On the sustainability of the Spanish public budget performance

In this paper, we address the issue of whether the current fiscal policy in Spain is sustainable. For this purpose we apply traditional empirical tests of fiscal sustainability proposed in the literature and, in addition, we introduce a deeper univariate analysis of the series involved. Our results show that a structural break seems to have taken place gradually in the Spanish budget performance, allowing to verifying the intertemporal borrowing constraint in a «strong sense», which means that no problems in marketing public debt are expected to arise if fiscal variables follow the pattern of the past in the future. Classification-JEL : E60, F41,: Sustainability, cointegration, structural breaks, intertemporal borrowing constraint.

The economic effects of exogenous fiscal shocks in Spain: a SVAR approach

This paper estimates the effects of exogenous fiscal policy shocks in Spain in a VAR framework. Government expenditure expansionary shocks are found to have positive effects on output in the short-term at the cost of higher inflation and public deficits and lower output in the medium and long term. Tax increases are found to drag economic activity in the medium term while entailing an only temporary improvement of the public budget balance. The application of these results to the analysis of fiscal policy in Spain since the mid-nineties points to the conclusion that the consolidation process does not seem to have involved costs in terms of output growth. Moreover, the stance of fiscal policy has become more counter-cyclical in that period. JEL Classification: E62, H30Fiscal multipliers, Fiscal shocks, VAR

Goal-Conflict Detection Based on Temporal Satisfiability Checking

In this oral communication, we present a novel approach to automatically compute boundary conditions for conflicting goals expressed in LTL, using a satisfiability procedure based on tableaux.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

Encapsulating deontic and branching time specifications

In this paper, we investigate formal mechanisms to enable designers to decompose specifications (stated in a given logic) into several interacting components in such a way that the composition of these components preserves their encapsulation and internal non-determinism. The preservation of encapsulation (or locality) enables a modular form of reasoning over specifications, while the conservation of the internal non-determinism is important to guarantee that the branching time properties of components are not lost when the entire system is obtained. The basic ideas come from the work of Fiadeiro and Maibaum where notions from category theory are used to structure logical specifications. As the work of Fiadeiro and Maibaum is stated in a linear temporal logic, here we investigate how to extend these notions to a branching time logic, which can be used to reason about systems where non-determinism is present. To illustrate the practical applications of these ideas, we introduce deontic operators in our logic and we show that the modularization of specifications also allows designers to maintain the encapsulation of deontic prescriptions; this is in particular useful to reason about fault-tolerant systems, as we demonstrate with a small example.Fil: Castro, Pablo Francisco. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba; ArgentinaFil: Maibaum, Thomas S. E.. Mc Master University; Canad

Goal-Conflict Detection Based on Temporal Satisfiability Checking

In this oral communication, we present a novel approach to automatically compute boundary conditions for conflicting goals expressed in LTL, using a satisfiability procedure based on tableaux.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

The economic effects of exogenous fiscal shocks in Spain : a SVAR approach

This paper estimates the effects of exogenous fiscal policy shocks in Spain in a VAR framework. Government expenditure expansionary shocks are found to have a positive impact on output in the short-term at the cost of higher inflation and public deficits and lower output in the medium and long term. Tax increases are found to have a negative impact on economic activity in the medium term while having only a temporary effect on the improvement of the public deficit. The application of these results to the analysis of fiscal policy in Spain since the mid-nineties point to the conclusion that the consolidation process does not seem to have involved costs in terms of output growth and the stance of fiscal policy has become more counter-cyclical. [resumen de autor

Investigación cualitativa asistida por ordenador en economía de la empresa

El interés por la comprensión holística de las organizaciones se manifiesta en la proliferación de artículos basados en metodologías cualitativas. Este hecho no se ve acompañado con el empleo de herramientas que contribuyan a la validez y fiabilidad de las investigaciones. Este trabajo pone de manifiesto la existencia de programas específicos para el tratamiento de datos cualitativos y explica la contribución que realizan en las diferentes fases del proceso de investigación. También analiza las ventajas e inconvenientes que se derivan de su uso y reflexiona acerca de su repercusión en la investigación de la Economía de la Empresa

QSPR modeling of the enthalpy of formation based on Partial Order Ranking

A new predictive method based on Partial Order Ranking is introduced in the realm of the QSPR–QSAR Theory using a single descriptor as variable and which is simple enough to perform calculations by hand. Comparisons are made with a model relying on the Least Squares Method subjected to the modeling of the Enthalpy of Formation from Elements exhibed by a set of 51 hydrocarbon molecules by means of a flexible type descriptor. The results achieved with the proposed method are quite satisfactory and its future aplicability seems to be very promising.Facultad de Ciencias ExactasInstituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicada

Application of a novel ranking approach in QSPR-QSAR

In this study we present a simple algorithm based on the Partial Order Ranking (POR) technique which allows to rank a series of compounds according to their molecular descriptor values. A training set composed of 82 normal boiling points for structurally diverse organic compounds is analyzed by considering a pool of 1202 molecular descriptors obtained from the Dragon 5 software and two “flexible” type of variables. The predictive performance of the proposed approach is assessed by means of a test set of 82 “unknown” structurally related molecules.Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicada

Fiscal policy shocks in the euro area and the US: an empirical assessment

We analyse the impact of fiscal policy shocks in the euro area as a whole, using a newly available quarterly dataset of fiscal variables for the period 1981-2007. To allow for comparability with previous results on euro area countries and the US, we use a standard structural VAR framework, and study the impact of aggregated and disaggregated government spending and net taxes shocks. In addition, to frame euro area results, we apply the same methodology for the same sample period to US data. We also explore the sensitivity of the provided results to the inclusion of variables aiming at measuring “financial stress” (increases in risk) and “fiscal stress” (sustainability concerns). Analysing US and euro area data with a common methodology provides some interesting insights on the interpretation of fiscal policy shocks. JEL Classification: E62, H30euro area, Fiscal multipliers, Fiscal shocks, SVAR