Globalization and Regional Income Inequality--Evidence from within China

China¡¯s recent accession to the WTO is expected to accelerate its integration into the world economy, which aggravates concerns over the impact of globalization on the already rising inter-region income inequality in China. This paper discusses China¡¯s globalization process and estimates an income generating function, incorporating trade and FDI variables. It then applies the newly developed Shapley value decomposition technique to quantify the contributions of globalization, along with other variables, to regional inequality. It is found that (a) globalization constitutes a positive and substantial share to regional inequality and the share rises over time; (b) capital is one of the largest and increasingly important contributor to regional inequality; (c) economic reform characterized by privatization exerts a significant impact on regional inequality; and (d) the relative contributions of education, location, urbanization and dependency ratio to regional inequality have been declining.

Globalization and Regional Income Inequality: Evidence from within China

globalization, inequality, decomposition, Shapley value, China

Inter-Industry Wage Differentials: An Increasingly Important Contributor to Urban China Income Inequality

How significantly inter-industry wage differentials contribute to rising income inequality is an essential policy issue for transitional economies. Using regression-based inequality decomposition, this paper finds that inter-industrial wage differentials contributed increasingly to income inequality in urban China through 1988, 1995, and 2002, mainly due to rapid income growth in monopolistic industries. Factors such as region, education, ownership, occupation, and holding a second job also contribute increasingly to income inequality, while being employed the whole year and age have decreasing contributions. If China seeks to reduce urban income inequality, removing entry barriers in the labor market and breaking monopoly power in the goods market are essential policy prescriptions.Inter-industry wage differntials, Income ineqality, Regression-based decomposition

Globalization and Regional Income Inequality: Empirical evidence from within China

globalization, inequality decomposition, Shapley value, China

The Inequality-Growth Nexus in the Short and Long Runs: Empirical Evidence from China

inequality, growth, polynominal inverse lag

A Refinement-Based Validation Method for Programmable Logic Controllers

International audienceProgrammable logic controllers (PLCs) are widely used in computer-based industrial applications. Timers play a pivotal role in PLC real-time embedded system applications. The paper addresses the formal validation of PLC systems with timers in the theorem proving system Coq. The timer behavior is characterized formally. A refinement validation methodology is presented in terms of an abstract model and a concrete model. The refinement is calibrated by a mapping relation. The soundness of the methodology is shown in the proving system. An illustrative case study demonstrates the eectiveness of the approach

Formalization and Verification of PLC Timers in Coq

International audienceProgrammable logic controllers (PLCs) are widely used in embedded systems. A timer plays a pivotal role in PLC real-time applications. The paper presents a formalization of TON-timers of PLC programs in the theorem proving system Coq. The behavior of a timer is characterized by a set of axioms at an abstract level. PLC programs with timers are modeled in Coq. As a case study, the quiz machine problem with timer is investigated. Relevant timing properties of practical interests are proposed and proven in Coq. This work unveils the hardness of timer modeling in embedded systems. It is an attempt of formally proving the correctness of PLC programs with timer control

The mPEG-PCL Copolymer for Selective Fermentation of Staphylococcus lugdunensis Against Candida parapsilosis in the Human Microbiome.

Many human skin diseases, such as seborrheic dermatitis, potentially occur due to the over-growth of fungi. It remains a challenge to develop fungicides with a lower risk of generating resistant fungi and non-specifically killing commensal microbes. Our probiotic approaches using a selective fermentation initiator of skin commensal bacteria, fermentation metabolites or their derivatives provide novel therapeutics to rein in the over-growth of fungi. Staphylococcus lugdunensis (S. lugdunensis) bacteria and Candida parapsilosis (C. parapsilosis) fungi coexist in the scalp microbiome. S. lugdunensis interfered with the growth of C. parapsilosis via fermentation. A methoxy poly(ethylene glycol)-b-poly(ε-caprolactone) (mPEG-PCL) copolymer functioned as a selective fermentation initiator of S. lugdunensis, selectively triggering the S. lugdunensis fermentation to produce acetic and isovaleric acids. The acetic acid and its pro-drug diethyleneglycol diacetate (Ac-DEG-Ac) effectively suppressed the growth of C. parapsilosis in vitro and impeded the fungal expansion in the human dandruff. We demonstrate for the first time that S. lugdunensis is a skin probiotic bacterium that can exploit mPEG-PCL to yield fungicidal short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs). The concept of bacterial fermentation as a part of skin immunity to re-balance the dysbiotic microbiome warrants a novel avenue for studying the probiotic function of the skin microbiome in promoting health