Price Rigidity and the Volatility of Vacancies and Unemployment

The successful matching model developed by Mortensen and Pissarides seems to find its hardest task in explaining the cyclical movements of some key labor market variables such as the vacancy rate and the vacancy-unemployment ratio. Several authors have discussed mechanisms compatible with the matching technology that are able to deliver the kind of correlations observed in the data. In this paper we explore four such additional mechanisms embedded in a full blown SDGE model. We find that price rigidity greatly improves the model's empirical performance making it capable of reproducing second moments of the data. Other components such as intertemporal substitution, endogenous match destruction, capital accumulation and distortionary taxes also play a relevant role.unemployment, vacancies, business cycle, price rigidities

Gas Source Localization Strategies for Teleoperated Mobile Robots. An Experimental Analysis

Gas source localization (GSL) is one of the most important and direct applications of a gas sensitive mobile robot, and consists in searching for one or multiple volatile emission sources with a mobile robot that has improved sensing capabilities (i.e. olfaction, wind flow, etc.). This work adresses GSL by employing a teleoperated mobile robot, and focuses on which search strategy is the most suitable for this teleoperated approach. Four different search strategies, namely chemotaxis, anemotaxis, gas-mapping, and visual-aided search, are analyzed and evaluated according to a set of proposed indicators (e.g. accuracy, efficiency, success rate, etc.) to determine the most suitable one for a human-teleoperated mobile robot. Experimental validation is carried out employing a large dataset composed of over 150 trials where volunteer operators had to locate a gas-leak in a virtual environment under various and realistic environmental conditions (i.e. different wind flow patterns and gas source locations). We report different findings, from which we highlight that, against intuition, visual-aided search is not always the best strategy, but depends on the environmental conditions and the operator’s ability to understand how gas distributes.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Fiscal Rules and Macroeconomic Stability

In this paper we analyze the impact of fiscal rules on the effectiveness of fiscal policy as a macroeconomic stabilizing instrument. First, we review the available evidence on the effects of fiscal policy to affect output in the short run and real interest rates and investment and growth in the long run, and we show how the use of fiscal rules has proved useful in restraining debt and deficits. Secondly, we discuss if debt consolidation rules trade off higher output instability in exchange for lower deficits, using three alternative representations of the intertemporal substitution mechanism in a SDGE framework. Our main conclusion is that both the impact of discretionary fiscal policy and the strength of automatic stabilizers are largely unaffected by the 'tightness' of these rules. Therefore, there is nothing in the design of fiscal rules aimed at preventing huge and long-lasting deviations of debt from the steady state level, which makes them an impediment to fiscal policy carrying out its job as a significant stabilizing policy instrument.fiscal rules,output volatility,automatic stabilizers

Optimal Corporate Governance Structures

This paper explores how motivating an incumbent CEO to make investments that improve the effectiveness of the firm organization under his management interacts with the replacement policy of the board of directors. We characterize the optimal compensation package (including severance pay) under governance structures that differ in the power that the incumbent CEO has on the board of directors. We explain why yielding the incumbent CEO some control of the board (entrenchment) can be desirable and offer predictions on when this arrangement is optimal. We also examine the correlation between the elements of his compensation package and the structure of the board.

Project based learning on industrial informatics: applying IoT to urban garden

Copyright (c) 2018 IEEEThe fast evolution of technologies forces teachers to trade content off for self-learning. PBL is one of the best ways to promote self-learning and simultaneously boost motivation. In this paper, we present our experience introducing project-based learning in the last year subject. New Internet of Things (IoT) topic allows us to carry out complete projects, integrating different technologies and tools. Moreover, the selection of open-source and standard free technologies makes easy and cheap the access to hardware and software platforms used. We carefully have picked communication, data management, and programming tools that we think would be attractive to our students. They can start making fast prototyping with little initial skills and, at the same time, these are serious and popular tools widely used in the industry. In this paper, we report on the design of a project-based learning for our course and the impact this has on the student satisfaction and motivation. Surveys taught us that tuning the courses towards developing real projects on the field, has a large impact on acceptance, learning objectives achievements and motivation towards the course content.”I Plan Propio Integral de Docencia de la Universidad de Málaga” y Proyecto de Innovación Educativa PIE17/085, de la Universidad de Málaga. Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Integrating Olfaction in a Robotic Telepresence Loop

In this work we propose enhancing a typical robotic telepresence architecture by considering olfactory and wind flow information in addition to the common audio and video channels. The objective is to expand the range of applications where robotics telepresence can be applied, including those related to the detection of volatile chemical substances (e.g. land-mine detection, explosive deactivation, operations in noxious environments, etc.). Concretely, we analyze how the sense of smell can be integrated in the telepresence loop, covering the digitization of the gases and wind flow present in the remote environment, the transmission through the communication network, and their display at the user location. Experiments under different environmental conditions are presented to validate the proposed telepresence system when localizing a gas emission leak at the remote environment.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Stakeholder, Transparency and Capital Structure

Firms that are more highly levered are forced to raise capital more often, a process that generates information about them. Of course transparency can improve the allocation of capital. However, when the information about the firm affects the terms under which the firm transacts with its customers and employees, transparency can have an offsetting negative effect. Under relatively general conditions, good news improves these terms of trade less than bad news worsens them, implying that increased transparency can lower firm value. In addition, we show that transparency can reduce the incentives of firms and stakeholders to undertake relationship specific investments. The negative effects of transparency can lead firms to pass up positive NPV investments that require external funding and to choose more conservative capital structures that they would otherwise choose. These effects should be especially important for technology firms that require a reputation for being on the leading edge.'

Economic Polarization Through Trade: Trade Liberalization and Regional Growth in Mexico

economic growth, regional disparities, trade, integration, polarization, Mexico