Politics of immigration - quotas of entrance and hidden economy

In spite of the fact that in recent years there has been a growing interest for the hidden economy, little attention has been lent to its relation with the illegal immigration as a consequence of the establishment of quotas. The objective of this work is to analyze the effect of a change in the quotas of legal immigrants in the size of the legal and illegal migration, the underground economy, and in the incomes perceived by the workers. The main conclusions are that, as opposed to the short time, in the long-term equilibrium, an increment of the quota does not have effect on the size of the migration, but in the composition between legal and illegal. On the other hand diminishes the work destined to the management of the underground economy by the reduction of illegal immigrants in the stationary state, however the effect is positive in the short run by the “called effect” of illegal immigrants that carries an increment in the quota.

Structural Breaks, Inflation and Interest Rates: Evidence for the G7 countries

This paper challenges the commonly used unit root/cointegration approach for testing the Fisher effect for the economies of the G7 countries. We first prove that nominal interest and inflation rate can be better represented as being broken trend stationary variables. Later, we use the Bai-Perron procedure to show the existence of structural changes in the Fisher equation. When these characteristics are taken into account the Fisher hypothesis we can only offer evidence in favor of this hypothesis for the US, the French and the Japanese economies.Unit Roots; Structural Breaks; Interest rates; Inflation;\ Fisher Effect

Rising above : Rising Eagle Youth Services (REYS) outcomes measurement

The project works toward giving a nonprofit organization the ability to measure the effect of its day-treatment curriculum on its clients. The project provides measuring instruments and an evaluation protocol, which includes procedural recommendations

Illegal immigration and a heterogeneous labour force. When can quotas generate an internal conflict?

In this paper we analyze the effects on the welfare of heterogeneous native workers in the context of the presence of legal and illegal immigrants, and where the main instrument of economic policy takes the form of entry quotas. In the framework of a model of overlapping generations, we find that these effects are not monotonous. More particularly, we note that in certain circumstances the effects on the native workers of a change in the quota are opposite in nature, depending on whether or not these workers are qualified. The key aspect of this result is, on the one hand, the effect of illegal immigration on wages and, on the other, the part of income generated by the illegal immigrants that is appropriated by the natives for managing this “informal” labour market. Keywords: Illegal immigration; entry quotas; qualification. JEL: F22, J61,J68.

REFINET: A new era for the sustainable development of Transport infrastructures networks in Europe

The main objective or the REFINET Coordination and Support Action has been about identifying research and innovation needs and supporting the mass-market deployment of existing innovative technologies, such as materials, components, systems and processes to support the modernisation of the European Transport Infrastructure using a multimodal approach to support investment decisions. To achieve its objectives, REFINET has in particular developed solutions enabling infrastructures decision-makers (e.g. Public Bodies, Ministries, the European Commission, Infrastructure Managers and Operators, etc.) to carry out an integrated evaluation, selection of projects and programs and monitoring them. This paper introduces to the main outcomes of REFINET, in particular the REFINET multi-modal transport infrastructure model, vision and Strategic Implementation Plan for research and innovation priorities.The authors wish to acknowledge the financial support of the European Commission under the H2020 programme, and are grateful to the REFINET Consortium partners, namely Fundación TECNALIA, D'Appolonia S.p.A., FEHRL, UIC, Fundación Plataforma Tecnológica Española de Construccion, DRAGADOS SA, CSTB and Ove Arup & Partners International Limited

Ritmos de resistencia: El djembe en las culturas africanas occidentales.

Este trabajo de investigación analiza aspectos de la cultura material e inmaterial que pueden ser contemplados como una práctica de resistencia, frente a los procesos de imposición cultu-ral, que ha fijado la modernidad y la pos-modernidad. La tesis de este ensayo esta fundamen-tada en cómo es percibida y utilizada la cultura musical tradicional en especial el djembe, te-niendo en cuenta la amplitud de connotaciones, simbólicas y rituales en las que interfiere este instrumento.This investigation is focuzed in the material and inmaterial aspects of the culture . These as-pects will be interpretate like a resistence practice for the imposition cultural process of the modernity and pos-modernity. The thesis of these investigation is; how the poblation use and see the traditional music culture, more special de Djembe. We need to focuzed in the diffe-rents symbolic connotation and ritual’s for know the influence of these instruments

Social capital, social cohesion, and economic growth

The study of determinants of economic growth and development is a special interest area to the economists. Theoretical investigation in this topic is characterized by a growing complexity and empirical work has not obtained satisfactory results. The incorporation of human capital and technical progress with endogenous character have not obtained the appropriate results to explain with clarity the key mechanisms of this economic phenomenon. In the last years, the researchers have focused part of their efforts in a new factor, namely social capital. The underlying idea is that the physical factor (productive capital) and the human (human capital) are not sufficient to explain the economic growth and economic development. Recent work suggests that previous studies omit a relevant dimension: social character of the economic activity (social capital), as is emphasized in Temple and Johnson (1998) and in Knaff and Keefer (1997), among others. Nevertheless, the discussion on definition and mechanisms through social capital is created, disappears, is accumulated or influences on the economic activity is still opened. Although, many studies are discussing the social capital definition and measurement from interdisciplinary point of view (Paldman, 2000). Paldman examines different indicators of social capital, most of them related to the nonprofit organizations or associational activity of a country and expectations and trustworthiness in which economic agents operate. Our paper contributes to this line of research in order to advance in the discussion of these aspects: social capital definition, relationship between social capital and other socio-economics factors, role of social capital in economic growth –as productivity factor or thecnology–; the consideration of convenient data base set and the use of appropriate econometric thecniques. The final objective is to provide theoretical and empirical evidence on the relationship between social capital and economic growth. As well as, between the social capital and the traditional factors considerated, that is to say, human capital and physical capital. This general objective will proceed as follows. In the first section we approach the social capital definition. Social capital can be constituted in a variety of ways. It is a particular situation that requires a meticulous revision of the literature in order to adopt a methodological position that in our case will be fundamentally functional and is focused on the importance of the nonprofit sector as component of social capital . In second section, we analyze the relationship between social capital and physical capital and, mainly, with the human capital and the public sector. Social capital is a complex resource and we can observe that there are others factors, for example the educational level that is affected by social capital, but is itself an influence on social capital. We argue that there is a strong interaction between sanitary policy, fiscal policy, cultural context and social capital. In third section we examine theoretically the mechanisms of relationship between social capital, as capacity of working jointly, and economic growth. In the discussion is fundamental the arguments established by Paldman and Svendsen (2000). The authors pointed out two mechanisms: (a) social capital as productive factor -that is to say, nonprofit organizations, associational activiy indicates the work capacity in equipment and, consequently, it supposes an productive factor; b) social capital as technology: that is to say, indicates the capacity of a society to generate the mechanisms that reduce the transaction and control costs within productive system. In fourth section, we observe the problems derived to use data of different countries. These studies supposed the presence of a same behavior at aggregate level for heterogeneous countries, and we consider that, the empirical results are biased because they use non appropriate econometric techniques. Thus, we propose that the analysis at regional level improves the results obtained because of allows to reduce some of these limitations, owing to exist an evident homogeneity concerning educational level, tax system, culture, etc. Finally, we develop an empirical analysis for the Spanish case where it is considered to establish if the social capital is relevant to explain the economic growth of the Spanish regions. We use as indicator of social capital some proxies as the density of associational activity, composition of these associations, inequality index, etc. The paper concludes with the main results.

Single-pixel digital "ghost" holography

Since its discovery, the "ghost" diffraction phenomenon has emerged as a non-conventional technique for optical imaging with very promising advantages. However, extracting intensity and phase information of a structured and realistic object remains a challenge. Here, we show that a "ghost" hologram can be recorded with a single-pixel configuration by adapting concepts from standard digital holography. The presented homodyne scheme enables phase imaging with nanometric depth resolution, three-dimensional focusing ability, and shows high signal-to-noise ratio

Body Composition, Psychological, Cardiovascular, and Physical Activity Factors Related with Academic School Performance

The aim of the present study was to analyse body composition, anxiety, cardiovascular, and physical activity factors related with academic performance of school students as well as to analyse differences, by age, in these factors. We analysed in 266 primary school students’ (8.81 ± 1.62 years, range: 5–13 years) heart rate, anthropometric variables to calculate body mass index, physical activity performance, anxiety levels and academic results by the average of marks. Students were divided in two different groups, firstly by their lower or higher academic performance, and secondly by age. Results showed a negative correlation between academic performance and age, weight, body mass index and trait anxiety variables. Additionally, significant differences were found by age, presenting older students higher scores in body mass index and lower physical activity, trait anxiety, heart rate and academic performance values than younger students. Overweight and obesity may have a great impact in academic performance in children and we pointed out the necessity to establish programs related with healthy habits which include improvements in physical activity and nutrition behaviours with the objective to enhance children’s health general status, psychological profile, cognitive and motor development, and academic performance

Understanding the temporal dimension of the red-edge spectral region for forest decline detection using high-resolution hyperspectral and Sentinel-2a imagery

The operational monitoring of forest decline requires the development of remote sensing methods that are sensitive to the spatiotemporal variations of pigment degradation and canopy defoliation. In this context, the red-edge spectral region (RESR) was proposed in the past due to its combined sensitivity to chlorophyll content and leaf area variation. In this study, the temporal dimension of the RESR was evaluated as a function of forest decline using a radiative transfer method with the PROSPECT and 3D FLIGHT models. These models were used to generate synthetic pine stands simulating decline and recovery processes over time and explore the temporal rate of change of the red-edge chlorophyll index (CI) as compared to the trajectories obtained for the structure-related Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). The temporal trend method proposed here consisted of using synthetic spectra to calculate the theoretical boundaries of the subspace for healthy and declining pine trees in the temporal domain, defined by CItime=n/CItime=n+1 vs. NDVItime=n/NDVItime=n+1. Within these boundaries, trees undergoing decline and recovery processes showed different trajectories through this subspace. The method was then validated using three high-resolution airborne hyperspectral images acquired at 40 cm resolution and 260 spectral bands of 6.5 nm full-width half-maximum (FWHM) over a forest with widespread tree decline, along with field-based monitoring of chlorosis and defoliation (i.e., ‘decline’ status) in 663 trees between the years 2015 and 2016. The temporal rate of change of chlorophyll vs. structural indices, based on reflectance spectra extracted from the hyperspectral images, was different for trees undergoing decline, and aligned towards the decline baseline established using the radiative transfer models. By contrast, healthy trees over time aligned towards the theoretically obtained healthy baseline. The applicability of this temporal trend method to the red-edge bands of the MultiSpectral Imager (MSI) instrument on board Sentinel-2a for operational forest status monitoring was also explored by comparing the temporal rate of change of the Sentinel-2-derived CI over areas with declining and healthy trees. Results demonstrated that the Sentinel-2a red-edge region was sensitive to the temporal dimension of forest condition, as the relationships obtained for pixels in healthy condition deviated from those of pixels undergoing decline.JRC.D.1-Bio-econom