A Regulatory Classification of Digital Assets: Toward an Operational Howey Test for Cryptocurrencies, ICOs, and Other Digital Assets

Digital assets are hot right now. Whether cryptocurrencies, like bitcoin, or initial coin offerings and tokens, this new asset class has captured the imagination of American investors. While it remains to be seen if this phenomenon has staying power, there is no doubt that these assets and their promoters have attracted the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission. But neither Congress nor the SEC has formally elucidated which digital assets are securities and which are not. This Article seeks to provide clarity in determining which digital assets are securities. It proposes two tests that operationalize the Supreme Court’s test in SEC v. W. J. Howey Co. The first test is the Bahamas Test, which asks whether a digital asset is sufficiently decentralized such that it is not a security. The second test is the Substantial Steps Test which is used to determine whether an investment is made with an expectation of profit. This Article takes a rules-based approach to provide clarity and begin a conversation about crafting more predictable jurisprudence and regulation in this area

The association between childhood cognitive ability and adult long-term sickness absence in three British birth cohorts: a cohort study

OBJECTIVES: The authors aimed to test the relationship between childhood cognitive function and long-term sick leave in adult life and whether any relationship was mediated by educational attainment, adult social class or adult mental ill-health. DESIGN: Cohort study. SETTING: The authors used data from the 1946, 1958 and 1970 British birth cohorts. Initial study populations included all live births in 1 week in that year. Follow-up arrangements have differed between the cohorts. PARTICIPANTS: The authors included only those alive, living in the UK and not permanent refusals at the time of the outcome. The authors further restricted analyses to those in employment, full-time education or caring for a family in the sweep immediately prior to the outcome. 2894 (1946), 15 053 (1958) and 14 713 (1970) cohort members were included. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: receipt of health-related benefits (eg, incapacity benefit) in 2000 and 2004 for the 1958 and 1970 cohorts, respectively, and individuals identified as 'permanently sick or disabled' in 1999 for 1946 cohort. RESULTS: After adjusting for sex and parental social class, better cognitive function at age 10/11 was associated with reduced odds of being long-term sick (1946: 0.70 (0.56 to 0.86), p=0.001; 1958: 0.69 (0.61 to 0.77), p<0.001; 1970: 0.80 (0.66 to 0.97), p=0.003). Educational attainment appeared to partly mediate the associations in all cohorts; adult social class appeared to have a mediating role in the 1946 cohort. CONCLUSIONS: Long-term sick leave is a complex outcome with many risk factors beyond health. Cognitive abilities might impact on the way individuals are able to develop strategies to maintain their employment or rapidly find new employment when faced with a range of difficulties. Education should form part of the policy response to long-term sick leave such that young people are better equipped with skills needed in a flexible labour market

Archaeology and Oral History of Inuit Land Use on the Kazan River, Nunavut: A Feature-based Approach

Archaeology and oral history are used to interpret recent Inuit land use along the lower Kazan River. A record of caribou crossings, camps, and other places of cultural significance generated by Inuit elders from Baker Lake is combined with the results of an archaeological survey to identify important spring and fall sites. The survey, which employed differential Geographic Positioning System (GPS) technology to record individual archaeological features (e.g., tent rings, caches), has resulted in a Geographic Information System (GIS) database for the Fall Caribou Crossing National Historic Site. Individual 'sites' are distinguished, within a more general 'non-site' distribution of features in the study region, on the basis of two criteria: clustering of features and the known history of use of these places by elders and previous generations of Harvaqtuurmiut Inuit. Analysis of the different kinds of features indicates considerable site variation, but also some seasonal patterning: fall has a more distinctive signature than spring. In this study, individual features are used to address questions of regional land use, site definition, and season of site occupation. This emphasis on the feature reflects the special circumstances of this project, which include the need to record archaeological materials occurring on the ground surface and spread over a large area and the availability of elders to interpret those materials.On a fait appel à l'archéologie et à l'histoire orale pour interpréter l'utilisation récente du territoire par les Inuit le long du cours inférieur de la rivière Kazan. Un relevé des traverses de caribou, des campements et d'autres lieux d'importance culturelle produit par les anciens inuit du lac Baker est combiné aux résultats d'un levé archéologique visant à identifier les grands sites printaniers et automnaux. Le levé, pour lequel on a utilisé la technologie du système de positionnement global (GPS) différentiel afin d'enregistrer les caractéristiques archéologiques individuelles (p. ex., les cercles de tente, les caches) a abouti à une banque de données de système d'information géographique (SIG) pour le Lieu historique national Fall Caribou Crossing. On distingue des «sites» individuels, parmi une répartition de caractéristiques plus générales appartenant à des «non-sites» distribués dans la région de l'étude, et ce, en se basant sur deux critères: la concentration des caractéristiques et l'histoire connue de l'utilisation de ces emplacements par les anciens et les générations antérieures des Inuit de Harvaqtuurmiut. Une analyse des divers types de caractéristiques révèle une variation considérable parmi les sites, mais aussi certains schémas saisonniers: l'automne est marquée de façon plus nette que le printemps. Dans cette étude, les caractéristiques individuelles sont utilisées pour aborder les questions d'utilisation régionale du territoire, de définition du site et de saison d'occupation. Cet accent mis sur la caractéristique reflète les conditions particulières du projet, parmi lesquelles on compte la nécessité de relever les matériaux archéologiques dispersés à la surface et sur une grande superficie ainsi que la disponibilité des anciens pour interpréter ces matériaux

Cervical and breast cancer screening uptake among women with serious mental illness: a data linkage study

Background Breast and cancer screening uptake has been found to be lower among women with serious mental illness (SMI). This study aims to corroborate these findings in the UK and to identify variation in screening uptake by illness/treatment factors, and primary care consultation frequency. Methods Linked population-based primary and secondary care data from the London borough of Lambeth (UK) were used to compare breast and cervical screening receipt among linked eligible SMI patients (n = 625 and n = 1393), to those without SMI known only to primary care (n = 106,554 and n = 25,385) using logistic regression models adjusted first for socio-demographic factors and second, additionally for primary care consultation frequency. Results Eligible SMI patients were less likely to have received breast (adjusted odds ratio (OR) 0.69, 95 % confidence interval (CI), 0.57 - 0.84, p < 0.001) or cervical screening (adjusted OR 0.72, CI: 0.60 - 0.85, p < 0.001). Schizophrenia diagnosis, depot injectable antipsychotic prescription, and illness severity and risk were associated with the lowest odds of uptake of breast (adjusted ORs 0.46 to 0.59, all p < 0.001) and cervical screening (adjusted ORs 0.48 - 0.65, all p < 0.001). Adjustments for consultation frequency further reduced effect sizes for all subgroups of SMI patient, in particular for cervical screening. Conclusions Women with SMI are less likely to receive breast and cervical cancer screening than comparable women without SMI. Higher primary care consultation rates among SMI patients is likely a mediating factor between SMI status and uptake, particularly for cervical screening - a service organised in primary care. To tackle health disparities linked to SMI, efforts at increasing screening uptake are key and should be targeted at women with other markers of illness severity or risk, beyond SMI status alone

A simulation suite for readout with SMuRF tone-tracking electronics

We present the details of a simulation suite for modeling the effects of readout with SLAC Microresonator RF (SMuRF) electronics. The SMuRF electronics are a warm readout and control system for use with superconducting microwave resonator-based detector systems. The system has been used with the BICEP/Keck program and will be used on the upcoming Simons Observatory and BICEP Array experiments. This simulation suite is a software implementation of the main SMuRF algorithms for offline analysis, modeling, and study. The firmware-implemented algorithms for calibration, resonator frequency estimation, and tone tracking present sources of potential bias or errors if not modeled properly. The simulator takes as input true detector signal, realistic resonator properties, and SMuRF-related user-controlled readout settings. It returns the final flux ramp-demodulated output of a detector timestream as would be passed to the experiment data acquisition system, enabling the analysis of the impact of readout-related parameters on the final science data. It is publicly available in Python with accompanying Jupyter notebooks for user tutorials.Comment: 12 pages + references, 7 figures. Proceedings for SPIE Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation 2022. Code at https://github.com/cyndiayu/babysmur

Community action for sustainable housing: Building a low-carbon future

This paper presents a new analytical framework of 'grassroots innovations' which views community-led initiatives for sustainable development as strategic green niches with the potential for wider transformation of mainstream society. This framework is applied to a low-carbon, low-impact, community-based sustainable housing initiative in the USA that pioneers straw bale housing techniques within a strong community-building ethos. The project is evaluated according to New Economics criteria of sustainable consumption, and is found to be successful at localising the construction supply chain, reducing ecological footprints, community-building, enabling collective action and building new institutions and systems of provision around housebuilding. However, viewing it as a strategic niche with aim to influence wider society, it is clear that it faces significant challenges in diffusing its ideas and practices beyond the niche. Its model is not necessarily suitable for scaling up or widespread replication; however, the scope for niche lessons to be adopted by mainstream builders is greater, given a supportive policy environment. Recognising the innovative nature of green niches at the policy level could lead to new approaches to governance of bottom-up community action for sustainable development