The Chinese state enterprise sector: labour market reform and the impact on male-female wage structure

The paper examines the wage structure in the Chinese state enterprise sector between 1981 and 1987. This period is of particular interest given the introduction of major labour market reforms in China during the early 1980s. In essence the reforms represented a movement away from administratively determined prices towards a market–oriented system combined with a relatively flexible system of labour allocation. The Juhn, Murphy and Pierce (1991) decomposition is employed to shed light on the role of changing labour market institutions over the period.

Labour market institutions and the gender wage gap in Britain and Australia, 1973-90

The importance of wage structure is frequently interpreted as indirect evidence of the role played by labour market institutions. The current paper follows in this tradition, examining the role of wage structure in explaining the trend in the gender wage gap over the period 1973–91 for both Australia and the UK. The focus is upon whether changes in wage structure (and associated gender wage gap) both across country and over time are compatible with institutional explanations. Combining comparisons both cross‐country and over time yields a more stringent, albeit indirect, test of the role of institutions.

Convergence in the gender wage gap in Australia over the 1980s: identifying the role of counteracting forces via the Juhn, Murphy and Pierce Decomposition

The paper utilises the Juhn Murphy and Pierce (1991) decomposition to shed light on the pattern of slow male-female wage convergence in Australia over the 1980s. The analysis allows one to distinguish between the role of wage structure and genderspecific effects. The central question addressed is whether rising wage inequality counteracted the forces of increased female investment in labour market skills, i.e. education and experience. The conclusion is that in contrast to the US and the UK, Australian women do not appear to have been swimming against a tide of adverse wage structure changes.

The gender wage gap in Australia- the path of future convergence

The paper attempts to project the future trend of the gender wage gap in Australia up to 2031. The empirical analysis utilises the Income Distribution Survey (1996) together with Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) demographic projections. The methodology combines the ABS projections with assumptions relating to the evolution of educational attainment in order to project the future distribution of human capital skills and consequently the future size of the gender wage gap. The analysis suggests that female relative pay will continue to rise up to 2031. However, gender wage convergence will be relatively slow, with a substantial gap remaining in 2031.

Polyhedral studies for minimum-span graph labelling with integer distance constraints

This paper studies the polytope of the minimum-span graph labelling problems with integer distance constraints (DC-MSGL). We first introduce a few classes of new valid inequalities for the DC-MSGL defined on general graphs and briefly discuss the separation problems of some of these inequalities. These are the initial steps of a branch-and-cut algorithm for solving the DC-MSGL. Following that, we present our polyhedral results on the dimension of the DC-MSGL polytope, and that some of the inequalities are facet defining, under reasonable conditions, for the polytope of the DC-MSGL on triangular graphs.

Non-quantized minimum free energy in untranslated region exons

In an attempt to improve automated gene prediction in the untranslated region of a gene, we completed an in-depth analysis of the minimum free energy for 8,689 sub-genetic DNA sequences. We expanded Zhang's classification model and classified each sub-genetic sequence into one of 27 possible motifs. We calculated the minimum free energy for each motif to explore statistical features that correlate to biologically relevant sub-genetic sequences. If biologically relevant sub-genetic sequences fall into distinct free energy quanta it may be possible to characterize a motif based on its minimum free energy. Proper characterization of motifs can lead to greater understanding in automated genefinding, gene variability and the role DNA structure plays in gene network regulation.

Our analysis determined: (1) the average free energy value for exons, introns and other biologically relevant sub-genetic sequences, (2) that these subsequences do not exist in distinct energy quanta, (3) that introns exist however in a tightly coupled average minimum free energy quantum compared to all other biologically relevant sub-genetic sequence types, (4) that single exon genes demonstrate a higher stability than exons which span the entire coding sequence as part of a multi-exon gene and (5) that all motif types contain a free energy global minimum at approximately nucleotide position 1,000 before reaching a plateau. These results should be relevant to the biochemist and bioinformatician seeking to understand the relationship between sub-genetic sequences and the information behind them.

Projections of the future path of the gender wage gap in Great Britain

Purpose – The paper attempts to project the future trend of the gender wage gap in Great Britain up to 2031.
Design/methodology/approach – The empirical analysis utilises the British Household Panel Study Wave F together with Office for National Statistics (ONS) demographic projections. The methodology combines the ONS projections with assumptions relating to the evolution of educational attainment in order to project the future distribution of human capital skills and consequently the future size of the gender wage gap.
Findings – The analysis suggests that gender wage convergence will be slow, with little female progress by 2031 unless there is a large rise in returns to female experience.
Originality/value – The paper has projected the pattern of male and female skill acquisition together with the associated trend in wages up to 2031.

Quantifying minimum monolith size and solute dilution from multi-compartment percolation sampler data

Preferential flow affects solute transport in natural soils, leading to high spatiotemporal variation of concentration. A multicompartment solute sampler (MCS), yielding multiple breakthrough curves at a given depth, can monitor tracer movement in a heterogeneous soil. We present a technique to estimate from MCS data whether a soil monolith is sufficiently large to capture preferential flow, which is a necessity for tracer breakthrough curves to be representative. For several soils, we estimate that an MCS should be larger than 0.1 to 0.2 m². We also expand dilution theory to analyze the concentration variations of a tracer passing the control plane monitored by the MCS, in addition to the conventional plume spreading analysis. We characterize the set of locally observed breakthrough curves by the entropy-based dilution index. For given first and second-central moment, the spatially uniform log-normal breakthrough curve maximizes the dilution index. The ratio between observed and maximum dilution index is denoted reactor ratio. For a 300-compartment solute sampler, covering an area of 0.75 m², we compute a reactor ratio of 0.665, compared with 0.04 for stochastic-convective and 1 for convective-dispersive transport. With a single, large collector the reactor ratio would be 0.958, severely underestimating concentration variations. Large collector areas are clearly inadequate to estimate dilution. Values of the dilution index and the reactor ratio for individual sampling compartments indicate efficient longitudinal mixing in most but not all cases, and considerable spatial variation of the leaching process.

Projecting the U.S. gender wage gap 2000-40

This paper projects the gender wage gap for 25–64 year old Americans for the period 2000–40. The analysis uses data from the Panel Survey of Income Dynamics (PSID) for 1995 and 1996 together with the U.S. Census Bureau demographic projections. The method combines the population projections with assumptions regarding the evolution of educational attainment in order to first project the future distribution of skills and, based on these projections, the future size of the gender wage gap. The main set of projections suggests that changing skill characteristics—specifically educational attainment—will continue to close the gender wage gap. However, even in 2040, a substantial pay gap of at least 75 percent of the size of that in 1995 will remain.

Projecting the trend in the Canadian gender wage gap 2001-2031: will an increase in female education acquisition and commitment be enough?

The paper projects the gender wage gap for 25-64 year-olds in Canada over the period 2001-2031. The empirical analysis uses the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics together with Statistics Canada demographic projections. The methodology combines the population projections with assumptions relating to the evolution of educational attainment in order to first project the future distribution of human capital skills and, based on these projections, the future size of the gender wage gap. The projections suggest continued gender wage convergence produced by changing skills characteristics. However, a substantial pay gap will remain in 2031.

Minimum span frequency assignment problem on triangular lattices

This paper considers the Minimum Span Frequency Assignment Problem with Interference Graph on Triangular Grid (MSFAP-TG), a special case of the Minimum Span Frequency/Channel Assignment (MSFAP) for cellular systems and optical networks. The MSFAP-TG is interesting in its own right and thus worth studying. In this paper, we propose strong integer programming formulations for the MSFAP-TG and present polyhedral results on these formulations. In solving the MSFAP-TG, we implement these integer programs to obtain exact solutions. We also develop a heuristic for obtaining feasible solutions and upper bounds for the problems. With the use of these upper bounds, and a simple lower bound, the computation time of the exact algorithm can be improved substantially. The heuristic turns out to be quite good in terms of the quality of upper bounds and is extremely efficient in computation time. Last of all, we present new concepts for tackling large scale MSFAP-TGs.

TDOA based transmitter localization with minimum number of teceivers and power measurements

This paper investigates the problem of localizing a wireless transmitter using a minimum number of receivers and other readily available means in a time difference of arrival (TDOA) setting. Using the necessary and sufficient conditions for unique solution, we use power measurements to compensate for the reduced number of receivers. In other words, if the transmitter is not located in the unique solution area, we provides a technique to find the true location via the measured received signal power. Our approach neither requires the knowledge of the transmission power nor the path loss exponent.