Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Subsidy and Local Bus Service Deregulation in Britain: A Re-evaluation

Local bus services in Britain (excluding London) were deregulated in October 1986. Bus vehicle kilometres increased after deregulation, but passenger journeys fell and bus fares increased in real terms. The inability to reverse the long-run decline in passenger journeys and the increase in bus fares is often cited as evidence of the failure of deregulation to promote greater competition in the industry. This evaluation is not clear-cut, however, since government macroeconomic policy caused significant reductions in subsidy to the bus industry concurrent with deregulation. It can be argued that it is the reduction in subsidy, rather than the lack of competition, which caused fares to increase. If this is the case, then the evaluation of deregulation should allow for the effects of subsidy reduction. This paper specifies and tests an econometric model in which the role of subsidy reduction is explicitly incorporated in a price-markup equation. The model can be used to generate forecasts of bus fares and passenger journeys after allowing for subsidy replacement. These forecasts are compared with those for the continuation of the regulated system. A cost-benefit analysis calculates the net present value of the internal and external welfare gains from deregulation per se in Britain excluding London for 1986-97. A similar analysis is conducted for the metropolitan and non-metropolitan areas of Britain. The London School of Economics and the University of Bath 2001
A Panchromatic Study of the Globular Cluster NGC 1904. I. The Blue Straggler Population

By combining high-resolution (HST/WFPC2) and wide-field ground-based (2.2 m ESO/WFI) and space (GALEX) observations, we have collected a multiwavelength photometric database (ranging from the far-UV to the near infrared) of the galactic globular cluster NGC 1904 (M79). The sample covers the entire cluster extension, from the very central regions up to the tidal radius. In the present paper, such a data set is used to study the BSS population and its radial distribution. A total number of 39 bright (m218 ≤ 19.5) BSSs have been detected, and they have been found to be highly segregated in the cluster core. No significant upturn in the BSS frequency has been observed in the outskirts of NGC 1904, in contrast to other clusters (M3, 47 Tuc, NGC 6752, M5) studied with the same technique. Such evidence, coupled with the large radius of avoidance estimated for NGC 1904 (ravoid ~ 30 core radii), indicates that the vast majority of the cluster heavy stars (binaries) has already sunk to the core. Accordingly, extensive dynamical simulations suggest that BSSs formed by mass transfer activity in primordial binaries evolving in isolation in the cluster outskirts represent only a negligible (0%-10%) fraction of the overall population.
Survey Evidence on Wage and Price Setting in Estonia

In this paper, we give a comprehensive overview of wage and price adjustment practices in Estonia, drawing from two managerial surveys which were conducted in autumn 2007 and summer 2009 within the framework of the Wage Dynamics Network (WDN), a joint research project by the Eurosystem/ESCB. Our discussion covers a broad range of results, including firm-level descriptive evidence for several institutional and structural characteristics of the Estonian economy such as unionisation and collective bargaining coverage, labour intensity of production, remuneration methods, product market competition, etc., and insights into the wage and price setting behaviour of Estonian firms. To illustrate this behaviour, we give an overview of the frequency and timing of wage and price changes; the extent of downward nominal and real wage rigidity; the determinants of wages paid to newly employed workers; and finally, the nature of firms\' adjustments to cost push and negative demand shocks
A multidimensional model of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

OBJECTIVE Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a clinically heterogeneous condition. This heterogeneity can reduce the power and obscure the findings from natural history studies to genome scans, neuroimaging, and clinical trials. The authors review the evidence supporting a multidimensional model of OCD. METHOD Computerized and manual literature searches were performed to identify factor-analytic studies of obsessive-compulsive symptoms before data from disciplines that bear on the potential usefulness of these dimensions were considered. Selection criteria included the novelty and importance of studies and their relevance to outcomes of interest to well-informed mental health professionals. RESULTS Twelve factor-analytic studies involving more than 2,000 patients were identified that consistently extracted at least four symptom dimensions: symmetry/ordering, hoarding, contamination/cleaning, and obsessions/checking. These dimensions were associated with distinct patterns of comorbidity, genetic transmission, neural substrates, and treatment response. The evidence supporting the hoarding dimension is particularly robust. CONCLUSIONS The complex clinical presentation of OCD can be summarized with a few consistent, temporally stable symptom dimensions. These can be understood as a spectrum of potentially overlapping syndromes that may 1) coexist in any patient, 2) be continuous with normal obsessive-compulsive phenomena, and 3) extend beyond the traditional nosological boundaries of OCD. Although the dimensional structure of obsessive-compulsive symptoms is imperfect, this quantitative approach to phenotypic traits has the potential to advance our understanding of OCD and may aid in the identification of more robust endophenotypes. The need for a dimensional rating scale and suggestions for future research aimed at reducing the burden of this disorder are discussed.
What Determines Efficiency? An Analysis of the Italian Water Sector

The Italian water sector has encompassed major changes since mid? 90s when law 96/94 has entered into force. Next to private participation, integration of services and growth in production scales, the reform was intended to revolutionize the traditional financial model almost fully based on public funds. Although citizens, politicians and experts on water services have been debating for a long time on the impact of the reform on the industry, as well as on the fairness of a tariff system inspired by the concept of full cost recovery, we are still on a state of uncertainty. The final purpose of this paper is to provide regulators with guidelines that could be used to revise water tariffs in a way that may be cost? efficient, sustainable and fair to the most. According to the analyses, which rely on firm? specific Xinefficiency scores, despite a satisfactory mean level of performance, in the period under investigation, efficiency improvements have been limited. Moreover, the results demonstrate that both the ownership structure and politics do have an impact on the efficiency of the firms: in particular, public shareholding and centreright local governments negatively affects firms’ performances. To this respect, we think that a more effective regulation would also have the side effect of loosening the ties between politicians and managers.
Precise Stability Phase Transitions for $\ell_1$ Minimization: A Unified Geometric Framework

ℓ1 minimization is often used for recovering sparse signals from an under-determined linear system. In this paper, we focus on finding sharp performance bounds on recovering approximately sparse signals using ℓ1 minimization under noisy measurements. While the restricted isometry property is powerful for the analysis of recovering approximately sparse signals with noisy measurements, the known bounds on the achievable sparsity1 level can be quite loose. The neighborly polytope analysis which yields sharp bounds for perfectly sparse signals cannot be readily generalized to approximately sparse signals. We start from analyzing a necessary and sufficient condition, the “balancedness” property of linear subspaces, for achieving a certain signal recovery accuracy. Then we give a unified null space Grassmann angle-based geometric framework to give sharp bounds on this “balancedness” property of linear subspaces. By investigating the “balancedness” property, this unified framework characterizes sharp quantitative tradeoffs between signal sparsity and the recovery accuracy of ℓ1 minimization for approximately sparse signal. As a consequence, this generalizes the neighborly polytope result for perfectly sparse signals. Besides the robustness in the “strong” sense for all sparse signals, we also discuss the notions of “weak” and “sectional” robustness. Our results concern fundamental properties of linear subspaces and so may be of independent mathematical interest.
Semiparametric Models for Missing Covariate and Response Data in Regression Models

Summary We consider a class of semiparametric models for the covariate distribution and missing data mechanism for missing covariate and/or response data for general classes of regression models including generalized linear models and generalized linear mixed models. Ignorable and nonignorable missing covariate and/or response data are considered. The proposed semiparametric model can be viewed as a sensitivity analysis for model misspecification of the missing covariate distribution and/or missing data mechanism. The semiparametric model consists of a generalized additive model (GAM) for the covariate distribution and/or missing data mechanism. Penalized regression splines are used to express the GAMs as a generalized linear mixed effects model, in which the variance of the corresponding random effects provides an intuitive index for choosing between the semiparametric and parametric model. Maximum likelihood estimates are then obtained via the EM algorithm. Simulations are given to demonstrate the methodology, and a real data set from a melanoma cancer clinical trial is analyzed using the proposed methods.
Laminar segregation of GABAergic neurons in the avian nucleus isthmi pars magnocellularis: A retrograde tracer and comparative study

The isthmic complex is part of a visual midbrain circuit thought to be involved in stimulus selection and spatial attention. In birds, this circuit is composed of the nuclei isthmi pars magnocellularis (Imc), pars parvocellularis (Ipc), and pars semilunaris (SLu), all of them reciprocally connected to the ipsilateral optic tectum (TeO). The Imc conveys heterotopic inhibition to the TeO, Ipc, and SLu via widespread γ‐aminobutyric acid (GABA)ergic axons that allow global competitive interactions among simultaneous sensory inputs. Anatomical studies in the chick have described a cytoarchitectonically uniform Imc nucleus containing two intermingled cell types: one projecting to the Ipc and SLu and the other to the TeO. Here we report that in passerine species, the Imc is segregated into an internal division displaying larger, sparsely distributed cells, and an external division displaying smaller, more densely packed cells. In vivo and in vitro injections of neural tracers in the TeO and the Ipc of the zebra finch demonstrated that neurons from the external and internal subdivisions project to the Ipc and the TeO, respectively, indicating that each Imc subdivision contains one of the two cell types hodologically defined in the chick. In an extensive survey across avian orders, we found that, in addition to passerines, only species of Piciformes and Rallidae exhibited a segregated Imc, whereas all other groups exhibited a uniform Imc. These results offer a comparative basis to investigate the functional role played by each Imc neural type in the competitive interactions mediated by this nucleus. J. Comp. Neurol. 521:1727–1742, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Poverty and household size

The widely held view that larger families tend to be poorer in developing countries has influenced research and policies. But the basis for this"stylized fact"is questionable, the authors argue. Widely cited evidence of a strong negative correlation between size and consumption per person is unconvincing, given that even poor households face economies of size in consumption. The authors find that the correlation between poverty and household size vanishes in Pakistan when the size elasticity of the cost of living is about 0.6. This turns out to be the elasticity implied by a modified version of the food-share method of setting scales. By contrast, some measures of child nutritional status indicate an elasticity closer to unity. Consideration of the weight attached to child versus adult welfare may help resolve the nonrobustness of demographic profiles of poverty. The authors show that the incidence of severe child stunting is more elastic to household size than their Engel curve estimate suggests, although the latter is still a fair predictor of child wasting. A consideration of the purpose of measuring poverty - notably the extent to which it is used to inform policies aimed at promoting child welfare - may go some way toward resolving the issues.
Environmental engagements through the lens of disclosure practices: A Malaysian story

Purpose – The objective of this paper is to examine environmental disclosure practices among Malaysian public-listed companies in an attempt to interpret corporate motivations for their environmental engagements and commitments. Design/methodology/approach – This paper investigates corporate motivations using content analysis by examining the corporate annual reports. Discourse analysis was used to analyse and then interpret the environmental information. In particular, the reasons that have inspired companies in Malaysia to engage in environmental matters are the focus of the research. Findings – The results revealed high levels of information in environmental disclosures concerning current environmental engagements and future environmental plans/strategies. The environmental information was found to contain messages that revealed the corporate motives of certain environmental engagements. Three key motivating factors were found to be: “stakeholders' concern”, “self-environmental concern” and “operational improvements”. Research limitations/implications – The paper advocates interpretation of the discourse of environmental information to determine the comprehensive scope on corporate environmental reporting. Originality/value – Disclosure practices (through the use of language) are utilised by business corporations to articulate messages concerning their environmental engagements and the motives behind such engagements. Furthermore, the paper offers some insights into current environmental reporting practices in a developing country.
Predicting Flu Trends using Twitter data

Reducing the impact of seasonal influenza epidemics and other pandemics such as the H1N1 is of paramount importance for public health authorities. Studies have shown that effective interventions can be taken to contain the epidemics if early detection can be made. Traditional approach employed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) includes collecting influenza-like illness (ILI) activity data from “sentinel” medical practices. Typically there is a 1–2 week delay between the time a patient is diagnosed and the moment that data point becomes available in aggregate ILI reports. In this paper we present the Social Network Enabled Flu Trends (SNEFT) framework, which monitors messages posted on Twitter with a mention of flu indicators to track and predict the emergence and spread of an influenza epidemic in a population. Based on the data collected during 2009 and 2010, we find that the volume of flu related tweets is highly correlated with the number of ILI cases reported by CDC. We further devise auto-regression models to predict the ILI activity level in a population. The models predict data collected and published by CDC, as the percentage of visits to “sentinel” physicians attributable to ILI in successively weeks. We test models with previous CDC data, with and without measures of Twitter data, showing that Twitter data can substantially improve the models prediction accuracy. Therefore, Twitter data provides real-time assessment of ILI activity.
Fear of Cultural Extinction and Psychopathology Among Mandaean Refugees: An Exploratory Path Analysis

The Mandaeans are a small religious community originating from Iraq and Iran who are facing the possibility of cultural extinction within the next few generations. This study aimed to examine the relationships between life experiences, psychopathology and fear of cultural extinction in Mandaean refugees. A survey was conducted of 315 adult Iraqi Mandaean refugees living in Australia. Past traumatic experiences and current resettlement difficulties were assessed. Mental health outcomes were also examined, including measures of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression. Fear of cultural extinction was measured by items developed in consultation with the Mandaean community. A path analysis was employed to investigate the relationship between trauma, living difficulties, PTSD, depression, and fear of cultural extinction. Results indicated that trauma and living difficulties impacted indirectly on fear of cultural extinction, while PTSD (and not depression) directly predicted levels of anxiety about the Mandaean culture ceasing to exist.
Development, discourse and law: transgender and same-sex sexualities in Nepal

This report presents research conducted in Nepal between November 2012 and January 2013 aimed at exploring the legal, social and economic context pertaining to sexual and gender minority rights. The research explored recent legal reform in Nepal, the wider socioeconomic and social context of legal reform, and included work with sexual and gender minority persons, aimed at understanding their life experiences. Findings of the research emphasise complex connections between law, social context and sexual subjectivity. There is dissonance in Nepal between a progressive legislative environment in respect of gender and sexual minority issues and everyday sociocultural ambivalence toward such sexual and gender minority persons. Such persons may suffer from explicit prejudice, lack of economic opportunity and familial rejection. Other forms of marginalisation may be more tacit, but nonetheless profoundly significant.
Brand Love: Mediating Role in Purchase Intentions and Word-of- Mouth

The objective of this research is two fold. First is to determine the impact of brand experience, brand trust and affective commitment on purchase intentions. Second is to ascertain the mediating role of brand love in the relationships of purchase intentions and word-of-mouth. The data was obtained from 265 cell phone customers from Islamabad and Rawalpindi cities of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Simple random sampling technique was used for the collection of data and the data was analyzed in SPSS 15.0 where correlation and regression analyses were performed. Results indicate that brand experience, brand trust and affective commitment have significant positive impacts on purchase intentions. In this relationship, the intensity of the impact of affective commitment is quite high as compared to other variables. Other results revealed that purchase intentions significantly predict brand love and word-of-mouth, and brand love also significantly predicts word-of-mouth. And finally, brand love has partial mediation affect in the relationship of purchase intentions and word-of-mouth.
North American Free Trade: Issues and Recommendations

This book has been the most widely cited analysis of the issues underlying the NAFTA negotiations. Many of its recommendations helped shape the negotiations. For those seeking in-depth analysis of the key issues involved in the negotiations, this book is an ideal companion to the authors' NAFTA: An Assessment, which evaluates the final agreement.The first part of the study surveys US, Mexican, and Canadiannegotiating objectives. Part two examines the implications ofNAFTA for trade, investment, and employment; labor andenvironmental concerns that arise because of Mexico's lower level of economic development; and the cross-cutting issues of rules of origin and intellectual property. Part three analyzes the energy, auto,steel, textile, agricultural, and financial services issues that werea major focus of the negotiations. Part four gives the authors'recommendations for making the agreement a "win-win-win" propositionfor all three countries and to strengthen the open world tradingsystem.
Summarizing CSP Hardness with Continuous Probability Distributions

We present empirical evidence that the distribution of effort required to solve CSPs randomly generated at the 50% satisfiable point, when using a backtracking algorithm, can be approximated by two standard families of continuous probability distribution functions. Solvable problems can be modelled by the Weibull distribution, and unsolvable problems by the lognormal distribution. These distributions fit equally well over a variety of backtracking based algorithms.
Biofuels and economic development in Tanzania

Biofuels provide a new opportunity to enhance economic development in Tanzania. Drawing on detailed cost estimates, we develop a dynamic computable general equilibrium model to estimate the impact of different biofuel production scenarios on growth and poverty. Our results indicate that maximizing the poverty-reducing effects of a biofuels industry in Tanzania requires engaging and improving the productivity of smallholder farmers. Evidence shows that cassava-based ethanol production is more profitable than other feedstock options. Our findings also indicate that cassava generates higher levels of pro-poor growth than do sugarcane-based systems. However, if smallholder yields can be improved rather than expanding cultivated land, then sugarcane and cassava outgrower schemes can produce similar pro-poor outcomes. We conclude that in so far as the public investments needed to establish a biofuels industry in Tanzania are in accordance with national development plans, producing biofuels will contribute to achieving the countrys overall development objectives.
Assessing the Need.

Rogers State College, Tulsa (Oklahoma), has devoted considerable energy and funds to the development of alternative delivery systems for academic courses. These include telecourses, independent study designs, computer-delivered courses, and multimedia instruction, for both entire courses and course modules. The college has a coordinator of distance education who assists in planning and administration of distance courses. Access to students and financial reasons have been clear motivators for the college. Rogers State College has its own television station, which has spurred the movement to television delivery. Experiences so far have indicated that one of the most serious problems with distance education is the student's high level of uncertainty regarding teacher expectations and student responsibility. The college is addressing this through careful planning and the use of an initial face-to-face orientation for each course. Developing courses that are relevant to students and allow for high levels of interaction is proving challenging but necessary. (SLD) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF TEACHERS OF ENGLISH PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA, NOVEMBER 193