From the bargaining table to the ballot box: political effects of right to work laws

Labor unions play a central role in the Democratic party coalition, providing candidates with voters, volunteers, and contributions, as well as lobbying policymakers. Has the sustained decline of organized labor hurt Democrats in elections and shifted public policy? We use the enactment of right-to-work laws—which weaken unions by removing agency shop protections—to estimate the effect of unions on politics from 1980 to 2016. Comparing counties on either side of a state and right-to-work border to causally identify the effects of the state laws, we find that right-towork laws reduce Democratic Presidential vote shares by 3.5 percentage points. We find similar effects in US Senate, US House, and Gubernatorial races, as well as on state legislative control. Turnout is also 2 to 3 percentage points lower in right-to-work counties after those laws pass. We next explore the mechanisms behind these effects, finding that right-to-work laws dampen organized labor campaign contributions to Democrats and that potential Democratic voters are less likely to be contacted to vote in right-to-work states. The weakening of unions also has large downstream effects both on who runs for office and on state legislative policy. Fewer working class candidates serve in state legislatures and Congress, and state policy moves in a more conservative direction following the passage of right-to-work laws

Finite-element modeling of liquid-crystal hydrodynamics with a variable degree of order

A finite-element model of liquid-crystal hydrodynamics based on the Qian and Sheng formulation has been developed. This formulation is a generalization of the Ericksen-Leslie theory to include variations in the order parameter, allowing for a proper description of disclinations. The present implementation is well suited to treat properly the various length scales necessary to model large regions yet resolve the rapid variations in the order parameter in proximity to disclinations

Revisiting the Impact of Bt Corn Adoption by U.S. Farmers

This study examines the impact of adopting Bt corn on farm profits, yields, and insecticide use. The study employs an econometric model that corrects for self-selection and simultaneity. The model is estimated using nationwide farm-level survey data for 2005. Regression analysis confirms that Bt adoption is associated with increased profits, yields and seeding rates. However, the results of this analysis suggest that Bt adoption is not significantly related to insecticide use. This result appears to be related to the fact that insect infestation levels were lower in 2005 than they were in earlier years.Genetically engineered corn, insect resistance, Bt corn, insecticide use, technology adoption, yields, Production Economics, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies,

Modeling of weak anisotropic anchoring of nematic liquid crystals in the Landau-de Gennes theory

The anisotropic anchoring effect of a treated solid surface on a nematic liquid crystal is described in the Landau-de Gennes theory using a power expansion on the tensor-order parameter and two mutually orthogonal unit vectors. The expression has three degrees of freedom, allowing for independent assignment of polar and azimuthal anchoring strengths and a preferred value of the surface-order parameter. It is shown that in the limit for a uniaxial constant-order parameter, the expression simplifies to the anisotropic generalization of the Rapini-Papoular anchoring energy density proposed by Zhao et al. Experimentally measurable values with a physical meaning in the Oseen-Frank theory can be scaled and assigned to the scalar coefficients of the tensor-order-parameter expansion. Results of numerical experiments comparing the anchoring according to the study of Zhao et al. in the Oseen-Frank theory and the power expansion in the Landau-de Gennes theory are presented and shown to agree well

The distributional consequences of supply-side reforms in general equilibrium

This paper addresses the issue on whether tax reforms consistent with lower public debt-to-GDP in the long-run can lead to a more efficient and equitable economy. To this end we solve a heterogeneous agent model comprised of a government, a representative capitalist and representative skilled and unskilled workers, under both rational expectations and adaptive learning. Our main findings are that (i) reductions in capital taxation, while beneficial at the aggregate level, lead to increased inequality mainly due to the substitutability of un- skilled labour and capital; (ii) a fall in taxation for skilled labour is Pareto improving, which is largely explained by its complementarity with the other factor inputs; (iii) all agents would prefer increasing the tax rate on capital to increasing the tax rate on skilled and un- skilled labour since it leads to relatively lower welfare losses; and (iv) heterogeneity in initial beliefs under adaptive learning quantitatively matters for welfare.tax reform, structural heterogeneity, inequality, adaptive learning

Characterisation of the mechanical and thermal degradation behaviour of natural fibres for lightweight automotive applications

It is well established that light-weighting of automotive parts leads to reduced carbon emissions over vehicle lifetime. Mineral fibres and fillers have a relatively high density and may require high levels of energy in their production, resulting in a large carbon footprint. Natural fibres have been identified as a potential candidate to substitute mineral fillers in automotive application of thermoplastic matrix composites. This paper focuses on the characterisation of the mechanical and thermal degradation of two types of natural fibres (date palm and coir fibres) as part of an evaluation of their potential for the substitution of high density mineral fillers with more environmentally friendly lower density natural fibre reinforcements

International real estate development--Mexico as an example

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 1992.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 69-71).by Edouard James Fernandez.M.S

ROBOSIM: An intelligent simulator for robotic systems

The purpose of this paper is to present an update of an intelligent robotics simulator package, ROBOSIM, first introduced at Technology 2000 in 1990. ROBOSIM is used for three-dimensional geometrical modeling of robot manipulators and various objects in their workspace, and for the simulation of action sequences performed by the manipulators. Geometric modeling of robot manipulators has an expanding area of interest because it can aid the design and usage of robots in a number of ways, including: design and testing of manipulators, robot action planning, on-line control of robot manipulators, telerobotic user interface, and training and education. NASA developed ROBOSIM between 1985-88 to facilitate the development of robotics, and used the package to develop robotics for welding, coating, and space operations. ROBOSIM has been further developed for academic use by its co-developer Vanderbilt University, and has been in both classroom and laboratory environments for teaching complex robotic concepts. Plans are being formulated to make ROBOSIM available to all U.S. engineering/engineering technology schools (over three hundred total with an estimated 10,000+ users per year)