EUROMOD: the European Union tax-benefit microsimulation model

This paper aims to provide an introduction to the current state of the art of EUROMOD, the European Union tax-benefit microsimulation model. It explains the original motivations for building a multi-country EU-wide model and summarises its current organisation. It provides an overview of EUROMOD components, covering its policy scope, the input data, the validation process and some technical aspects such as the tax-benefit programming language and the user interface. The paper also reviews some recent applications of EUROMOD and, finally, considers future developments

The Economic Impacts of Improved Foreign Investor Confidence in Bangladesh: A CGE Analysis

This paper uses a large-scale computable general equilibrium model of Bangladesh to simulate the economic effects of attracting foreign investment by improved business confidence. The simulation results indicate that if all revenue of newly arrived capital accrues to foreign investors and the government maintains budget neutrality, in the long-run this would expand GDP slightly. In general, capital-intensive sectors experience robust expansion and labour-intensive sectors suffer a contraction in output and employment. Urban households experience increases in consumption because they are relatively heavily concentrated in manufacturing sectors that are favourably affected. In contrast, rural households experience decreases in consumption because they are relatively concentrated in the agriculture sector which is adversely affected.Business confidence; foreign direct investment; computable general equilibrium model; Bangladesh.

A Tissue Engineering product development pathway

Tissue engineering is a field of inquiry and research that uses engineering techniques and principles of biological sciences to develop functional substitutes for reconstruction of damaged organs. Commercial translation of tissue engineering products is currently in progress all over the world. Many companies are moving their interest towards this market segment that grows by 6% per year. Aim of this thesis is to probe the possibility of developing tissue engineering products in the most cost-effective way, minimizing the industrial risk and developing a specific fund raising model. Tissue engineering is based on three main features: cells, scaffolds and bioreactors. Cells are seeded on a scaffold and cultured in a bioreactor in order to obtain a tissue engineering product. Nevertheless, developing cell carrying products is hampered by certification claims ("advanced therapies" certification rules) that unbearably increase R&D and certification costs and can be faced by either big companies or start-ups of big companies and spin-offs of complex aggregates of research centers involved in advanced cell research. On the other hand, scaffolds (certification class IIb) and bioreactors for tissue engineering (certification class I) can be developed with a lower economic effort, being the competition based on innovation, since their market is in the "growth phase" for scaffolds and in the "introduction phase" for bioreactors in the Levitt's product life cycle theory. Purpose of this thesis is to basically study scaffold and bioreactor features, then to preliminarily design some models of bioreactors and, eventually, to set a business model, based on private and public fund raising, aimed to the development of scaffolds for dental implantology and of bioreactors for cardiovascular and bone tissue engineering. Finally, a business plan of a company being spin-off of Politecnico di Torino and industrial start-up has been elaborate

Exploring Reusable Takeout Packaging as an Alternative to Disposable Plastics in Maine\u27s Restaurant Industry

Since the emergence of plastic over 100 years ago, businesses have increasingly relied on them to protect products. While convenient, the proliferation of plastic packaging is a major contributor to pollutants in the soil, oceans, and bodies of humans and animals alike. Goals in states like Maine seek to reduce the amount of waste and alleviate these issues. However, the deeply embedded popularity of disposable packaging and lack of reliable waste processing capabilities has caused Maine to fall short of its goals. While solutions need to focus on reducing the amount of packaging entering the economy, most businesses rely on substitutes for plastic rather than waste reduction. On its face, biodegradable substitutes for plastic appear to be a good solution. However, lifecycle assessments of these materials indicate that their environmental impact is similar to traditional plastics. Further, studies suggest that biodegradable packaging can leave behind contaminants after they decompose. Thus, strategies like reuse, that focus on reducing the amount of waste, are preferable to material substitution. Compared to other sectors, the restaurant industry is just beginning to explore reuse as a solution to waste issues. In particular, the recent explosion in the popularity of takeout and delivery food makes the restaurant industry an impactful area of study. In this thesis, I explore reusable takeout packaging in the restaurant industry and the factors that influence the adoption of these systems. Chapter One presents a review of literature focused on reusable packaging in the restaurant industry. Reuse systems were examined through the lens of four major identifiable themes: environmental impact, economic success, social behavior, and operational logistics. As will be seen, success of reusable programs largely depends on how these four factors interplay with each other within a given business environment. Chapter Two investigate the factors that make single-use packaging so durable in our society and what social aspects prevent a switch towards reusable packaging. While reusable packaging can provide many benefits, there are numerous social barriers that cause single-use packaging to continue its dominance. This chapter explores these barriers and presents the findings of stakeholder engaged research that was conducted as part of this project. Chapter Three presents the findings of a waste audit conducted in the town of Bar Harbor, ME. This short chapter helps contextualize the findings from the previous chapters and provides a baseline for understanding the barriers and opportunities for reusable packaging systems in Maine’s coastal communities. Chapter Four pulls the learnings from the previous three chapters into a cohesive business plan. While every detail of this chapter is meant to be actionable, the plan itself is intended only as a framework for a business that provides reusable packaging logistics in Maine. This chapter goes through the entire process of starting a business and identifies viable locations, potential risks, marketing strategy, and explores the financial considerations involved in starting such an organization. Finally, Chapter 5 takes note of the key findings from this paper and suggests areas where future research can improve on this work

Integrated approach to solid waste management in Pune city

The solid waste is increasing in Pune city due to growth of population, urbanization, higher per capita income and standard of living, changing lifestyle and food habits. The solid waste created by the household units, shops, restaurant and commercial units are higher. Solid waste is inevitable task in urbanization process and it will increase in future. The collection, segregation, storage, transports and processing of solid waste needs planning and more investment. Clean city improves standard of living by reducing different diseases. Public private partnership is more useful in solid waste management. Government and Municipal Corporation must encourage local management through collection, transport and segregation and disposal of solid waste. Public awareness and segregation at source, rules and regulations related to solid waste will bring good change in solid waste management.Urbanization, management, lifestyle

STARGATE : Static Repository Gateway and Toolkit. Final Project Report

STARGATE (Static Repository Gateway and Toolkit) was funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and is intended to demonstrate the ease of use of the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) Static Repository technology, and the potential benefits offered to publishers in making their metadata available in this way This technology offers a simpler method of participating in many information discovery services than creating fully-fledged OAI-compliant repositories. It does this by allowing the infrastructure and technical support required to participate in OAI-based services to be shifted from the data provider (the journal) to a third party and allows a single third party gateway provider to provide intermediation for many data providers (journals). Specifically, STARGATE has created a series of Static Repositories of publisher metadata provided by a selection of Library and Information Science journals. It has demonstrated the interoperability of these repositories by exposing their metadata via a Static Repository Gateway for harvesting and cross-searching by external service providers. The project has conducted a critical evaluation of the Static Repository approach in conjunction with the participating publishers and service providers. The technology works. The project has demonstrated that Static Repositories are easy to create and that the differences between fully-fledged and static OAI Repositories have no impact on the participation of small journal publishers in OAI-based services. The problems for a service that arise out of the use of Static Repositories are parallel to those created by any other repository dealing with journal articles. Problems arise from the diversity of metadata element sets provided by a given journal and the lack of specific metadata elements for the articles' volume and issue details. Another issue for the use of publishers' metadata arise as the collection policies of some existing services only allow Open Access materials to be included in them. The project recommends that the use of Static Repositories continues to be explored - in particular as a flexible way to expose existing sets of structured information to OAI services and to create the opportunity to enhance the metadata as part of the process. The project further recommends that the publishing community consider the creation or adoption of an application profile for journal articles to support information discovery that can search by volume and issue. Significant further use of the Static Repository technology by small journal publishers will require the future creation and maintenance of a community-specific Static Repository Gateway. Further use will also require advocacy within the publishing community but might initially be most effectively kick-started through the creation of OAI repositories based on metadata held by the commercial services which publish or mediate access to electronic copies of journals on behalf of small publishers

Recent Development in Russian Agro-Food Sector and Its Further Policies

Agribusiness,

Revisiting the Regional Growth Convergence Debate in Colombia Using Income Indicators

This paper investigates growth convergence across Colombian departments during the period of 1975 to 2000, following both the regression and the distributional approaches suggested in the literature, and using two income measures computed by Centro de Estudios Ganaderos (CEGA).We also discuss issues related to data provided by Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadısticas (DANE) used by previous convergence studies. Our results show no evidence supporting convergence using per capita gross departmental product, but rather persistence in the distribution. Using per capita gross household disposable income, we find convergence, but only at a low speed, close to one percent per year. Furthermore, we find no evidence of the existence of different steady states for the two variables considered.Colombia, regional growth convergence, growth regression, kernel density estimators

Budget pressures on Australian governments 2014

Unprecedented infrastructure spending by states and territories is largely responsible for a $106 billion decline in their finances since 2006, argues this report. Overview Australian government budgets are under pressure. Without tough decisions, they risk posting deficits of around 4½ per cent of GDP within 10 years. The problems have got worse since our first Budget Pressures report. We would be better off if we faced up to the tough problems sooner rather than later. We now need to find savings and tax increases of$70 billion a year. Over the economic cycle of boom and bust, balanced budgets are much better than the alternative. Persistent government deficits incur interest payments, and limit future borrowings, reducing flexibility in a crisis. They are also unfair: they require future taxpayers to pay for today’s spending. Despite relatively favourable economic conditions, Australian governments will post a collective deficit of between 2-3 per cent of GDP this year, and will remain in deficit by 1 per cent of GDP in 2017. Long-term spending has increased. The biggest driver was the sustained increase in health spending. Over the past decade health expenditure rose by over $40 billion in real terms. The ageing population was not the prime cause. Rather, people of any age saw doctors more often, had more tests and operations and took more prescription drugs. Similarly, Age Pension costs grew much faster than GDP, not because of population ageing, but with policy decisions to increase benefits and widen eligibility. New analysis in this edition of Budget Pressures shows that budget sustainability is also threatened by infrastructure spending. After a threefold increase in capital spending over the last 10 years, states are paying 3 per cent more of their revenues in interest and depreciation. Capital recycling and public private partnerships may improve credit ratings, but ultimately future recurrent budgets must still pay for the cost of past infrastructure. Continued trends in health and Age Pension costs are likely to drag future budgets backwards by 2 per cent of GDP by 2023. Future budgets will also be strained by promises of substantial new spending on the National Disability Insurance Scheme, schools, and defence, costing an extra 1 per cent of GDP. In addition, prices of Australia’s minerals are likely to decline, dragging budgets another ½ percent of GDP into the red. What can responsible leaders do to bring Australia’s budgets under control? First, they must explain the size and importance of the problem. Second, they must design a package of measures that share the burden of reform fairly across the community. As we showed in our Balancing Budgets report, the most promising reforms include lifting the age of access to Age Pension and superannuation, tightening the Age Pension assets test, paying less for pharmaceuticals with expired patents and asking students to pay a greater share of their tertiary education. However, given the size of the problem, budgets can only be balanced by looking at both expenditure and revenue. The highest priority tax increases should be the withdrawal of poorly targeted tax concessions, particularly superannuation for the wealthy, capital gains discounts, and negative gearing. Sustainable budgets require governments to make tough choices. They are politically difficult, but vital to Australia’s prosperity