Does Medical Equipment Expansion Lead to More Diagnostic Services? Evidence from China’s Sichuan Province

A major goal of China’s healthcare reform is to control the increasing healthcare spending, much of which can be attributed to the overuse of diagnostic tests and has been relatively less studied in the literature. This article analyzes the correlation between medical equipment expansion and the increase in diagnostic test expenditure in China, using Sichuan Province as an example. County-level data aggregated from hospitals’ annual reports in Sichuan Province from 2008 to 2012 were used. The results show a positive correlation between the expansion of medical equipment and the increase in diagnostic test expenditure. Our study provides implications on reforming China’s healthcare delivery system and medical equipment regulation policies.     

Do regional house prices converge or diverge in China?

This paper aims to test whether the regional house prices are convergent or divergent in China using a monthly panel data set of China’s 70 large and medium-sized cities from July 2005 to December 2010. This issue is closely related to understanding the efficiency of the country-level housing policies made by China’s central government. The test results suggest that the regional house prices in China are generally divergent, and thereby the country-level policies may be inefficient since they do not explicitly take the strong heterogeneity of China’s regional housing markets into consideration. As a consequence, it may be better for China’s central government to further decentralize and devolve its governance toward the housing market to the local governments.     

Unbundling the differences between Psychic and Cultural Distance: An empirical examination of the existing measures

The diversity between the country-scores of Hofstede, Schwartz, GLOBE, Håkanson and Ambos and Dow and Karunaratna is the main focus of this study. To investigate the correlation between the country-scores of these CD (Cultural Distance), pPD (perceived Psychic Distance) and PDs (Psychic Distance stimuli) instruments we apply the Mantel test, a test predominantly used in anthropology and genetics, which can be particularly insightful when examining “distance” data. The matrix correlation findings provide evidence supporting the high diversity between these measures and their lack of consistent results for the same countries. Therefore, despite the similarity between the way of conceptualizing and operationalizing CD that Hofstede, Schwartz and GLOBE share, these CD measures do not report consistent findings. Consistently, the lack of correlation, between the PDs measure of Dow & Karunaratna and pPD of Håkanson & Ambos, indicates the diversity between PD stimuli measures and perceived PD measures. At the same time, while the two Psychic Distance (PD) measures indicate high correlation in some cases, overall they are highly diverse from the CD measures. We argue, therefore, that identical studies could reach significantly different conclusions by simply using different measures of CD,pPD&PDs which then denotes significant implications for the reliability of research findings. Additionally, we point out potential weaknesses of these measures when examining culturally proximate countries and multicultural nations.     

The use of open source internet to analysis and predict stock market trading volume

The objective of this paper is to evaluate the impact of information demand and supply on stock market trading volume. Few studies have demonstrated the role of Google search data in analyzing trading volume activity. In this study, we employ a proxy for information demand which is derived from weekly internet search volume. The latest is from Google Trends database, for 25 of the largest stocks traded on CAC40 index, between April 2007 and March 2014. We use news headlines as a proxy for information supply. We use Garch model to analyze and predict trading volume.The empirical results present new evidences. First, information supply has an impact on trading volume but information demand's impact is much more important. Secondly, by applying MCA to results found, it could be concluded that the impact of public information on transaction volume is conditioned by two elements: the firm and market news disclosure and the second element relates to the characteristics of the market participants, more precisely their news interpretations and their risk aversion. Thirdly, we used Chow structural break test to verify the stability of our model. We found that for securities with structural changes, information demand is the responsible variable of the change in our model. Finally, we found that information variables have a predictive power on transaction volume.This paper contributes to existing literature by incorporating open source internet-based data into the analysis and prediction of transaction volume. Using internet information about the stock market, which has appeared recently as an interesting research for financial empiricists, computer scientists and practitioners, will have a very important utility because quantifying demand and supply of information becomes possible.     

The Coordination Role of Stress Tests in Bank Risk‐Taking

We examine whether stress tests distort banks' risk‐taking decisions. We study a model in which a regulator may choose to rescue banks in the event of concurrent bank failures. Our analysis reveals a novel coordination role of stress tests. Disclosure of stress‐test results informs banks of the failure likelihood of other banks, which can reduce welfare by facilitating banks' coordination in risk‐taking. However, conducting stress tests also enables the regulator to more effectively intervene banks, coordinating them preemptively into taking lower risks. We find that, if the regulator has a strong incentive to bail out, stress tests improve welfare, whereas if the regulator's incentive to bail out is weak, stress tests impair welfare.     

GB/T2542-2012《砌墙砖试验方法》合理性分析及建议

本文是在GB/T2542-2012《砌墙砖试验方法》实施后,在操作实践中发现配套设备、试验过程和标准的落实中存在一些问题。通过对这些问题进行分析,提出合理化的建议。     

地方高校大型分析测试仪器的管理和使用——以榆林学院为例

本文以榆林学院为例,从地方高校大型分析测试仪器设备发展中呈现出的特点以及存在的问题出发,在提高大型仪器设备的利用率和使用效益等方面进行了分析探讨。     

铁路客专现浇连续梁碗扣满堂支架的设计及检算

本文详细介绍成渝客运专线梁滩河特大桥预应力混凝土连续梁现浇施工中碗扣满堂支架的设计及检算,为类似工程施工提供参考。     

Can the Islamic bank be an emerging leader? A panel data causality analysis

This short note investigates the ability of Islamic banks (IBs) to play a leading role in revamping and driving conventional banking. To this end, we used a panel of 10 major conventional banks (CBs) and 10 IBs over the period 2006–2013. We applied panel regression tests and carried out a panel causality analysis. Our findings identified no significant causality effect from IBs to CBs and indicated that IBs are not able to play a role of leader.