The Economic Cost of Corruption: A Survey and New Evidence

This paper reviews the empirical literature on the economic costs of corruption. Corruption affects economic growth, the level of GDP per capita, investment activity, international trade and price stability negatively. Additionally, it biases the composition of government expenditures. The second part of the paper estimates the effect of corruption on economic growth and GDP per capita as well as on six possible transmission channels. The results of this analysis allows to calculate the total effect of corruption: An increase of corruption by about one index point reduces GDP growth by 0.13 percentage points and GDP per capita by 425 US$

Long-term orbital lifetime predictions

Long-term orbital lifetime predictions are analyzed. Predictions were made for three satellites: the Solar Max Mission (SMM), the Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF), and the Pegasus Boiler Plate (BP). A technique is discussed for determining an appropriate ballistic coefficient to use in the lifetime prediction. The orbital decay rate should be monitored regularly. Ballistic coefficient updates should be done whenever there is a significant change in the actual decay rate or in the solar activity prediction

Government decentralization as a disincentive for transnational terror? An empirical analysis

Using panel data for a maximum of 109 countries over the years 1976-2000, we empirically analyze the impact of decentralization on the occurrence of transnational terror. Our results show that expenditure decentralization reduces the number of transnational terror events in a country, while political decentralization has no impact. These results are robust to the choice of control variables and method of estimation.Terrorism; Decentralization; Federalism; Governance quality; Government effectiveness

Experimental investigation of the cornering characteristics of 18 by 5.5, type 7, aircraft tires with different tread patterns

The characteristics, which include the cornering-force and drag-force friction coefficients and self-alining torque, were obtained on dry, damp, and flooded runway surfaces over a range of yaw angles from 0 deg to 12 deg and at ground speeds from approximately 5 to 90 knots. The results indicate that a tread pattern with pinholes in the ribs reduces the tire cornering capability at high yaw angles on a damp surface but improves cornering on a dry surface. A tread pattern which has transverse grooves across the entire width of the tread improves the tire cornering performance slightly at high speeds on the flooded runway surface. The cornering capability of all the tires is degraded at high ground speeds by thin film lubrication and/or tire hydroplaning effects. Alterations to the conventional tread pattern provide only marginal improvements in the tire cornering capability which suggests that runway surface treatments may be a more effective way of improving aircraft ground performance during wet operations

Cross-Country Determinants of Life Satisfaction:Exploring Different Determinants across Groups inSociety

This paper explores a wide range of cross-country determinants of life satisfaction exploiting adatabase of 90,000 observations in 70 countries. We distinguish four groups of aggregate variablesas potential determinants of satisfaction: political, economic, institutional, and human developmentand culture. We use ordered probit to investigate the importance of these variables on individual lifesatisfaction and test the robustness of our results with Extreme Bounds Analysis. The results showthat only a small number of factors, such as openness, business climate, postcommunism, thenumber of chambers in parliament, Christian majority, and infant mortality robustly influence lifesatisfaction across countries while the importance of many variables suggested in the previousliterature is not confirmed. This remains largely true when the analysis splits national populationsaccording to gender, income and political orientation also.Life Satisfaction, Happiness, Institutions, Extreme Bounds Analysis

Do People Make the Place?: An Examination of the Attraction-Selection-Attrition Hypothesis

This study tests the hypotheses that (1) congruence between internal need states and external environments drives the organizational-choice process, and (2) those attracted to particular organizations are more homogeneous than the applicant pool in general. Subjects were evaluated on fourteen needs using the Jackson Personality Research Form. They then viewed two video-taped segments of simulated campus interviews to gain information about two distinct organizational types. The interview segments entered the discussion in-progress to avoid any reference to a particular job which might introduce an occupational confound. Subjects received job offers from both organizations and were asked to indicate which of the two organizations they found more attractive by accepting one of the offers. Analysis of variance results indicated only weak support for the congruency hypothesis. Differences were observed in n Ach between the groups of subjects attracted to each organization. No differences were found for any of the other need strength measures. This suggests that the subjects attracted to the ifferent organizations are substantially similar. Implications for the homogeneity hypothesis are discussed and suggestions for further study of this concept are offered

Measurement and Dimensionality of Compensation Satisfaction in Law Enforcement

This research examined the dimensionality of carpensation satisfaction for the occupational area of law enforcanent by analyzing the factor structure of Henanan and SChwab\u27s (1985) Pay Satisfaction Questionnaire (PSQ) . The PSQ is intended to measure four facets of compensation satisfaction: 1) pay level, 2) benefits, 3) pay raises, and 4) pay structure-administration. Previous research showed support for the PSQ level and benefits scales, but yielded equivocal results for the raises and structure-administration scales. Previous research also showed that the factor structure of the PSQ varied by job classification group. The present study, using data fran 1189 unifomed law enforcanent officers anployed by eight different state police or highway patrol organizations, found that a three-factor solution (level, benefits, and structure-administration) represents the appropriate dimensional structure for compensation satisfaction in the occupational area of law enforcanent, at least within the danain of the 18 itans of the PSQ. These findings are integrated with those of previous research, and implications for research and practice are discussed

The bigger the better? Evidence of the effect of government size on life satisfaction around the world

This paper empirically analyzes the question whether government involvement in the economy is conducive or detrimental to life satisfaction in a cross-section of 74 countries. This provides a test of a longstanding dispute between standard neoclassical economic theory, which predicts that government plays an unambiguously positive role for individuals’ quality of life, and public choice theory, that was developed to understand why governments often choose excessive involvement and regulation, thereby harming voters’ quality of life. Our results show that life satisfaction decreases with higher government spending. This negative impact of the government is stronger in countries with a leftwing median voter. It is alleviated by government effectiveness – but only in countries where the state sector is already small.Life satisfaction, Government

Dynamic Response of a Collidant Impacting a Low Pressure Airbag

There are many uses of low pressure airbags, both military and commercial. Many of these applications have been hampered by inadequate and inaccurate modeling tools. This dissertation contains the derivation of a four degree-of-freedom system of differential equations from physical laws of mass and energy conservation, force equilibrium, and the Ideal Gas Law. Kinematic equations were derived to model a cylindrical airbag as a single control volume impacted by a parallelepiped collidant. An efficient numerical procedure was devised to solve the simplified system of equations in a manner amenable to discovering design trends. The largest public airbag experiment, both in scale and scope, was designed and built to collect data on low-pressure airbag responses, otherwise unavailable in the literature. The experimental results were compared to computational simulations to validate the simplified numerical model. Experimental response trends are presented that will aid airbag designers. The two objectives of using a low pressure airbag to demonstrate the feasibility to 1) accelerate a munition to 15 feet per second velocity from a bomb bay, and 2) decelerate humans hitting trucks below the human tolerance level of 50 G\u27s, were both met

Collaboration to Institutionalize Service-Learning in Higher Education Organizations: The Relationship Between the Structures of Academic and Student Affairs

Higher education organizations are distinguished by a structural divide between academic affairs and student affairs. Specific to this separation is the divide between the formal curriculum created and managed by faculty and the informal \u27hidden\u27 curriculum developed and delivered to students by student affairs professionals. This divide prompts questions about the role of structure and the cultures that are reinforced by those structures to influence collaboration to integrate new pedagogies such as service-learning. Case study design was used to analyze three institutions in New England to understand the influence of organizational structures to institutionalize service-learning and to determine the degree to which collaboration between divisions at those campuses influences the institutionalization of this pedagogy. To approach the study it was important to understand the structural characteristics that define the work environments of each campus, and how institutional constituents, including faculty, senior leaders, student affairs professionals, and service-learning directors and staff understand the meaning and value of service-learning as a conceptual model of education. Six themes provided a framework for cross-campus comparison: separate purposes and responsibilities, faculty culture and relationships to student affairs, faculty authority over the academic curriculum, role of the senior academic administrator to motivate collaboration, separate reporting structures for academic affairs and student affairs, and the role of the academic department and its influence on collaboration. Interviews were the primary method of data collection, supported by analysis of institutional documents and observations at each campus. The results of the study show that the divide between faculty and student affairs continues to be a critical institutional factor in higher education. However, findings also provide evidence that in some institutions traditional boundaries have become more permeable and fluid, enabling professional staff and faculty to work in more cooperative ways to expand a culture of service and contribute to sustained service-learning pedagogy