The choice of banking firm: Are the interest rate a significant criteria?

The objective of the research is to know the factors that in Spain determine the choice of banking organization. The obtained results indicate that the dimension of the network of branches is the reason more valued. In spite of the increasing symmetry of the Spanish banking market, the preferences of the clients of the savings banks and those of the banks are not absolutely coincident, being the proximity - the main reason for election- much more valued by the former than by the latter. The existence of divergences in the preferences has also been detected according to the region and the typology of city of residence.

Do Productivity Improvements Move Us Along the Environmental Kuznets Curve?

The Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis focuses on the argument that rising prosperity will eventually be accompanied by falling pollution levels as a result of one or more of three factors: (1) structural change in the economy; (2) demand for environmental quality increasing at a more-than-proportional rate; (3) technological progress. Here, we focus on the third of these. In particular, energy efficiency is commonly regarded as a key element of climate policy in terms of achieving reductions in economy-wide CO2 emissions over time. However, a growing literature suggests that improvements in energy efficiency will lead to rebound (or backfire) effects that partially (or wholly) offset energy savings from efficiency improvements. Where efficiency improvements are aimed at the production side of the economy, the net impact of increased efficiency in any input to production will depend on the combination and relative strength of substitution, output/competitiveness, composition and income effects that occur in response to changes in effective and actual factor prices, as well as on the structure of the economy in question, including which sectors are targeted with the efficiency improvement. In this paper we consider whether increasing labour productivity will have a more beneficial, or more predictable, impact on CO2/GDP ratios than improvements in energy efficiency. We do this by using CGE models of the Scottish regional and UK national economies to analyse the impacts of a simple 5% exogenous (and costless) increase in energy or labour augmenting technological progress.

Interest Rate Co-movements, Global Factors and the Long End of the Term Spread

The disconnect between rising short and low long interest rates has been a distinctive feature of the 2000s. Both research and policy circles have argued that international forces, such as global monetary policy (e.g. Rogoff, 2006); international business cycles (e.g. Borio and Filardo, 2007); or a global savings glut (e.g Bernanke, 2005) may be responsible. In this paper, we employ recent advances in panel data econometrics to document the disconnect and link it explicitly to the existence of a global latent factor that dominates the long end of the term spread for the recent period; the saving glut story emerges as the most likely contender for the global factor.

Volatility of Housing

The aim of the project is to develop a theoretical framework where homelessness arises due to various economic and social factors that vary over time. The ultimate goal is i) to understand whether homelessness spells, entrances and exits could be predicted and if so what information is necessary; and ii) to design and evaluate a homelessness prevention programme in a changing and uncertain environment. Examples of the questions we want to answer are: Should it be made easier for people to borrow money so that they can get out of homelessness, or will such borrowing allow people to over-consume today and so fall into homelessness tomorrow? Should precautionary savings be encouraged so that people have cushions to withstand future shocks, or will savings just delay entry into homelessness? What interventions will affect the probability of becoming homeless and how will they affect behaviour? How will interventions affect incentives to save and to consume before homelessness prevention programmes kick in?

Some Implications Of Capping The Inflation Indexation Of USS Pensions

On 1 October 2011 the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) substantially reduced the pension entitlements of its members. The most onerous of the changes is the cap placed on the indexation of pensions where in the event of high inflation the cap will quickly lower the real value of the pension. This paper quantifies the impact of the inflation cap and high inflation on the real value of the member’s pension and the concomitant impact on the USS and universities.

The Adoption of agricultural credit cooperativism in Spain (1890-1935) : solidarity from below?

The spread of agrarian credit cooperativism in Spain (1890-1934) was done under a variety of ideological and economic orientations. This article focuses on the construction of a few tools and indicators to explain the characteristics of agricultural credit cooperatives. An analysis of financial operations of rural savings banks is related with socio-political aspects that influenced their development; This analysis helps us to explain the relative success of German credit cooperative models adopted in the context of Spanish agriculture, as happened on European periphery.

A balance of questions: what can we ask of climate change economics?

The standard approach to the economics of climate change, which has its best known implementation in Nordhaus's DICE and RICE models (well described in Nordhaus's 2008 book, A Question of Balance) is not well equipped to deal with the possibility of catastrophe, since we are unable to evaluate a risk averse representative agent's expected utility when there is any signi cant probability of zero consumption. Whilst other authors attempt to develop new tools with which to address these problems, the simple solution proposed in this paper is to ask a question that the currently available tools of climate change economics are capable of answering. Rather than having agents optimally choosing a path (that differs from the recommendations of climate scientists) within models which cannot capture the essential features of the problem, I argue that economic models should be used to determine the savings and investment paths which implement climate targets that have been suggested in the physical science literature.

The Emperor Has New Clothes: Empirical Tests of Mainstream Theories of Economic Growth

Modern macroeconomic theory utilises optimal control techniques to model the maximisation of individual well-being using a lifetime utility function. Agents face choices over current and future consumption (with resultant implied savings decisions) seeking to maximise the present value of current plus future well-being. However, such inter-temporal welfare-maximising assumptions remain empirically untested. In the work presented here we test whether welfare was in (historical) fact maximised in the US between 1870-2000 and find empirical support for the optimising basis of growth theory, but only once a comprehensive view of what constitutes a country’s wealth or capital is taken into account.

La revolución energética cubana en la UCLV: ¿un paso en el camino hacia la sostenibilidad?. Parte I: Análisis de los impactos ambientales

La Revolución Energética Cubana (REC) surge de las necesidades de resolver la situación social y económica de Cuba, sumergida en una crisis energética con constantes apagones que limitaban por completo todo desarrollo del país. La REC (2006) se basa en los principios de la autosuficiencia energética, el ahorro y uso racional de la energía, y el incremento de la eficiencia en todos los aspectos. En el presente trabajo se realiza el análisis de la sostenibilidad socio-ambiental de la REC en la Universidad Central Marta Abreu de Las Villas (UCLV), ubicada en Santa Clara (Cuba). La valoración se ha efectuado mediante el análisis de los impactos ambientales y sociales en dos estudios paralelos que se complementan aplicando la técnica de conmensurabilidad débil. El conjunto de los programas de la REC han propiciado mejoras en el suministro eléctrico y en el ahorro energético, disminuyendo en un 44% las emisiones de CO2, a pesar del incremento en la actividad docente y en la flota de equipos. Las medidas adoptadas han incidido en la calidad de la docencia, las condiciones de vida, la concienciación y la participación de la población, dando lugar a un impacto social positivo. De esta manera, el balance global de la REC es positivo ya que ha permitido el desarrollo de la UCLV sin incrementar los impactos ambientales, por lo que se puede considerar un paso en el camino hacia la sostenibilidad socio-ambiental.

La revolución energética cubana en la UCLV: ¿un paso en el camino hacia la sostenibilidad?. Parte II: Análisis de los impactos sociales

La Revolución Energética Cubana (REC) surge de las necesidades de resolver la situación social y económica de Cuba, sumergida en una crisis energética con constantes apagones que limitaban por completo el desarrollo del país. La REC (2006) es un conjunto de medidas basadas en los principios de la autosuficiencia energética, el ahorro y uso racional de la energía, y el incremento de la eficiencia en todos los aspectos. En el presente trabajo se realiza el análisis de la sostenibilidad socio-ambiental de la REC en la Universidad Central Marta Abreu de las Villas (UCLV), ubicada en Santa Clara (Cuba). La valoración se ha efectuado mediante el análisis de los impactos ambientales y sociales en dos estudios paralelos que se complementan aplicando la técnica de conmensurabilidad débil. El conjunto de los programas de la REC han propiciado mejoras en el suministro eléctrico y en el ahorro energético, disminuyendo en un 30% las emisiones de CO2, a pesar del incremento en la actividad docente y en la flota de equipos, en la universidad. Las medidas adoptadas han incidido en la calidad de la docencia, las condiciones de vida, la concienciación y la participación de la población, dando lugar a un impacto social positivo. De esta manera, el balance global de la REC se califica de positivo ya que ha permitido el desarrollo de la UCLV sin incrementar los impactos ambientales, por lo que se puede considerar un paso en el camino hacia la sostenibilidad socio-ambiental.

Gestió dels recursos hídrics del Monestir Budista Sakya Tashi Ling

Amb la finalitat de millorar l’autosuficiència hídrica del monestir budista del Garraf Sakya Tashi Ling, es fa una avaluació de l’estat dels recursos hídrics d’aquest sistema, així com els seus usos i punts de consum. L’avaluació s’ha realitzat mitjançant la integració i ús de paràmetres mediambientals, hídrics i arquitectònics. Amb l’estimació d’entrades i consums d’aigua, juntament amb els càlculs realitzats, s’ha diagnosticat l’estat actual del sistema. Mitjançant la realització d’un inventari dels diferents equipaments i dispositius instal·lats en els punts de consum d’aigua, s’han detectat mancances en la eficiència hídrica com l’escassa implementació de dispositius d’estalvi hídric o la inexistent captació de les aigües pluvials. El diagnòstic de les mancances ha orientat les propostes de millora aplicables al sistema. Aquestes incideixen principalment en la millora de l’estalvi d’aigua amb la instal·lació de dispositius estalviadors i en la captació d’aigües pluvials mitjançant una xarxa de recollida, emmagatzematge i distribució.

Rethinking economy-wide rebound measures: an unbiased proposal

In spite of having been first introduced in the last half of the ninetieth century, the debate about the possible rebound effects from energy efficiency improvements is still an open question in the economic literature. This paper contributes to the existing research on this issue proposing an unbiased measure for economy-wide rebound effects. The novelty of this economy-wide rebound measure stems from the fact that not only actual energy savings but also potential energy savings are quantified under general equilibrium conditions. Our findings indicate that the use of engineering savings instead of general equilibrium potential savings downward biases economy-wide rebound effects and upward-biases backfire effects. The discrepancies between the traditional indicator and our proposed measure are analysed in the context of the Spanish economy.

The Impact of democratization: a preliminary investigation on social policies and political violence in Latin America

The recent strides of democracy in Latin America have been associated to conflicting outcomes. The expectation that democracy would bring about peace and prosperity have been only partly satisfied. While political violence has been by and large eradicated from the sub-continent, poverty and social injustice still prevail and hold sway. Our study argues that democracy matters for inequality through the growing strength of center left and left parties and by making political leaders in general more responsive to the underprivileged. Furthermore, although the pension reforms recently enacted in the region generated overall regressive outcomes on income distribution, democratic countries still benefit from their political past: where democratic tradition was stronger, such outcomes have been milder. Democratic tradition and the specific ideological connotations of the parties in power, on the other hand, did not play an equally crucial role in securing lower levels of political violence: during the last wave of democratizations in Latin America, domestic peace was rather an outcome of political and social concessions to those in distress. In sum, together with other factors and especially economic ones, the reason why recent democratizations have provided domestic peace in most cases, but have been unable so far to solve the problem of poverty and inequality, is that democratic traditions in the subcontinent have been relatively weak and, more specifically, that this weakness has undermined the growth of left and progressive parties, acting as an obstacle to redistribution. Such weakness, on the other hand, has not prevented the drastic reduction of domestic political violence, since what mattered in this case was a combination of symbolic or material concessions and political agreements among powerful élites and counter-élites.

Cost evaluation of cardiovascular magnetic resonance versus coronary angiography for the diagnostic work-up of coronary artery disease: Application of the European Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance registry data to the German, United Kingdom, Swiss, and United States health care systems.

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) has favorable characteristics for diagnostic evaluation and risk stratification of patients with known or suspected CAD. CMR utilization in CAD detection is growing fast. However, data on its cost-effectiveness are scarce. The goal of this study is to compare the costs of two strategies for detection of significant coronary artery stenoses in patients with suspected coronary artery disease (CAD): 1) Performing CMR first to assess myocardial ischemia and/or infarct scar before referring positive patients (defined as presence of ischemia and/or infarct scar to coronary angiography (CXA) versus 2) a hypothetical CXA performed in all patients as a single test to detect CAD. METHODS: A subgroup of the European CMR pilot registry was used including 2,717 consecutive patients who underwent stress-CMR. From these patients, 21% were positive for CAD (ischemia and/or infarct scar), 73% negative, and 6% uncertain and underwent additional testing. The diagnostic costs were evaluated using invoicing costs of each test performed. Costs analysis was performed from a health care payer perspective in German, United Kingdom, Swiss, and United States health care settings. RESULTS: In the public sectors of the German, United Kingdom, and Swiss health care systems, cost savings from the CMR-driven strategy were 50%, 25% and 23%, respectively, versus outpatient CXA. If CXA was carried out as an inpatient procedure, cost savings were 46%, 50% and 48%, respectively. In the United States context, cost savings were 51% when compared with inpatient CXA, but higher for CMR by 8% versus outpatient CXA. CONCLUSION: This analysis suggests that from an economic perspective, the use of CMR should be encouraged as a management option for patients with suspected CAD.

Bacillus thuringiensis: fermentation process and risk assessment: a short review

Several factors make the local production of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) highly appropriate for pest control in developing nations. Bt can be cheaply produced on a wide variety of low cost, organic substrates. Local production results in considerable savings in hard currency which otherwise would be spent on importation of chemical and biological insecticides. The use of Bt in Brazil has been limited in comparison with chemical insecticides. Although Bt is imported, some Brazilian researchers have been working on its development and production. Fermentation processes (submerged and semi-solid) were applied, using by-products from agro-industries. As the semi-solid fermentation process demonstrated to be interesting for Bt endotoxins production, it could be adopted for small scale local production. Although promising results had been achieved, national products have not been registered due to the absence of a specific legislation for biological products. Effective actions are being developed in order to solve this gap. Regardless of the biocontrol agents being considered atoxic and harmless to the environment, information related to direct and indirect effects of microbials are still insufficient in many cases. The risk analysis of the use of microbial control agents is of upmost importance nowadays, and is also discussed.