The location of executive suites and business centers in the United States: an exploratory analysis

Increasingly, corporate occupiers seek more flexible ways of meeting their accommodation needs. One consequence of this process has been the growth of the executive suite, serviced office or business centre market. This paper, the final report of a research project funded by the Real Estate Research Institute, focuses upon the geographical distribution of business centers offering executive suites within the US. After a brief review of the development of the market, the paper examines the availability of data, provides basic descriptive statistics of the distribution of executive suites by state and by metropolitan statistical area and then attempts to model the distribution using demographic and socio-economic data at MSA level. The distribution reflects employment in key growth sectors and the position of the MSA in the urban hierarchy. An appendix presents a preliminary view of the global distribution of suites.

Typification of four North American club-chollas: the names of four Engelmannian species from Mexico and Southwestern United States

The names Opuntia bulbispina, O. clavata, O. emoryi and O. grahamii, originally proposed by George Engelmann between 1848 and 1856, are reviewed and typified after new findings of previously unknown voucher specimens. Original materials collected by some of the collaborators employed by Engelmann during the Mexican Boundary Survey were discovered in a loan from the Torrey Herbarium at the New York Botanical Garden (NY). Many of the materials include fragments of stems and fruits, and others include only sectioned flowers and some seeds. Particularly good descriptions of the species here concerned were published in Engelmann’s “Synopsis of the Cactaceae” in 1857, and exceptional illustrations were produced by Paulus Roetter and printed in “Cactaceae of the Boundary” in 1859. The problems surrounding some previous typifications of these names range from typification of joint lectotypes to illegitimate typifications of illustrations when original material was known to exist. The materials selected for typification were collected by the Mexican Boundary Survey and are lodged at the herbaria of the Missouri Botanical Garden (MO) and the New York Botanical Garden (NY); some are illustrations published by Engelmann.

Macroeconomic forecasting with mixed-frequency data: forecasting output growth in the United States

Many macroeconomic series, such as U.S. real output growth, are sampled quarterly, although potentially useful predictors are often observed at a higher frequency. We look at whether a mixed data-frequency sampling (MIDAS) approach can improve forecasts of output growth. The MIDAS specification used in the comparison uses a novel way of including an autoregressive term. We find that the use of monthly data on the current quarter leads to significant improvement in forecasting current and next quarter output growth, and that MIDAS is an effective way to exploit monthly data compared with alternative methods.

Cross-cultural generality and specificity in self-regulation: avoidance personal goals and multiple aspects of well-being in the United States and Japan

The authors examined avoidance personal goals as concurrent (Study 1) and longitudinal (Study 2) predictors of multiple aspects of well-being in the United States and Japan. In both studies, participants adopted more avoidance personal goals in Japan relative to the United States. Both studies also demonstrated that avoidance personal goals were significant negative predictors of the most relevant aspects of well-being in each culture. Specifically, avoidance personal goals were negative predictors of intrapersonal and eudaimonic well-being in the United States and were negative predictors of interpersonal and eudaimonic well-being in Japan. The findings clarify and extend puzzling findings from prior empirical work in this area, and raise provocative possibilities about the nature of avoidance goal pursuit.

The United States in Southern Africa: Chester Crocker's linkage strategy 1981-1988

Chester Crocker was appointed as Reagan's Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs in 1981. He had criticised the inconsistencies of US African policy and proposed a renewed emphasis on the balance between America's global interests with specific regional priorities. While the focus of Congressmen, journalists and public opinion centred on the issue of apartheid, it was the Namibian War of Independence (South African Border War) that initially drew the attention of the Reagan administration, and it was the resolution of this war that remained the priority for the US government in this region throughout Crocker's time in office.

The heliospheric Hale cycle over the last 300 years and its implications for a “lost” late 18th century solar cycle

A Hale cycle, one complete magnetic cycle of the Sun, spans two complete Schwabe cycles (also referred to as sunspot and, more generally, solar cycles). The approximately 22-year Hale cycle is seen in magnetic polarities of both sunspots and polar fields, as well as in the intensity of galactic cosmic rays reaching Earth, with odd- and even-numbered solar cycles displaying qualitatively different waveforms. Correct numbering of solar cycles also underpins empirical cycle-to-cycle relations which are used as first-order tests of stellar dynamo models. There has been much debate about whether the unusually long solar cycle 4 (SC4), spanning- 1784–1799, was actually two shorter solar cycles combined as a result of poor data coverage in the original Wolf sunspot number record. Indeed, the group sunspot number does show a small increase around 1794–1799 and there is evidence of an increase in the mean latitude of sunspots at this time, suggesting the existence of a cycle ‘‘4b’’. In this study, we use cosmogenic radionuclide data and associated reconstructions of the heliospheric magnetic field (HMF) to show that the Hale cycle has persisted over the last 300 years and that data prior to 1800 are more consistent with cycle 4 being a single long cycle (the ‘‘no SC4b’’ scenario). We also investigate the effect of cycle 4b on the HMF using an open solar flux (OSF) continuity model, in which the OSF source term is related to sunspot number and the OSF loss term is determined by the heliospheric current sheet tilt, assumed to be a simple function of solar cycle phase. The results are surprising; Without SC4b, the HMF shows two distinct peaks in the 1784–1799 interval, while the addition of SC4b removes the secondary peak, as the OSF loss term acts in opposition to the later rise in sunspot number. The timing and magnitude of the main SC4 HMF peak is also significantly changed by the addition of SC4b. These results are compared with the cosmogenic isotope reconstructions of HMF and historical aurora records. These data marginally favour the existence of SC4b (the ‘‘SC4b’’ scenario), though the result is less certain than that based on the persistence of the Hale cycle. Thus while the current uncertainties in the observations preclude any definitive conclusions, the data favour the ‘‘no SC4b’’ scenario. Future improvements to cosmogenic isotope reconstructions of the HMF, through either improved modelling or additional ice cores from well-separated geographic locations, may enable questions of the existence of SC4b and the phase of Hale cycle prior to the Maunder minimum to be settled conclusively.

Prediction of the economic activity from the short and long-term interest rate differential: new evidences in Chile and the United States of America cases

The purpose of this work is to verify the stability of the relationship between real activity and interest rate spread. The test is based on Chen (1988) and Osorio and Galea (2006). The analysis is applied to Chile and the United States, from 1980 to 1999. In general, in both cases the relationship was statistically significant in early 80s, but a break point is found in both countries during that decades, suggesting that the relationship depends on the monetary rule follow by the Central Bank.

Racial Conflict in the United States of America : A Deconstructive Perspective on Native Speaker by Changrae Lee

Written about the time of the Golden Venture incident, Chang-rae Lee’s Native Speaker makes a particular reference to that incident, whereby implying that particular immigrants, on the grounds of their racial identities, are mistreated and considered as aliens by some Americas. While some whites discriminate against immigrants, there is widespread ethnic tension between Korean Americans and African Americans. Significantly, racial conflict between Koreans and blacks and the racist attitude of some whites toward immigrants are mirrored in the relationship between the Korean-American protagonist Henry and his American wife Lelia. That is, due to their different racial identities they do not understand each other and they always argue. However, toward the end of the novel, Henry and Lelia come to understand each other. While ethnic conflict between Koreans and blacks and certain whites’ discriminatory attitudes toward immigrants is serious one, the novel suggests the unimportance of racial identity. In other words, the novel concludes that there is no discriminatory treatment of immigrants and, in fact, every one is a native Speaker in America. In the novel there is no message of how racial conflict could be resolved. However, this essay suggests that by investigating how the tension between Henry and Lelia is resolved, one could suggest a solution for the ethnicity problem in America and in real life.