Measuring the Efficiency Cost of Taxing Risky Capital Income

In this paper, we derive a measure of the efficiency cost of taxing risky capital income in an infinite horizon stochastic model. The resulting measure differs from all those that have been proposed in the existing literature. It can be represented by the expression -sigma(s) T(s)c(deltaX(s)), where T(s) measures the present value of the taxes that would be paid on a unit of investment in a riskless project with the same expected depreciation rate and tax treatment as capital invested in period s, X(s), while c(X(s)) represents the certainty equivalent to the representative individual of the lottery where measures the ex post change in investment in period s due to the tax change. The paper then compares this measure with others that have appeared in the literature. We were unable to find support for the argument in Bulow-Suinmers(1984) that the efficiency cost of taxing risky capital income is much larger than that implied by the measure -sigma(s)T(s)E(deltaX(s)). In fact, we show in special cases that our measure implies a smaller efficiency cost than does the measure -sigma(s)T(s)E(deltaX(s)).

Tax Structure and Government Behavior: Implications for Tax Policy

Changes in tax policy can affect all aspects of the economy. Not only do firms and individuals change behavior, creating efficiency costs, but government expenditure choices can also change. Unless these expenditure choices had been optimal' previously, changes in response to a tax reform affect welfare and should be taken into account when designing tax policy. This paper develops a specific model of government behavior and then explores the implications of government, as well as private, behavioral responses for tax policy. In particular, we assume that government officials favor expenditure (or regulatory) choices that increase the government's budget. As a result, higher tax rates on a particular activity encourage government behavior that aids the growth of this activity. This response enables tax policy to redirect government activity in desirable directions, but it also makes Pigovian taxes on negative externalities less effective.

Productivity of Florida Springs: first semi-annual report to Biology Division, Office of Naval Research, progress from June 1, 1952 to January 31, 1953

Work has begun on studying the factors responsible for productivity in the Florida springs, which are nearly constant temperature, constant chemical, steady state giant laboratories. Progress has been made on five aspects: qualitative description, quantitative description, completion of knowledge of chemical factors, measurement of productivity , development of productivity theory. Measurement of the primary productivity in Silver Springs and Green Cove Springs by two new methods: the raising of organisms in cages, and the measurement of night & day differences in oxygen downstream agree roughly. Production in these springs is greater than previous production figures reported for marine, fresh water, and land areas. Instantaneous measures of production show large variations with season, time of day, cloud cover. Production estimates range from 11,000 lbs per acre per year to 70,000 lbs. glucose per acre per year during daylight hours. Essential stability of the springs environment has been shown with respect to temperature, phosphorus, and plant cover. A correlation of species number with lack of stability has been shown with insects. Quantitative studies have shown very large plant base to pyramids of mass. Correlation of marine invasion with chlorinity has been shown. The essential aspects of pH regulated phosphorus geochemistry in Florida have been outlined. Some theoretical ideas on productivity have been evolved. Mapping of sessile organisms in springs and taxonomic identification of dominants are half completed. Plans for second six months include measurement of herbivore and carnivore production rates and completion of food chain efficiency determinations in Silver Springs as a preparation for subsequent comparisons between springs. (34pp.

Applications of remote sensing to estuarine management : Final report and annual report number 7

Remote sensing techniques have been applied to problems in estuarine management in the seventh and final year of a NASA grant. A chromaticity technique for multi-date Landsat measurement of suspended sediment has been verified and made operational, and applied to sedimentation analysis of the ·Bay of Fundy Tidal Power Project. Dye-buoy photogrannnetry has been used to measure currents at depth and analyze suspended sediment plumes from hydraulic · dredging. Wetland permit sites and beach erosion site\u27s have been evaluated with aerial photography. Submerged aquatic vegetation has been mapped with tide- and wind-synchronized color photography. Virginia state resource monitoring needs have led to implementation of Landsat data p.rocessing capability for joint work with NASA Goddard on demonstration projects. This final report contains summaries and tables of the projects and activities of the Remote Sensing Center over the past seven years

Digitalis for treatment of heart failure in patients in sinus rhythm

<b>Background</b><p></p> Digitalis glycosides have been in clinical use for the treatment of heart failure (HF) for longer than 200 years. In recent years, several trials have been conducted to address concerns about their efficacy and toxicity.<p></p> <b>Objectives</b><p></p> To examine the effectiveness of digitalis glycosides in treating HF in patients with normal sinus rhythm. To examine the effects of digitalis in patients taking diuretics and angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors; in patients with varying severity and duration of disease; in patients with prior exposure to digitalis versus no prior exposure; and in patients with "HF due to systolic dysfunction" versus "HF with preserved ejection fraction."<p></p> <b>Search methods</b><p></p> Searches on the following databases were updated in May 2013: The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), MEDLINE, EMBASE, and Dissertation Abstracts. Annual meeting abstracts of the American Heart Association, the American College of Cardiology, and the European Society of Cardiology were searched from 1996 to March 2013. In addition, reference lists provided by the pharmaceutical industry (GlaxoSmithKline and Covis Pharma) were searched.<p></p> <b>Selection criteria</b><p></p> Included were randomized placebo-controlled trials of 20 or more adult participants of either sex with symptomatic HF who were studied for seven weeks or longer. Excluded were trials in which the prevalence of atrial fibrillation was 2% or greater, or in which any arrhythmia that might compromise cardiac function or any potentially reversible cause of HF such as acute ischemic heart disease or myocarditis was present.<p></p> <b>Data collection and analysis</b><p></p> Articles selected from the searches described above were evaluated in a joint effort of the review authors. The staff of the Cochrane Heart Group ran searches on the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, MEDLINE, and EMBASE.<p></p> <b>Main results</b><p></p> No new studies were identified in the updated searches. Thirteen studies (7896 participants) are included, and major endpoints of mortality, hospitalization, and clinical status, based respectively on 8, 4, and 12 of these selected studies, were recorded and analyzed. The data show no evidence of a difference in mortality between treatment and control groups, whereas digitalis therapy is associated with lower rates of both hospitalization and clinical deterioration. The largest study, in which most participants were taking angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors, showed a significant rise in “other cardiac” deaths, possibly due to arrhythmias. However collectively, these findings were based on studies done before beta-blockers, as well as angiotensin receptor blockers and aldosterone antagonists, became widely used to treat HF.<p></p> <b>Authors' conclusions</b><p></p> The literature indicates that digitalis may have a useful role in the treatment of patients with HF who are in normal sinus rhythm. New trials are needed to elucidate the importance of the dosage of digitalis and its usefulness in the era of beta-blockers and other agents shown to be effective in treating HF.<p></p&gt

Transport Properties of Carbon Nanotube C60_{60} Peapods

We measure the conductance of carbon nanotube peapods from room temperature down to 250mK. Our devices show both metallic and semiconducting behavior at room temperature. At the lowest temperatures, we observe single electron effects. Our results suggest that the encapsulated C$_{60}$ molecules do not introduce substantial backscattering for electrons near the Fermi level. This is remarkable given that previous tunneling spectroscopy measurements show that encapsulated C$_{60}$ strongly modifies the electronic structure of a nanotube away from the Fermi level.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures. This is one of two manuscripts replacing the one orginally submitted as arXiv:cond-mat/0606258. The other one is arXiv:0704.3641 [cond-mat

Structures, Bonding, and Energetics of N2O2 Isomers

The structures and energetics of the N202 isomers are predicted at several levels of theory. Both single reference and multireference based correlated methods were used to determine the structures and relative energies. Five high-energy minima were located above 2NO with QCISD(T)/6-311 +G(2df)//MP2/6-311 +G( d) (PT2F/6-311+G(2df)//MCSCF/6-31G(d)) relative energies of ca. 38 (51), 46 (51), 61 (74), 69 (74), and 68 (80) kcallmol for 1 ,2-diaza-3,4-dioxacyclobutene (1), bond stretch 1 ,3-diaza-2,4-dioxa[l.l.O]bicyclobutane (2), a-N202 (3), 4, and 1 ,3-diaza-2,4-dioxa[l.l.O]bicyclobutane (5), respectively. The effect of basis sets on structures is small within a given level of theory. The MCSCF structures agree reasonably with those of MP2

A Tunable Anomalous Hall Effect in a Non-Ferromagnetic System

We measure the low-field Hall resistivity of a magnetically-doped two-dimensional electron gas as a function of temperature and electrically-gated carrier density. Comparing these results with the carrier density extracted from Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations reveals an excess Hall resistivity that increases with decreasing temperature. This excess Hall resistivity qualitatively tracks the paramagnetic polarization of the sample, in analogy to the ferromagnetic anomalous Hall effect. The data are consistent with skew-scattering of carriers by disorder near the crossover to localization

Theoretical studies of spin‐forbidden radiationless decay in polyatomic systems. II. Radiationless decay of a‐N2O2

The stability with respect to spin‐forbidden radiationless decay of the previously reported [J. Chem. Phys. 88, 7248 (1988)] asymmetric dimer of NO, N–N–O–O (a‐N2O2) is considered. The spin‐allowed decay channel a‐N2O2(1 A’)→N2O(X  1Σ+)+O(1 D) is endoergic. However, the spin‐forbidden decay channel a‐N2O2(1 A’)→N2O(X  1Σ+)+O(3 P) is exoergic. Large scale multireference configuration interactionwave functions, approximately 300 000–1 400 000 configuration state functions, based on double zeta polarization and triplet zeta polarization bases are used to study this process. The minimum energy crossing of the ground singlet 1 A’ state and the lowest excited triplet 3 A‘ state was determined as was the interstate spin–orbit coupling. This electronic structure data was used in the context of a simple one‐dimensional model to show that a‐N2O2 is rapidly predissociated to N2O(X  1Σ+) and O(3 P)