2,361 research outputs found

    Formation of a primitive nervous system

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    Assimilation and cohort effects for German immigrants

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    Demographic change and the rising demand for highly qualified labor in Germany attracts notice to the analysis of immigration. In addition, the pattern of immigration changed markedly during the past decades. Therefore we use the latest data of the German Socioeconomic Panel up to the year 2006 in order to investigate the economic performance of immigrants. We perform regressions of three pooled cross sections (1986, 1996, 2006) to estimate assimilation and quality of immigrants as reflected by their earnings. Further we take the heterogeneity of immigrants into account by separating them by country of origin. The rising wage inequality in Germany since the mid nineties will also be considered. We find a negative wage gap and a yearly assimilation rate of 2.3 percent. Due to a changing immigration pattern the cohort quality is declining. --

    What Determines the Duration of Stay of Immigrants in Germany?: Evidence from a Longitudinal Duration Analysis

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    We analyze the return-migration of German immigrants using the latest data of the German Socio- Economic Panel from 1984 to 2006. We conduct a Cox proportional hazard model with years of residence in Germany as waiting time. The analysis reveals that return migration is heavily influenced by country of origin. Individuals from countries with free labor movement agreements with Germany show a considerably higher likelihood of leaving the country relative to the others. The main finding is, with respect to the self-selection process we discovered that highly skilled are more likely to return than the less skilled. In addition, the results give plenty of information regarding the design of German immigration policy.Remigration, Cox proportional hazard model, Germany

    Assimilation and Cohort Effects for German Immigrants

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    Demographic change and the rising demand for highly qualified labor in Germany attracts notice to the analysis of immigration. In addition, the pattern of immigration changed markedly during the past decades. Therefore we use the latest data of the German Socioeconomic Panel up to the year 2006 in order to investigate the economic performance of immigrants. We perform regressions of three pooled cross sections (1986, 1996, 2006) to estimate assimilation and quality of immigrants as reflected by their earnings. Further we take the heterogeneity of immigrants into account by separating them by country of origin. The rising wage inequality in Germany since the mid nineties will also be considered. We find a negative wage gap and a yearly assimilation rate of 2.3 percent. Due to a changing immigration pattern the cohort quality is declining.Assimilation, immigrants, cohort quality, Germany

    Information structure and the accessibility of clausally introduced referents

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    This paper will examine the role of various factors in affecting the salience, and hence the accessibility to pronominal reference, of entities introduced into a discourse by a full clause. We begin with the premise that the possibility of pronominal reference with it versus that depends on the cognitive status of the referent, in the sense of Gundel, Hedberg and Zacharski (1993). This formulation of the problem provides grounds for an explanation of the data presented above, and provides a framework within which we examine the role of various other factors in promoting the salience of a clausally introduced entity, including the information structure of the utterance in which the entity is introduced. For entities introduced by clausal complements to bridge verbs, we show that the information structure of the utterance introducing the entity has a partial, or one-sided, effect on the salience of the entity. When the complement clause is focal, the salience of the entity depends only on its referential givenness-newness (in the sense of Gundel 1988, 1999b), as we would expect. But when the complement clause is ground material, the salience of an entity introduced by the clause is enhanced. Other factors, including the presuppositionality of factive and interrogative complements, also serve to enhance the salience of entities introduced by complement clauses

    Declining export prices due to increased competition from NIC: Evidence from Germany and the CEEC

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    In this paper the export demand and supply of German manufacturing industry is estimated for the period 1993:1 through 2005:4. The Johansen (1991, 1994) procedure is applied to estimate the long-run relationship in a VECM. Special attention is pointed on the development of the German export price being exposed to the competitive environment of fast growing countries like Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland. Since they offer similar high-technology products on international export markets and are gaining market share Germanys export price suffers downward pressure

    Oil and gas in the political marketplace in Somalia

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    The prospects around hydrocarbons (oil and gas) and future oil concessions have been accelerating in Somalia since 2012. The potential in this sector is already an important factor in political dynamics in the country, as seen for example in the ongoing maritime dispute with Kenya, as well as through the interests of several different countries and the involvement of a number of commercial actors. This memo argues that, while legislation and regulation, at least nominally, has been progressing in the last 3-4 years, it remains unfinished but now frames the operation of the political marketplace, with control over the Ministry of Petroleum and Somalia Petroleum Agency (SPA) constituting the key motivations of political elites and associated bargaining. Control of these ‘institutions’ enables access to informal flows of money as well as allows control over the allocation of sub-contracts, which are likely to come from the various grants and loans that will become available through the debt relief process. Control over contracts is a major issue in Somalia’s political economy and political marketplace. The memo highlights the underlying dynamics behind the regulatory developments and the push for – arguably premature – auctioning. It suggests that speculation is feeding the political marketplace in Somalia; speculation in future oil wealth (in the shortterm through foreign oil companies that are willing to pay access fees, rents and other inducements up front). In addition, speculation on the operational sub-contracts that exploration will generate (logistics, security, accommodation and hospitality). These drivers are elevated in the current pre-election period, where potential unconditional cash injections and the political trading around key positions – and the control or influence of contracts – in the emerging ‘institutions’ are important dynamics. The establishment of the federal government in Mogadishu, in 2012, has changed the organisation of this sector bringing it under a central authority where for years previously arrangements were made with regional authorities. In addition, past controversies associated with Soma Oil (Coastal Exploration) and TGS (Spectrum) still cast a shadow over the Somali petroleum sector and serve a useful purpose in highlighting the reputational risks of opaque engagement in this area and the need for proper regulation and oversight

    Debt relief and the political marketplace in Somalia

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    This memo provides an analysis of the implications of prospective debt relief for the dynamics of the political marketplace in Somalia. While there is clearly great moral value in writing off Somalia’s debt and opening the possibility for new development funding, which is in line with recent global trends and emphasised more so given the Covid-19 pandemic, this memo questions the dominance of short-term political calculus over ensuring systems of accountability and transparency. The contradictions of international demands, benchmarks and statements with the reality of those achievements is highlighted below and suggests that international political drivers are problematic and instrumentalised domestically. The memo further suggests that there are high risks in countries such as Somalia that key financial institutions become drawn into the political marketplace making short-term transactional decisions at the expense of long-term institution-building. The study findings were based on 34 interviews conducted between March and August 2020, out of which 26 were carried out remotely and 8 in Mogadishu. The key informants included long-term Somalia analysts and observers, Government and ex-Government officials, Mogadishu-based academics, civil society and businesspeople, ex-World Bank staff, donor and former donor staff members. In addition, the study carried out an extensive literature and media survey, including open sources such as the IMF and World Bank documents available online, as well as other grey literature

    Low jitter phase-locked loop clock synthesis with wide locking range

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    The fast growing demand of wireless and high speed data communications has driven efforts to increase the levels of integration in many communications applications. Phase noise and timing jitter are important design considerations for these communications applications. The desire for highly complex levels of integration using low cost CMOS technologies works against the minimization of timing jitter and phase noise for communications systems which employ a phase-locked loop for frequency and clock synthesis with on-chip VCO. This dictates an integrated CMOS implementation of the VCO with very low phase noise performance. The ring oscillator VCOs based on differential delay cell chains have been used successfully in communications applications, but thermal noise induced phase noise have to be minimized in order not to limit their applicability to some applications which impose stringent timing jitter and phase noise requirements on the PLL clock synthesizer. Obtaining lower timing jitter and phase noise at the PLL output also requires the minimization of noise in critical circuit design blocks as well as the optimization of the loop bandwidth of the PLL. In this dissertation the fundamental performance limits of CMOS PLL clock synthesizers based on ring oscillator VCOs are investigated. The effect of flicker and thermal noise in MOS transistors on timing jitter and phase noise are explored, with particular emphasis on source coupled NMOS differential delay cells with symmetric load elements. Several new circuit architectures are employed for the charge pump circuit and phase-frequency detector (PFD) to minimize the timing jitter due to the finite dead zone in the PFD and the current mismatch in the charge pump circuit. The selection of the optimum PLL loop bandwidth is critical in determining the phase noise performance at the PLL output. The optimum loop bandwidth and the phase noise performance of the PLL is determined using behavioral simulations. These results are compared with transistor level simulated results and experimental results for the PLL clock synthesizer fabricated in a 0.35 ”m CMOS technology with good agreement. To demonstrate the proposed concept, a fully integrated CMOS PLL clock synthesizer utilizing integer-N frequency multiplier technique to synthesize several clock signals in the range of 20-400 MHz with low phase noise was designed. Implemented in a standard 0.35-”m N-well CMOS process technology, the PLL achieves a period jitter of 6.5-ps (rms) and 38-ps (peak-to-peak) at 216 MHz with a phase noise of -120 dBc/Hz at frequency offsets above 10 KHz. The specific research contributions of this work include (1) proposing, designing, and implementing a new charge pump circuit architecture that matches current levels and therefore minimizes one source of phase noise due to fluctuations in the control voltage of the VCO, (2) an improved phase-frequency detector architecture which has improved characteristics in lock condition, (3) an improved ring oscillator VCO with excellent thermal noise induced phase noise characteristics, (4) the application of selfbiased techniques together with fixed bias to CMOS low phase noise PLL clock synthesizer for digital video communications ,and (5) an analytical model that describes the phase noise performance of the proposed VCO and PLL clock synthesizer
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