THE IMPACT OF EQUIVALENCE SCALES ON THE ANALYSIS OF INCOME AND FOOD SPENDING DISTRIBUTIONS

This article examines the effects of different income and food spending adult equivalence scales on estimated expenditure elasticities, on the demographic characteristics of the rich and poor, and on the percentage of household income spent on food by various income quintiles. Empirical results are found to be heavily influenced by the choice of equivalence scales. For example, elasticities varied by over 300%, and the demographic characteristics of the poor varied greatly.Consumer/Household Economics, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

ESTIMATING THE VARIANCE OF FOOD PRICE INFLATION

Stochastic index theory views each commodity price change as an independent observation on the rate of inflation that can be estimated by averaging over all prices. Our methodology estimates both the overall rate of inflation and relative price changes along with standard errors.Food prices, Index numbers, Inflation, Demand and Price Analysis,

BOX-COX TRANSFORMATIONS AND ERROR TERM SPECIFICATION IN DEMAND MODELS

This paper analyzes the influence of error-term specification and functional form on a quarterly demand model for beef. The Box-Cox transformation is used to generalize the functional form while the equation error term is postulated to be both heteroskedastic and autoregressive. Results indicated that both functional form and error-term specification can play a major role in elasticity estimation, elasticity behavior, and hypothesis testing.Demand and Price Analysis,

ANALYSIS OF FOOD STAMP PROGRAM PARTICIPATION AND FOOD EXPENDITURES

A two equation model is developed to examine jointly the determinants of household food stamp program participation and program effects on food expenditures. The model is unique in that it postulates that the participation decision is based on a cost-benefit ratio, selected socioeconomic characteristics, and the potential for increasing both food and nonfood expenditures. Data from the 1977-78 USDA Nationwide Food Consumption Survey Supplemental Low Income Sample is used to estimate the model. Findings suggest that households, in making the participation decision place equal value on the potential for increasing their food and nonfood expenditures. However, at the margin, bonus stamp income is found to have more than twice the impact of money income on food expenditures. The model's potential for policy analysis is also examined.Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH TO DEFINING AND ASSESSING POVERTY THRESHOLDS

This paper introduces a new method for defining poverty lines based on an individual' s self-evaluation of the household's present situation. The proposed method focuses on the minimum household income necessary to purchase food supplies evaluated by society to be barely adequate. The method is especially useful for evaluation and comparing poverty thresholds derived from different methods. It is also valuable for comparing the official U.S. poverty guidelines across households of different sizes. The approach can be extended to include estimation of thresholds differentiated by various household characteristics and comparison of thresholds across these characteristics.Food Security and Poverty,

INFORMATIONAL EFFECTS OF NUTRIENT INTAKE DETERMINANTS ON CHOLESTEROL CONSUMPTION

Nutrient information and dietary data for a sample of U.S. household meal planners are used to estimate the direct and indirect effects of various dietary determinants on cholesterol intake. Holding sociodemographic and household characteristics constant, greater nutrition information translates to significantly lower intake of dietary cholesterol. Evidence supports the hypothesis that schooling promotes better health behavior through greater acquisition and use of health information. Blacks and Hispanics stand to benefit from nutrition education programs to increase their awareness of diet-health relationship. A low-calorie diet decreases the intake of cholesterol more than a low-fat diet.Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

USDA's Healthy Eating Index and Nutrition Information

A comprehensive model is developed to measure the extent that nutrition knowledge and diet-health awareness, among other factors, influence an individual's Healthy Eating Index (HEI), USDA's measure of overall diet quality. This is the first study that rigorously attempts to examine variation in the index across population groups by controlling for personal and household characteristics and nutrition information levels, as well as test for the endogeneity of nutrition information. Results indicate that one's level of nutrition information has an important influence on one's HEI and that nutrition information and the HEI are simultaneously determined. Other factors explaining variations in HEI's across individuals are income and education levels, race, ethnicity, and age. Evidence supports the hypothesis that higher education promotes more healthful food choices through better acquisition and use of health information.diet quality, Healthy Eating Index, nutrient demand, nutrition knowledge, health inputs, health production, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Restoring Pre-Industrial CO\u3csub\u3e2\u3c/sub\u3e Levels While Achieving Sustainable Development Goals

© 2020 by the authors. Unless humanity achieves United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 and restores the relatively stable climate of pre-industrial CO2 levels (as early as 2140), species extinctions, starvation, drought/floods, and violence will exacerbate mass migrations. This paper presents conceptual designs and techno-economic analyses to calculate sustainable limits for growing high-protein seafood and macroalgae-for-biofuel. We review the availability of wet solid waste and outline the mass balance of carbon and plant nutrients passing through a hydrothermal liquefaction process. The paper reviews the availability of dry solid waste and dry biomass for bioenergy with CO2 capture and storage (BECCS) while generating Allam Cycle electricity. Sufficient wet-waste biomass supports quickly building hydrothermal liquefaction facilities. Macroalgae-for-biofuel technology can be developed and straightforwardly implemented on SDG-achieving high protein seafood infrastructure. The analyses indicate a potential for (1) 0.5 billion tonnes/yr of seafood; (2) 20 million barrels/day of biofuel from solid waste; (3) more biocrude oil from macroalgae than current fossil oil; and (4) sequestration of 28 to 38 billion tonnes/yr of bio-CO2. Carbon dioxide removal (CDR) costs are between 25–33% of those for BECCS with pre-2019 technology or the projected cost of air-capture CDR

Fermilab E791

Fermilab E791, a very high statistics charm particle experiment, recently completed its data taking at Fermilab's Tagged Photon Laboratory. Over 20 billion events were recorded through a loose transverse energy trigger and written to 8mm tape in the the 1991-92 fixed target run at Fermilab. This unprecedented data sample containing charm is being analysed on many-thousand MIP RISC computing farms set up at sites in the collaboration. A glimpse of the data taking and analysis effort is presented. We also show some preliminary results for common charm decay modes. Our present analysis indicates a very rich yield of over 200K reconstructed charm decays.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, LaTe