Monitoring recessions: A Bayesian sequential quickest detection method

Monitoring business cycles faces two potentially conflicting objectives: accuracy and timeliness. To strike a balance between these dual objectives, we propose a Bayesian sequential quickest detection method to identify turning points in real time with a sequential stopping time as a solution. Using four monthly indexes of real economic activity in the United States, we evaluated the method’s real-time ability to date the past five recessions. The proposed method identified similar turning-point dates as the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), with no false alarms, but on average, it dated peaks four months faster and troughs 10 months faster relative to the NBER announcement. The timeliness of our method is also notable compared to the dynamic factor Markov-switching model: the average lead time was about five months when dating peaks and two months when dating troughs.     

Designing a guideline-based utilization management program

Many public and private organizations are developing and publishing clinical guidelines to assist health care providers and patients in making appropriate medical decisions. Unless clinical guidelines are part of a well-designed managed care program, they have little effect on physician practice styles. This article explores integral components of an effective guideline-based utilization management program. Initial evaluation of this program suggests that, as part of a well-designed utilization management program, clinical guidelines can inform patients and physicians, and create appropriate incentives for effective health care delivery.     

Growth and equity effects of changing demographic structures in the Netherlands: simulations within a social accounting matrix

"This paper deals with the economic consequences of a changing demography in an industrialized country, namely the Netherlands. The analytical framework chosen is that of general equilibrium as statistically given by the social accounting matrix (SAM) in which we introduce households by size for the present economic demographic situation (1981) and for a future simulated situation (2010) featuring in particular a relative increase in one-person households (individualization). The income (output) multipliers of both SAMs show a positive growth bias towards three and more person households and towards mining, public utilities, trade and banking."     

Intention and Stochastic Outcomes: An Experimental study

Do people care about intentions – even when good intentions do not produce good results? In our experiments we find that rates of punishment and reward react strongly to intentions (the wage a firm decides to pay) and more modestly to distributional outcomes (the higher or lower wage actually received including the stochastic component). For example, workers who end up receiving medium wages respond much more positively when this resulted from the firm offering a high wage but bad luck lowered the worker's pay than when this resulted from the firm offering a low wage and good luck raised the pay.     

Regional, national, and spatially explicit scenarios of demographic and economic change based on SRES

We report here spatially explicit scenario interpretations for population and economic activity (GDP) for the time period 1990 to 2100 based on three scenarios (A2, B1, and B2) from the IPCC Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES). At the highest degree of spatial detail, the scenario indicators are calculated at a 0.5 by 0.5 degree resolution. All three scenarios follow the qualitative scenario characteristics, as outlined in the original SRES scenarios. Two scenarios (B1 and B2) also follow (with minor adjustments due to scenario improvements) the original SRES quantifications at the level of 4 and 11 world regions respectively. The quantification of the original SRES A2 scenario has been revised to reflect recent changing perceptions on the demographic outlook of world population growth. In this revised “high population growth” scenario, A2r world population reaches some 12 billion by 2100 (as opposed to some 15 billion in the original SRES A2 scenario) and is characterized by a “delayed fertility transition” that is also mirrored in a delayed (economic) development catch-up, resulting in an initially stagnating and subsequently only very slow reduction in income disparities. The spatially explicit scenario interpretation proceeds via two steps. Through a combination of decomposition and optimization methods, world regional scenario results are first disaggregated to the level of 185 countries. In a subsequent second step, national results are further disaggregated to a grid cell level, taking urbanization and regional (rural–urban) income disparities explicitly into account. A distinguishing feature of the spatially explicit scenario results reported here is that both methodologies, as well as numerical assumptions underlying the “downscaling” exercise, are scenario-dependent, leading to distinctly different spatial patterns of population and economic activities across the three scenarios examined.     

基于模糊优化模型下的IPO投资选择的研究与应用

针对影响新股投资决策的因素的不确定性,尝试把模糊优化模型应用到新股投资决策中,对新股的价值做了更加科学、合理的评价,简化了投资决策过程,得出更加有效的结论,以便于降低投资者的投资风险。给出了实例分析,得到了简便易懂的结果,具有较强的可靠性和实用性,将为投资者进行投资决策提供理论和实践指导。     

社保基金监管的现状、问题与建议

目前,我国已经初步确立社保基金监管体制,取得了明显的成效.但依然存在着局部地区违规操作、管理体制不顺畅和相关法制、监管建设滞后等问题.从世界范围社会保障基金监管实践看,依托完备法律法规体制实施社保基金监管,确立社保基金监管部门、监管结构,赋予执法权威,社保基金监管向专业化、市场化发展成为社保基金监管的共同点.借鉴国际先进管理经验,我国应提高立法层次、建立完善的法律体制;强化监管力量,适当集中,构建主辅分明、多重监管的社保基金监管结构;推进社会保险基金监管的市场化.     

Welfare effects of 1992: A general equilibrium assessment for EC and EFTA countries

In this paper production, trade and welfare effects of European integration are discussed, with particular emphasis on the effects for the EC and EFTA. Insights from previous partial and general equilibrium analyses of the internal market are reviewed, and new model simulations are presented. In addition to the standard experiments of 1992 — as reduced trade costs and as full market integration — for the EC alone, and for the European Economic Area (EEA), an intermediate case, with full integration in the EC but only lower trade costs between the EC and EFTA, is analysed. All cases show that EFTA will benefit significantly from freer trade and closer integration with the EC. With regard to non-European regions, the simulations of European integration show some degree of trade diversion, but stylized model experiments indicate that a successful outcome of the Uruguay-round may more than offset the trade-diverting effects of 1992.     

持续利用的自然资源价格论

本文提出了自然资源持续利用的福利准则及价格构成，并且还阐述了有关自然资源持续利用的价格理论问题。旨在完善自然资源的价格理论体系。     

泰山旅游需求时空分布规律及旅游者行为特征的初步研究

泰山旅游需求存在着明显的时空分布规律．调查显示．游人数量的日变化、周变化和年内变化十分显著；客源地主要分布于山东及其周边省市；旅游区内部以泰山中路和岱顶的需求强度最大。最后对旅游交通方式、旅游消费、旅客职业构成双重游率等旅游者行为特征进行了分析。