Temporal trends in intergenerational social mobility in Switzerland: A cohort study of men and women born between 1912 and 1974

The central question addressed in this paper is to what extent the influence of social origin on life chances has changed over time for both men and women. In order to capture this change, intergenerational social mobility of eight different birth-cohorts, covering most of the entire twentieth century, is analysed using a unique collection of twelve Swiss national population sample surveys. The main results show that social mobility has remained constant across cohorts born in 1912 and those born in 1974. This suggests that unlike some other industrialised countries, inequality based on social origin is persistent in Switzerland.

Fresh News; The Farmers' Market Newsletter, Summer 2003

Newsletter produced by Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

Fresh News; The Farmers' Market Newsletter, Fall 2001

Newsletter produced by Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

Fresh News; The Farmers' Market Newsletter, Winter-Spring 2002

Newsletter produced by Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

Fresh News; The Farmers' Market Newsletter, Fall-Winter 2003

Newsletter produced by Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

Fresh News; The Farmers' Market Newsletter, Fall 2002

Newsletter produced by Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

Iowa Farmers' Market Development Manual, 2003

Farmers Market Manual produced by Iowa Departmment of Agriculture and Land Stewardship

Market Transparency, Market Quality and Sunshine Trading

This paper analyzes the implications of pre-trade transpareny on market performance. We find that transparency increases the precision held by agents, however we show that this increase in precision may not be due to prices themselves. In competitive markets, transparency increases market liquidity and reduces price volatility, whereas these results may not hold under imperfect competition. More importantly, market depth and volatility might be positively related with proper priors. Moreover, we study the incentives for liquidity traders to engage in sunshine trading. We obtain that the choice of sunshine/dark trading for a noise trader is independent of his order size, being the traders with higher liquidity needs more interested in sunshine trading, as long as this practice is desirable. Key words: Market Microstructure, Transparency, Prior Information, Market Quality, Sunshine Trading

Contagion or Interdependence in the recent Global Financial Crisis? An application to the stock markets using unconditional cross-market correlations

We consider stock market contagion as a significant increase in cross-market linkages after a shock to one country or group of countries. Under this definition we study if contagion occurred from the U.S. Financial Crisis to the rest of the major stock markets in the world by using the adjusted (unconditional) correlation coefficient approach (Forbes and Rigobon, 2002) which consists of testing if average crossmarket correlations increase significantly during the relevant period of turmoil. We would not reject the null hypothesis of interdependence in favour of contagion if the increase in correlation only suggests a continuation of high linkages in all state of the world. Moreover, if contagion occurs, this would justify the intervention of the IMF and the suddenly portfolio restructuring during the period under study.

Temporal variability and trends of the downward solar radiation over Europe during the 20th century, with regional focus in the dimming/brightening phenomena on the Iberian Peninsula

Proyecto de investigación elaborado a partir de una estancia en el Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, a Alemanya, entre 2010 y 2012. La radiación solar que alcanza la superficie terrestre es un factor clave entre los procesos que controlan el clima de la Tierra, dado el papel que desempeñan en el balance energético y el ciclo hidrológico. Establecer su contribución al cambio climático reciente supone una gran dificultad debido a la complejidad de los procesos implicados, la gran cantidad de información requerida, y la incertidumbre de las bases de datos disponibles en la actualidad. Así, el objetivo principal del proyecto ha consistido en generar una base de datos de insolación incluyendo las series más largas (desde finales del siglo XIX) disponibles en toda Europa. Esta base de datos complementa para nuestro continente el Global Energy Balance Archive (GEBA) que mantiene y gestiona el grupo que ha acogido al receptor de la ayuda postdoctoral, y permite extender espacial (especialmente en países del sur de Europa) y temporalmente las series climáticas disponibles de mediciones de irradiancia solar. Como la insolación es un proxy de la irradiancia solar, el proyecto actual también ha tratado de calibrar de forma exhaustiva ambas variables, a fin de generar una nueva base de datos reconstruida de esta segunda variable que esté disponible desde finales del siglo XIX en Europa. Un segundo objetivo del proyecto ha consistido en continuar trabajando a escala de mayor detalle sobre la Península Ibérica, con el fin de proporcionar una mejor comprensión del fenómeno del “global dimming/brightening” y su impacto en el ciclo hidrológico y balance energético. Finalmente, un tercer objetivo del presente proyecto postdoctoral ha consistido en continuar estudiando los posibles ciclos semanales a gran escala de diferentes variables climáticas, línea de investigación de interés para la detección de posibles efectos de los aerosoles antrópicos en el clima a escalas temporales breves, y consecuentemente estrechamente vinculado al fenómeno del “global dimming/brightening”.

Cancer mortality in Europe, 2000-2004, and an overview of trends since 1975.

BACKGROUND: To update the pattern of cancer mortality in Europe. Materials and methods: We analysed cancer mortality in 34 European countries during 2000-2004, with an overview of trends in 1975-2004 using data from the World Health Organization. RESULTS: From 1990-1994 to 2000-2004, overall cancer mortality in the European Union declined from 185.2 to 168.0/100 000 (world standard, -9%) in men and from 104.8 to 96.9 (-8%) in women, with larger falls in middle age. Total cancer mortality trends were favourable, though to a variable degree, in all major European countries, including Russia, but not in Romania. The major determinants of these favourable trends were the decline of lung (-16%) and other tobacco-related cancers in men, together with the persistent falls in gastric cancer, and the recent appreciable falls in colorectal cancer. In women, relevant contributions came from the persistent decline in cervical cancer and the recent falls in breast cancer mortality, particularly in northern and western Europe. Favourable trends were also observed for testicular cancer, Hodgkin lymphomas, leukaemias, and other neoplasms amenable to treatment, though the reductions were still appreciably smaller in eastern Europe. CONCLUSION: This updated analysis of cancer mortality in Europe showed a persistent favourable trend over the last years.

Tools & Trends, October 2004, Vol. 13, no.3

This is a quarterly newsletter for communities and economic developers in Iowa and surrounding states.