The effect of bank structure and profitability on firm openings

An examination of the effects of price and availability of credit from commercial lending organizations on the start-up rates of new businesses within specific markets, finding that profitable and competitive banking markets are associated with higher rates of firm births.Banking structure ; Industrial location

A Monte Carlo examination of bias tests in mortgage lending

An exploration of the effectiveness of testing procedures in uncovering discrimination by mortgage lenders, reflecting perceived shortcomings in the scope of data provided by the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, which indicates that the rejection rate for black mortgage applicants is much higher than for whites. The authors find that for plausible levels of bias, the sample size is critical, but that low levels of bias can be difficult to detect even with large sample sizes.Mortgages ; Discrimination in mortgage loans

The Halphen cubics of order two

For each $m\ge 1$, Roulleau and Urz\'ua give an implicit construction of a configuration of $4(3m^2-1)$ complex plane cubic curves. This construction was crucial for their work on surfaces of general type. We make this construction explicit by proving that the Roulleau-Urz\'ua configuration consists precisely of the Halphen cubics of order $m$, and we determine specific equations of the cubics for $m=1$ (which were known) and for $m=2$ (which are new).Comment: 20 page

The Chanka: Archaeological Research in Andahuaylas (Apurimac), Peru

In AD 1438 a battle took place outside the city of Cuzco that changed the course of South American history. The Chanka, a powerful ethnic group from the Andahuaylas region, had begun an aggressive program of expansion. Conquering a host of smaller polities, their army had advanced well inside the territory of their traditional rival, the Inca. In a series of unusual maneuvers, the Inca defeated the invading Chanka forces and became the most powerful people in the Andes. Many scholars believe that the defeat of the Chanka represents a defining moment in the history of South America as the Inca then continued to expand and establish the largest empire of the Americas. Despite its critical position in South American history, until recently the Chanka heartland remained unexplored and the cultural processes that led to their rapid development and subsequent defeat by the Inca had not been investigated. From 2001 to 2004, Brian Bauer conducted an archaeological survey of the Andahuaylas region. This project represents an unparalleled opportunity to examine theoretical issues concerning the history and cultural development of late-prehistoric societies in this area of the Andes. The resulting book includes an archaeological analysis on the development of the Chanka and examines their ultimate defeat by the Inca. Series: Monographs 6

USING NUDGES TO INCREASE ENGAGEMENT WITH SUICIDE PREVENTION RESOURCES IN AN ONLINE SAMPLE OF UNITED STATE MILITARY VETERANS

Suicide rates have continually increased from 1999 to 2019 in the United States, with populations such as military Veterans showing substantially higher suicide death and attempt rates than civilians. Behavioral economics researchers have demonstrated that people regularly make decisions that are not aligned with their own self-interests (i.e., irrational decisions). These irrational decisions often stem from humans having bounded rationality (i.e., limited computational power), which produce reliable cognitive biases that occur outside of people’s awareness and influence the decisions they make. There are many important decisions leading up to a suicide attempt (e.g., whether to engage with suicide prevention resources), and it is likely that these same biases pervade suicide-relevant decisions. This study tests a behavioral economic intervention - nudges - as a potential way to increase engagement with suicide prevention resources in a sample of US military veterans (N = 457) using Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Results showed that overall, nudges were no more effective than control messages at increasing engagement with crisis resources. Only Social Norms were more effective than control messages and one other nudge group (using a Veteran suicide story). Further, findings indicated that participants were more likely to engage with crisis lines compared to safety plans. Exploratory analyses revealed that depression scores and higher delayed discounting scores were two correlates associated with crisis resource engagement overall. Limitations of this study included high data loss due to poor quality, suggesting that Amazon’s Mechanical Turk may be an inappropriate platform for testing the effect of nudges on behavior. Future studies should consider using social media to test nudges so that researchers can more adequately test and refine messages in a naturalistic setting

Non-cancellation of electroweak logarithms in high-energy scattering

We study electroweak Sudakov corrections in high energy scattering, and the cancellation between real and virtual Sudakov corrections. Numerical results are given for the case of heavy quark production by gluon collisions involving the rates $gg \to t \bar t, b \bar b, t \bar b W, t \bar t Z, b \bar b Z, t \bar t H, b \bar b H$. Gauge boson virtual corrections are related to real transverse gauge boson emission, and Higgs virtual corrections to Higgs and longitudinal gauge boson emission. At the LHC, electroweak corrections become important in the TeV regime. At the proposed 100 TeV collider, electroweak interactions enter a new regime, where the corrections are very large and need to be resummed.Comment: 11 pages, 12 figures, 1 table. v2: Journal versio

Aid Management and Coordination: Some Dilemmas

SUMMARY What dilemmas arise in managing aid programmes in poor countries with weak administrative structures and great dependence on external finance? This article considers Bangladesh (1984) and Tanzania (1981–84). Section I treats, for Bangladesh, the case against aid sceptically, but many of its arguments raise valid questions. Section II argues that weaknesses are as much administrative practice as policy and doctrine, in part resulting from the proliferation of funding agencies, and requiring improved coordination and standardisation of donor procedures. However, coordination of donor approaches to policy — homogenised leverage — is questionable (Section III). SOMMAIRE Administration de l'aide et la coordination: quelques dilemmas Quels sont les dilemmes liés à l'administration des programmes d'aide dans des pays pauvres, ayant des structures faibles d'administration, et qui sont largement dépendents des finances extérieures? Cet article considère le Bangladesh (1984) et la Tanzanie (1981–84). La section I analyse le cas du Bangladesh d'un ton sceptique, mais beaucoup de ses arguments mènent à des questions valides. La section II nous montre que les faiblesses sont autant dues aux pratiques administratives qu'aux politiques et doctrines, résultant de la prolifération des agences de financement, ce qui exige une coordination améliorée et une standardisation des procédures des donneurs. Cependant, une coordination des approches des donneurs envers une politique — utilisant des forces de levier d'une manière concertée — peut être mise en question (section III). RESUMEN Administración y coordinación de la ayuda: algunos dilemas Este artículo considera los casos de Bangladesh (1984) y Tanzania (1981–84) para examinar los dilemas que surgen en la administración de los programas de ayuda en países pobres con débiles estructuras institucionales y alta dependencia del financiamento externo. La sección I trata escépticamente, para Bangladesh, el caso en contra de la ayuda; no obstante, sus argumentos generan preguntas válidas. La sección II argumenta que las debilidades corresponden tanto a prácticas administrativas como a aspectos de índole política y doctrinaria, que en parte son resultantes de la proliferación de agencias financieras y que se requiere un mejoramiento en la coordinación y normatización de los procedimientos de los donantes. La sección III concluye, sin embargo, que la coordinación del enfoque a una política — instrumental homogeneizado — es discutible