Overtaxed? : a comment on the Maltese experience

Successive government economic documents in Malta over the past twenty years consider the role of the local tax structure in terms of its contribution to stimulate personal initiative and encourage production, and to generate sufficient revenue for the State to finance at least the annual current expenditure. Yet, it is becoming common to read that local production is overburdened with taxation and regulations. If this claim is correct it means that the tax policies currently implemented are defeating the Government's own set objectives. In this paper we comment on the theoretical relationships that exist between the tax structure and the two policy goals indicated and we assess the validity of the proposition that Malta is an overtaxed economy. No reference is made to non-tax factors, which are considered harmful for economic development.peer-reviewe

Maltese migration : a critique of two views

The year 1984 may have started a new phase in the international migration movement of Maltese. It registered the lowest number of emigrants and return migrants in a year - 629 and 654 respectively - for the past forty years and thus yielded, practically, a net emigration of zero. This latter result rendered operative one of the basic assumptions underlying population projections in the Maltese Islands introduced by government economic planners in 1977. If this condition persists throughout the eighties, the Maltese population will grow at about 0.9% annually, that is, at the average rate of natural increase for the past years.peer-reviewe

A contribution to income distribution analysis in Malta

Income and wealth distribution statistics constitute an important element in the formulation and assessment of pragmatic and effective economic and social policies. Yet, notwithstanding the unquestionable usefulnessof such data - also spelled out in a report by economic advisers to the Maltese Government - and notwithstanding claims regarding the elimination of poverty from the Maltese Islands, data on the size distribution of income and wealth are not readily available. Information on the income and assets of Maltese taxpayes and welfare recipients may be being compiled by the Departments of Inland Revenue and Social Welfare; but, if such data exist, they are not published. For this reason, fragmentary statistics on the wage or income distributions of certain subgroups in the Maltese population assume a relevant significance for socio-economic analysis despite any inherent shortcomings.peer-reviewe

Dispersion of pre-tax basic pay rates in Malta

This paper records the dispersion pattern of the basic pay rates of wage and salary earners in Malta in census years 1957 and 1967. Studies of labour's aggregate remuneration rates i.e. basic rates plus bonuses, overtime payments and non-financial fringe benefits, cannot be carried out; statistical data are inadequate in quality and in quantity. For the same reason it is not feasible to analyse the personal or the household income dispersion within a set time period or over time i. e. to graph the time profile of personal or household incomes. The compilation of data about income and wealth composition and ownership has only recently been initiated in Malta; this late start in collecting such statistical information, crucial for socio-economic planning, seems common to many developing countries. It is hoped, therefore, that this paper's modest contribution would be of interest to researchers engaged in worldwide comparative studies of labour 'income', however defined, and also to those 'development economists' active in constructing socio-politico-economic indices for evaluating the existence or otherwise, of a trade-off between distribution and productivity policy targets in less developed countries.peer-reviewe

Welfare programme reform and income supplements

The economic objectives that demand the consideration of State Authorities in any country, irrespective of the socio-political framework within which they are to be attained, could be reduced to two basic, generally conflicting, goals: Productivity and Distribution. These policy goals aim to determine and guide to achieve the scale upon which goods and services are to be produced and how the continually formed aggregate output is to be shared.peer-reviewe

Computational modeling of TC0583 as a putative component of the Chlamydia muridarum V-type ATP synthase complex and assessment of its protective capabilities as a vaccine antigen.

Numerous Chlamydia trachomatis proteins have been identified as potential subunit vaccines, of which the major outer-membrane protein (MOMP) has, so far, proven the most efficacious. Recently, subunit A of the V-type ATP synthase (ATPase; TC0582) complex was shown to elicit partial protection against infection. Computational modeling of a neighboring gene revealed a novel subunit of the V-type ATPase (TC0583). To determine if this newly identified subunit could induce protection and/or enhance the partial protection provided by subunit A alone, challenge studies were performed using a combination of these recombinant proteins. The TC0583 subunit alone and concurrently with TC0582, was used to vaccinate BALB/c mice utilizing CpG-1826 and Montanide ISA 720 VG as adjuvants. Vaccinated animals were challenged intranasally with Chlamydia muridarum and the course of the infection was followed. Mice immunized with individual antigens showed minimal alleviation of body weight reduction; however, mice immunized with TC0583 and TC0582 in combination, displayed weight loss levels close to those observed with MOMP. Importantly, immunization with a combination of recombinant subunit proteins reduced chlamydial inclusion forming units by approximately a log-fold. These protection levels support that, these highly conserved Chlamydia proteins, in combination with other antigens, may serve as potential vaccine candidates

Occurrence of Legionella in beach shower facilities

It has been analyzed 36 samples of water proceeding from beach shower facilities: 7 of these were found to be contaminated with Legionella (19.44%). In three showers, L. pneumophila 1 was reported, in two L. pneumophila 2-14; in another two cases L. pneumophila 2-14 was found together with Legionella sp. and L. pneumophila 1 together with L. pneumophila 2-14. This study, which confirms the circulation of Legionella in our region of southern Italy, extends the list of the possible sources of infection, including also public and private beaches among the contaminated sites. It is the Authors opinion that when evaluating the risk in these cases we should take into account that the crowding of the beaches in the summer months and the communal nature of shower use in these periods increases the frequency of exposure of children and old people. These vulnerable categories are significantly more likely to develop the disease once infected

Kepuasan Kerja Karyawan Food And Beverage Service Department di Hotel Grand Tjokro Pekanbaru

The purpose of this research is how employee satisfaction Food and Beverage Service Department in work and how efforts to improve employee job satisfaction Food and Beverage Service Department in Grand Tjokro Hotel.This research was used descriptive quantitatif method to describe the issues. The sample used in this research was 7 people. Quesionnaires, interviews, and observations were used to collect the research data.The results of this research indicate that based on the research results obtained on the employee job satisfaction Food and Beverage Service Department at Grand Tjokro Hotel Pekanbaru quite satisfied. This is evidenced by the acquisition of the overall total score, which is 264 points. Challenging work mentally, appreciations, good work condition and colleagues who support are important things in improving the employees Food and Beverage Service Department work satisfaction

Network Awareness of P2P Live Streaming Applications

Early P2P-TV systems have already attracted millions of users, and many new commercial solutions are entering this market. Little information is however available about how these systems work. In this paper we present large scale sets of experiments to compare three of the most successful P2P-TV systems, namely PPLive, SopCast and TVAnts. Our goal is to assess what level of "network awareness" has been embedded in the applications, i.e., what parameters mainly drive the peer selection and data exchange. By using a general framework that can be extended to other systems and metrics, we show that all applications largely base their choices on the peer bandwidth, i.e., they prefer high-bandwidth users, which is rather intuitive. Moreover, TVAnts and PPLive exhibits also a preference to exchange data among peers in the same autonomous system the peer belongs to. However, no evidence about preference versus peers in the same subnet or that are closer to the considered peer emerges. We believe that next-generation P2P live streaming applications definitively need to improve the level of network-awareness, so to better localize the traffic in the network and thus increase their network-friendliness as wel