. Wikipedia is NOT an academic source, nor necessarily is any random web page – make sure your information comes from a reliable source. Make sure you use at least 4 references that come from a variety of sources and are relatively up to date. Your paper should be about 5-6 pages (2x-spaced, 1-inch margins, 12 pt. font, etc.), excluding bibliography. Include maps, charts, or graphs as appropriate – if they are large, you can attach them as appendices. Using hard data and statistics always brings extra points!