Reaney Feasibility Study.

Conducted on behalf of Planning Capstone 2002. Supported by the Neighborhood Planning for Community Revitalization (NPCR) program at the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs, University of Minnesota

Cultural practices and life insurance consumption: An international analysis using GLOBE scores

This cross-disciplinary study examines how national culture practice affects cross-country variations in life insurance consumption. To proxy for national culture dimensions, we use the refined measure of the GLOBE project which includes several additional cultural dimensions not included in Hofstede's analysis. Using 1966-2004 data across thirty-eight countries, our analysis reveals a strong relationship between life insurance consumption and the practice scores of in-group collectivism as well as power distance. These relationships continue to hold, even after controlling for other country-level variables such as national income, expected inflation rate, banking sector development, investor protection index, dependency ratio, life expectancy, and religion.Culture GLOBE Individualism Power distance Life insurance consumption

CA2VES Webinar Series: Working with Manufacturing Extension Partnerships (MEPs)

This video, published by the Clemson University Center for Workforce Development, outlines the step-by-step process for initiating, leveraging, and maintaining and growing manufacturing extension partnerships. The presentation also provides a partner perspective from the South Carolina Manufacturing Extension Partnership (SCMEP), who talk about their organization, South Carolina data, and provide testimonials. The video runs 35:01 minutes in length

The Echo Distributed File System

this paper describes how the Echo design and implementation set out to realize these properties, and our experience with the resulting system. A Distributed System Is Not Just a Network of Computer

The Determination of Capital Structure: Is National Culture a Missing Piece to the Puzzle?

Why does knowing the nationality of the company help predict its financial leverage? Differences in institutional backgrounds provide only a partial answer to this question. This study suggests that national culture affects corporate capital structures. Empirical hypotheses, drawn from financial models and cross-cultural psychology, are tested against a sample of 5591 firms across 22 countries. Results show that countries with high scores on the cultural dimensions of “conservatism” and “mastery” tend to have lower corporate debt ratios. The effects are strong and remain significant even after accounting for differences in economic performance, legal systems, financial institutions, and some other well-known determinants of debt ratios.© 2002 JIBS. Journal of International Business Studies (2002) 33, 99–127

Cervical transcutaneous vagal nerve stimulation (ctVNS) improves human cognitive performance under sleep deprivation stress

Lindsey McIntire et al. assess the impact of noninvasive cervical transcutaneous vagal nerve stimulation (ctVNS) on cognitive performance, mood, and attention in a cohort of sleep-deprived participants. Their results suggest that ctVNS can significantly improve arousal and multi-tasking, and may represent an alternative treatment for fatigue in humans