Shrinkage Confidence Procedures

The possibility of improving on the usual multivariate normal confidence was first discussed in Stein (1962). Using the ideas of shrinkage, through Bayesian and empirical Bayesian arguments, domination results, both analytic and numerical, have been obtained. Here we trace some of the developments in confidence set estimation.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/10-STS319 the Statistical Science (http://www.imstat.org/sts/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Performance of a Ka-band satellite system under variable transmitted signal power conditions

A laboratory hardware-based satellite communication system simulator has been used to measure the effects of transmitted signal power changes on the performance of a Ka-band system. Such power changes can be used to compensate for signal fade due to rain attenuation. This paper presents and discusses the results of these measurements

Just Markets from the Perspective of Catholic Social Teaching

The justice of markets is intricately connected to the treatment of the poor and the disadvantaged in market economies. The increased interest of multinational corporations in low-income market segments affords, on one hand, the opportunity for a more inclusive capitalism, and on the other, the threat of greater exploitation of poor and disadvantaged consumers. This article traces the contributions of Catholic Social Teaching and its basic principles toward providing insight into what constitutes justice in such marketing to the impoverished situations

The Integrative Justice Model for Marketing to the Poor: An Extension of S-D Logic to Distributive Justice and Macromarketing

As multinational corporations (MNCs) increasingly turn their attention to the fast growing markets of China, India, Brazil, and other developing areas, the question of fair treatment of consumers and other residents of those areas is more intensively debated than ever before. In essence, issues of distributive justice come to the fore, that is, are the benefits and burdens of rapid economic development being fairly allocated among the parties and stakeholders to the expanded economic transactions? In response to this question, the authors have postulated a detailed normative model for ethically marketing to impoverished consumer segments; they label their model, the Integrative Justice Model (IJM) for impoverished markets. In this article, the authors show how the IJM, an independently derived model of normative marketing, conforms in its key operational elements to the foundational premises (FPs) of the positive S-D logic and extends the S-D logic perspective to societal and ethical concerns. Furthermore, the authors connect the S-D logic philosophy to macromarketing frameworks such as distributive justice, sustainability, and labor

Marketing to the Poor: An Integrative Justice Model for Engaging Impoverished Marketing Segments

The relatively recent entry of multinational corporations (MNCs) into low-income markets, particularly in developing countries, affords the opportunity for the more inclusive capitalism envisioned by globalists. Alternatively, an expansion of MNC marketing in less developed economies might foreshadow the greater exploitation of disadvantaged consumers predicted by many critics of expanded free trade. To diffuse the charge of “exploitative” marketing, it is imperative that corporate marketing efforts seeking to engage impoverished segments be grounded in a strong ethical framework. This article unveils one such framework—the “integrative justice model” (IJM). The IJM is an aspirational model that outlines how to market ethically to disadvantaged consumers in both developed and developing countries. The authors derive the elements of this model from frameworks of moral philosophy and management theory. Although the IJM is normative in nature, the authors connect it to real-world examples, which provides MNCs that market to the poor practical benchmarks for conducting their business operations with fairness and equity. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the IJM for public policy

Gross National Happiness (GNH): Linkages to and Implications for Macromarketing

This theoretical commentary explores the concept of Gross National Happiness (GNH) and connects it with several central macromarketing concepts such as QoL, ethics, the common good, the purpose of market activity as well as the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. The paper portrays GNH as a normative concept that captures collective well-being; it categorizes GNH, at least from the standpoint of Western moral philosophy, as most closely aligned with classical utilitarianism, and it distinguishes GNH from QoL on the basis of its predominantly aspirational and subjective orientation. It asserts that GNH can be seen as one manifestation of the common good, and, in that manner can be perceived as a ‘more ethical’ conception of the purpose of business activity. Finally, it links GNH to promising areas of Macromarketing scholarship. One essential contribution of this commentary is that it differentiates subjective community happiness from more objective measures of QoL familiar to macromarketing studies

Minimax estimation with thresholding and its application to wavelet analysis

Many statistical practices involve choosing between a full model and reduced models where some coefficients are reduced to zero. Data were used to select a model with estimated coefficients. Is it possible to do so and still come up with an estimator always better than the traditional estimator based on the full model? The James-Stein estimator is such an estimator, having a property called minimaxity. However, the estimator considers only one reduced model, namely the origin. Hence it reduces no coefficient estimator to zero or every coefficient estimator to zero. In many applications including wavelet analysis, what should be more desirable is to reduce to zero only the estimators smaller than a threshold, called thresholding in this paper. Is it possible to construct this kind of estimators which are minimax? In this paper, we construct such minimax estimators which perform thresholding. We apply our recommended estimator to the wavelet analysis and show that it performs the best among the well-known estimators aiming simultaneously at estimation and model selection. Some of our estimators are also shown to be asymptotically optimal.Comment: Published at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/009053604000000977 in the Annals of Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aos/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

SITE project. Phase 1: Continuous data bit-error-rate testing

The Systems Integration, Test, and Evaluation (SITE) Project at NASA LeRC encompasses a number of research and technology areas of satellite communications systems. Phase 1 of this project established a complete satellite link simulator system. The evaluation of proof-of-concept microwave devices, radiofrequency (RF) and bit-error-rate (BER) testing of hardware, testing of remote airlinks, and other tests were performed as part of this first testing phase. This final report covers the test results produced in phase 1 of the SITE Project. The data presented include 20-GHz high-power-amplifier testing, 30-GHz low-noise-receiver testing, amplitude equalization, transponder baseline testing, switch matrix tests, and continuous-wave and modulated interference tests. The report also presents the methods used to measure the RF and BER performance of the complete system. Correlations of the RF and BER data are summarized to note the effects of the RF responses on the BER