Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Do Domestic Macroeconomic Factors Play a Role in Determining Long-Term Nominal Interest Rates? Application in the Case of a Small Open-Economy

The determinants of long-term nominal interest rates have not yet been fully explained by either economic theory or empirical studies. Since long-term nominal interest rates are the sum of long-term real interest rates and inflation expectations, any macroeconomic factor that impacts expected inflation, real rates or both should affect long-term nominal interest rates. The objective of this paper is to examine how the dynamics of nominal bond yields is related to domestic macroeconomic fundamentals. We consider a structural VECM where identification is achieved by imposing long-run restrictions. A technical innovation of the paper is the identification of structural stochastic trends in a VECM including exogenous variables, which enables us to address the special features of a smallopen economy like Canada. We then assess the impact of various shocks - monetary, fiscal and supply shocks - on nominal bond yields. Our analysis supports the view that domestic macroeconomic policies play a determining role in the long-run dynamics of nominal bond yields. First, an unexpected permanent fiscal deterioration results in large increases in long-term nominal interest rates. Second, a permanent shock to inflation results in higher nominal long rates. Supply shocks, however, have no significant long-run impact on long-term nominal rates.
Wireless Channels that Exhibit "Worse than Rayleigh" Fading: Analytical and Measurement Results

We describe several disparate practical settings in which cases of severe, or "worse than Rayleigh, "fading have been encountered. To explain this behavior, we present two physical models. The first model employs a statistically non-stationary random process that switches between two distributions, akin to the multi-state models proposed for land mobile satellite channels. The other model we propose is a multiplicative model of two small scale fading processes. We also describe the analytical pdf for such a multiplicative model using two Weibull random variables as the underlying small scale fading distributions. Measured data is used to corroborate these models, and our computer simulations confirm the ability to replicate the statistics of these severe fading processes. These proposed models can be used by researchers investigating communication system designs in severe fading environments
Auditor underreporting of time and moral reasoning: An experimental lab study*

Abstract. This paper introduces the theory of moral reasoning as a valid determinant of the underreporting of audit time. In an experimental lab design for a sample of 88 auditors from a national public accounting firm, actual underreporting on an audit task was observed. Findings show that underreporting is systematically related to the auditor's level of moral reasoning as measured by the Defining Issues Test (DIT). Here those with relatively low DIT scores were shown to underreport most severely. Results also show that although an unattainable time budget affects behavior, peer pressure has the most significant impact on underreporting. The present study makes three important contributions to the auditing and psychology literature. First, it establishes the significance of peer pressure as an antecedent to underreporting. Second, it shows that an auditor's moral reasoning explains actual underreporting behavior under conditions of workâ€ related pressure. Third, it reveals marked underreporting under simulated audit conditions.
An Analysis of the Labor Market for Uber’s Driver-Partners in the United States

Uber, the ride-sharing company launched in 2010, has grown at an exponential rate. Using both survey and administrative data, the authors provide the first comprehensive analysis of the labor market for Uber’s driver-partners. Drivers appear to be attracted to the Uber platform largely because of the flexibility it offers, the level of compensation, and the fact that earnings per hour do not vary much based on the number of hours worked. Uber’s driver-partners are more similar in terms of their age and education to the general workforce than to taxi drivers and chauffeurs. Most of Uber’s driver-partners had full- or part-time employment before joining Uber, and many continue in those positions after starting to drive with the Uber platform, which makes the flexibility to set their own hours especially valuable. Drivers often cite the desire to smooth fluctuations in their income as one of their reasons for partnering with Uber.
Synaptic targeting domains of synapsin I revealed by transgenic expression in photoreceptor cells.

Synapsins are abundant nerve terminal proteins present at all synapses except for ribbon synapses, e.g. photoreceptor cell synapses. Multiple functions have been proposed for synapsins, including clustering of synaptic vesicles and regulation of synaptic vesicle exocytosis. To investigate the physiological functions of synapsin and to ascertain which domains of synapsin are involved in synaptic targeting in vivo, we expressed synapsin Ib and its N‐ and C‐terminal domains in the photoreceptor cells of transgenic mice. In these cells synapsin Ib is targeted efficiently to synaptic vesicles but has no significant effect on the development, structure or physiology of the synapses. This suggests that synapsin I does not have dominant physiological or morphoregulatory functions at these synapses. Full‐length synapsin Ib and the N‐terminal domains of synapsin Ib but not its C‐terminal domains are transported to synapses, revealing that the molecular apparatus for synaptic targeting of synapsins is also present in cells which form ribbon synapses that normally lack synapsins. This apparatus appears to utilize the conserved N‐terminal domains that are shared between all synapsins.
Alternative Income Determination Rules and Earnings Usefulness: The Case of R&D Costs*

Accounting procedures have been suggested as a factor affecting the usefulness of reported earnings for the users of financial statements. However little evidence exists to confirm the ways in which mandatory changes in income determination rules influence the way the market responds to accounting information. This study expands the existing literature by testing the notion that accounting method choice can affect earnings usefulness for firms engaged in research and development (R&) activities. We test hypotheses concerning: (1) changes in earnings usefulness for firms that switched their RD and (2) differences in earnings usefulness between similar firms using different R&D accounting methods prior to the rule change. We find that for our sample of R&D firms there is a statistically significant decline in earnings usefulness for firms forced to switch from capitalizing to expensing R&D outlays and that the decline appears to persist over time. In addition the comparison of earnings usefulness between firms using different R&D accounting methods before SFAS No. 2 indicates that capitalizing firms had significantly higher earnings usefulness than expensing firms.
Vulnerable people, precarious housing, and regional resilience: an exploratory analysis

This article has two purposes. First, it explores the ideas of vulnerability, precariousness, and resilience as they apply to people, housing, neighborhoods, and metropolitan areas. People might be more vulnerable to shocks or strains, we propose, if they are members of racial/ethnic minorities, recent immigrants, non-high school graduates, are children or over 75 years old, disabled, recent veterans, living in poverty, or living in single-parent households. Housing may be more precarious, we propose, when it is rented, multi-family, manufactured, crowded, or subject to overpayment. The article goes on to document the relationships between potential personal or household vulnerability and potentially precarious housing conditions. Microdata from the 2005–2007 American Community Survey suggest that an important minority of people have multiple vulnerabilities; these vulnerabilities associate with residence in precarious housing. We suggest that policy be directed toward precarious situations most likely to afflict the most vulnerable populations, especially single-parent households and immigrants.
Influence of APOE Gene Polymorphism on Interindividual and Interethnic Warfarin Dosage Requirement: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

BACKGROUND Warfarin is the most extensively used coumarin anticoagulant. It has been shown that the anticoagulant effect of warfarin is associated with genetic variation. Apolipoprotein E (ApoE) is a possible candidate to influence the maintenance dose of warfarin. ApoE affects the vitamin K cycle by mediating the uptake of vitamin K into the liver. The vitamin K cycle is the drug target of warfarin. However, the association between genetic variants of the APOE gene and warfarin dose requirement is still controversial. METHODS Revman 5.3 software was used to analyze the relationship between APOE genotypes and warfarin dose requirements. RESULTS In our meta-analysis, the E2/E2 genotype was significantly associated with warfarin dose. E2/E2 patients required 12% (P = 0.0002) lower mean daily warfarin dose than E3/E3 carriers. In addition, subgroup analysis showed that Asians with the E4/E4 genotype tended to need lower warfarin maintenance doses, while the African American E4/E4 carriers needed slightly higher doses than E3/E3 carriers; however, these subgroups were very small. CONCLUSION This is the first meta-analysis of the association between APOE genotypes and warfarin dose. APOE E2/E2 might be one of the factors affecting warfarin dose requirements. The effect of APOE may vary between ethnicities.
Working in film : employment in a project-based industry

Currently the “creative industries”, especially the British film industry, are receiving much popular attention. The aim of this paper is to present a description and evaluation of employment in the film industry, and through doing so to challenge dominant populist and academic analyses of employment in this sector, as exemplified by the Labour government and a number of British and American academic commentators. These analyses are both premised on the apparent occurrence of an epoch breaking change in society, the balance of economic activity in society and the organisation of work. However, trends in employment practice over recent years, it would appear from the survey evidence and from other sources presented here, have not improved in the manner they could be expected to if such fundamental epochal change had occurred. Rather the data presented here point to much continuity in the employment relationship between capital and labour.
Social Consequences of Unemployment: an East-West Comparison

The paper compares the experience of unemployment in Britain with that in three former state socialist societies - Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, countries with relatively recent welfare systems, providing a low level of coverage for the unemployed. The analysis examines the implications of the different types of welfare regime for financial stress, for social isolation and for psychological wellbeing. While it finds that the implications of welfare arrangments depend considerably on the nature of the labour market, it concludes that the combination of very high unemployment with low welfare coverage - exemplified by the case of Bulgaria - has exceptionally high social and personal costs. There is no evidence that these are offset by the emergence of alternative welfare arrangements based on community solidarities.
Carbon emissions and economic development: future trajectories based on historical experience

This paper estimates the historic relationship between carbon emissions and GDP using data across countries and across time. We combine this relationship with plausible projections for GDP and population growth to construct a model that offers insights into the likely path of global emissions in the next century. In addition, we experiment with a method for incorporating oil prices into the model. Our analysis provides independent confirmation of the business-as-usual forecasts generated by the larger structural models.
Canadian faith-based development NGOs and CIDA funding

Abstract This article analyses the faith-based NGO sector in Canada, particularly its relationship to Canada's public development agency, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), using data on CIDA project expenditures over six years (2005–2010) and registered charity information filings. Faith-based NGOs constituted about one-quarter of all NGOs receiving CIDA funding, and received about one-third (about CAD100 million per year) of CIDA program and project funding to Canadian NGOs. Faith-based NGOs received a third of their CIDA support for humanitarian relief programs, compared to only a fifth for secular NGOs, and served less as channels for official bilateral programming. They were also less dependent on CIDA funding, raising a greater proportion of their revenue directly from the public. Resume Cet article s'interesse aux ONG confessionnelles canadiennes, plus particulierement a leurs relations avec l'Agence canadienne de developpement international (ACDI). A cette fin, la recherche a ex.
Inflation, Interest, and Relative Prices

Irving Fisher ([1930] 1965) first elaborated the hypothesis that interest rates contain market forecasts of future inflation rates. If the market is efficient or rational, it makes the best possible forecasts of future inflation rates, given the information available when interest rates are set. However, the hypothesis that interest rates contain the best possible assessments of expected future inflation rates is only clear-cut in a world where the inflation rate is unambiguous, as is true, for example, when relative prices are constant so that all goods experience the same inflation rate. If relative prices change, an overall inflation rate may be difficult to define even for an individual consumer. In fact, relative prices vary substantially during the 1953-77 period that we study. We propose a model to explain the observed behavior of interest rates and money prices of consumption goods which allows for relative price changes but is nevertheless in the spirit of Fisher. The model attributes the "Fisher effect" relationships between interest rates and inflation rates observed in the data to a component of expected inflation rates which is common to all In setting interest rates on treasury bills, the market appears to respond only to the common part of the expected inflation rates of different goods. However, there are seasonals in expected inflation rates which are different for different goods. We suggest that these differential seasonals reflect real costs of providing different goods to the market at different times of the year and hence are properly ignored by the market in setting interest rates. Finally, there is increasing similarity in the movement of the unexpected inflation rates of different goods for longer measurement intervals. In part, we interpret this as the result of a gradual reallocation of resources in response to. surprise shifts in supply or demand conditions. The tests use data for the U.S. Consumer Price Index and its major subcomponents from 1953 to 1977. * Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago, and Graduate School of Management, University of Rochester. The comments of Nicholas Gonedes, Michael Jensen, Merton Miller, Walter Wasserfallen, and a referee are gratefully acknowledged. This research is supported by the National Science Foundation.
Discovering the Link between Inflation Rates and Inflation Uncertainty

A new time-series model is used to reassess the strength of the link between inflation uncertainty and the level of inflation in the United States. The model provides several statistical measures that can be used to examine different aspects of uncertainty. The main finding is that uncertainty about the long rather than short-term prospects for inflation moved strongly with the rate of inflation since the early 1970s. Copyright 1991 by Ohio State University Press.
Assessing Applied Protection Across the World

This paper presents MAcMap-HS-6, a database providing a consistent, ad valorem equivalent measure of tariff duties and tariff rate quotas for 163 countries and 208 partners, at the six-digit level of the Harmonized System (5111 products), accounting for all preferential agreements.We describe the methodology used to compute and aggregate an ad valorem equivalent of applied protection. Emphasis is placed on minimizing the endogeneity bias in the aggregation procedure, while acknowledging structural differences in export specialization.The resulting quantitative assessment is illustrated by giving an overview of applied protection across the world in 2001, in terms of average as well as distribution.
Short article: Size matters: Bigger is faster

A largely unexplored aspect of lexical access in visual word recognition is “semantic size”—namely, the real-world size of an object to which a word refers. A total of 42 participants performed a lexical decision task on concrete nouns denoting either big or small objects (e.g., bookcase or teaspoon). Items were matched pairwise on relevant lexical dimensions. Participants’ reaction times were reliably faster to semantically “big” versus “small” words. The results are discussed in terms of possible mechanisms, including more active representations for “big” words, due to the ecological importance attributed to large objects in the environment and the relative speed of neural responses to large objects.
Hindlimb muscle function in turtles: is novel skeletal design correlated with novel muscle function?

ABSTRACT Variations in musculoskeletal lever systems have formed an important foundation for predictions about the diversity of muscle function and organismal performance. Changes in the structure of lever systems may be coupled with changes in muscle use and give rise to novel muscle functions. The two extant turtle lineages, cryptodires and pleurodires, exhibit differences in hindlimb structure. Cryptodires possess the ancestral musculoskeletal morphology, with most hip muscles originating on the pelvic girdle, which is not fused to the shell. In contrast, pleurodires exhibit a derived morphology, in which fusion of the pelvic girdle to the shell has resulted in shifts in the origin of most hip muscles onto the interior of the shell. To test how variation in muscle arrangement might influence muscle function during different locomotor behaviors, we combined measurements of muscle leverage in five major hindlimb muscles with data on muscle use and hindlimb kinematics during swimming and walking in representative semiaquatic cryptodire (Trachemys scripta) and pleurodire (Emydura subglobosa) species. We found substantial differences in muscle leverage between the two species. Additionally, we found that there were extensive differences in muscle use in both species, especially while walking, with some pleurodire muscles exhibiting novel functions associated with their derived musculoskeletal lever system. However, the two species shared similar overall kinematic profiles within each environment. Our results suggest that changes in limb lever systems may relate to changes in limb muscle motor patterns and kinematics, but that other factors must also contribute to differences in muscle activity and limb kinematics between these taxa. Summary: Novel muscle arrangements and leverage patterns associated with derived fusion of the pelvis to the shell in pleurodire turtles are associated with several novel muscle activity patterns in this lineage.
The Future of Our Discipline: The Status of Doctoral Students in Political Science

T h e author wishes to acknowledge the helpful comments and support of Scott Barclay, Stephen Frantzich, and Michael Malbin. 1. Cigler (1997) has noted a similar phenomenon in the study of interest groups: Most interest group scholars tend to come from either a tradition of seeing political parties and interest groups as mediating entities or from voting behavior research (leading to an interest in PACs). They thus pay relatively little attention to interest groups in courts, and leave such activities out of the larger picture. Public law scholars, on the other hand, conduct most research on interest groups in court, but without adequate use of the broader interest group literature. 2. An example: Does it matter that U.S. district judges can seek elevation to the U.S. Court of Appeals without leaving the district court, while members of the U.S. House of Representatives must give up their office to seek a Senate seat? 3. See Romzek and Utter (1996) for another study highly useful in prompting thoughts of the differences between legislative and judicial staff. 4. While those conducting social science research on the law have access to several such journals, particularly Law and Society Review and Law and Social Inquiry, comparable journals may not be as readily available in other subfields.
The not-very-rich and the very poor: Poverty persistence and poverty concentration in Sweden

We question the common description of poverty in Western countries as largely brief and transient and show that the spell-based analyses from which this view stems diverts attention from the bulk of poverty, which is persistent rather than transient. Measures of poverty concentration are suggested. Using Swedish population data spanning 18 years (1990–2007, N (persons*years) = 102,754,809), we can avoid problems that plague poverty research using survey data and can give precise calculations of completed durations without relying on questionable assumptions. The majority of poverty years were experienced by people in long-term poverty: 69 percent of all poverty years over the 18-year period fell on people with 5 years or more in poverty. Half of all poverty years were borne by only 5 percent of the population, meaning that poverty was highly concentrated. This speaks in favour of the social policy efficiency in targeting a small group of long-term poor.
Detection of deterministic and probabilistic convection initiation using Himawari-8 Advanced Himawari Imager data

Abstract. The detection of convective initiation (CI) is very important because convective clouds bring heavy rainfall and thunderstorms that typically cause severe socio-economic damage. In this study, deterministic and probabilistic CI detection models based on decision trees (DT), random forest (RF), and logistic regression (LR) were developed using Himawari-8 Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) data obtained from June to August 2016 over the Korean Peninsula. A total of 12 interest fields that contain brightness temperature, spectral differences of the brightness temperatures, and their time trends were used to develop CI detection models. While, in our study, the interest field of 11.2 µm Tb was considered the most crucial for detecting CI in the deterministic models and the probabilistic RF model, the trispectral difference, i.e. (8.6–11.2 µm)–(11.2–12.4 µm), was determined to be the most important one in the LR model. The performance of the four models varied by CI case and validation data. Nonetheless, the DT model typically showed higher probability of detection (POD), while the RF model produced higher overall accuracy (OA) and critical success index (CSI) and lower false alarm rate (FAR) than the other models. The CI detection of the mean lead times by the four models were in the range of 20–40 min, which implies that convective clouds can be detected 30 min in advance, before precipitation intensity exceeds 35 dBZ over the Korean Peninsula in summer using the Himawari-8 AHI data.