8 research outputs found
What Should We Agree on about the Repugnant Conclusion?
The Repugnant Conclusion served an important purpose in catalyzing and inspiring the pioneering stage of population ethics research. We believe, however, that the Repugnant Conclusion now receives too much focus. Avoiding the Repugnant Conclusion should no longer be the central goal driving population ethics research, despite
its importance to the fundamental accomplishments of the existing literature
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Essays on macroeconomic development policies
This dissertation examines the policies of developed countries and international financial institutions on developing countries. The first chapter estimates the output effects of IMF loans during acute macroeconomic crises. Using the universe of financial crises from 1975-2010, I study whether recovery dynamics differ across crises that do and do not receive IMF intervention. I condition on the type of financial crisis, employ a new estimator to find the most relevant controls units—the synthetic control method—and use forward looking variables to address the different selection issues associated with IMF lending. In contrast to much of the existing literature, I find that IMF lending has large short-run effects. Countries that receive an IMF loan have GDP that is, on average, 1-2 percent larger in the 2-3 years following the onset of a crisis than what is predicted by their synthetic controls. Consistent with either a liquidity effect or policy advice specific to managing a crisis, the difference fades in the medium run. Likewise, I find the recovery effects are largest in countries with weak institutions: places where policy advice and an “international lender of last resort” may be most useful. The second chapter (joint with Melissa LoPalo, Dean Spears and Mark Budolfson) asks how costly climate change will be for India. We first draw on microeconometric estimates of the impacts of heat waves on important social indicators. This analysis demonstrates that India is uniquely climate vulnerable given the high levels of humidity in south Asia. Then, using a modified regional Integrated Assessment Model (RICE, Nordhaus (2010)), we perform a welfare exercise in which we quantify total future damages in terms of consumption equivalent near-term losses: how much would consumption need to be reduced for the next 20 years to be equivalently bad (in a welfare sense) as projected climate damages? We find damages are as costly for welfare as a near-term humanitarian crisis (30% GDP per capita reduction over 20 years), but that the relationship is convex: if India can spur even minimal international coordination we estimate there would be large social returns. The third chapter presents a quantitative analysis of the macroeconomic characteristics and performance of fragile states, especially in the context of their engagement with the International Monetary Fund. It finds, among other things: (i) fragility may be a more fluid state than previously documented; (ii) while in fragile states GDP growth is more volatile, it is only slightly slower, on average, than growth in nonfragile states; (iii) fragile states’ GDP appeared to grow about 1 percentage point faster following approval of an IMF lending arrangement; and (v) foreign aid flows to fragile states increased by about 60 percent in the years following approval of IMF program engagement, with or without IMF financing (no such increase was observed for non-fragile states), illustrating the IMF’s catalytic role. While this analysis provides a positive overall assessment of the IMF’s role in fragile states, care must be exercised in interpreting the results, especially concerning causalityEconomic
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Utilitarian benchmarks for emissions and pledges promote equity, climate and development.
Tools are needed to benchmark carbon emissions and pledges against criteria of equity and fairness. However, standard economic approaches, which use a transparent optimization framework, ignore equity. Models that do include equity benchmarks exist, but often use opaque methodologies. Here we propose a utilitarian benchmark computed in a transparent optimization framework, which could usefully inform the equity benchmark debate. Implementing the utilitarian benchmark, which we see as ethically minimal and conceptually parsimonious, in two leading climate-economy models allows for calculation of the optimal allocation of future emissions. We compare this optimum with historical emissions and initial nationally determined contributions. Compared with cost minimization, utilitarian optimization features better outcomes for human development, equity and the climate. Peak temperature is lower under utilitarianism because it reduces the human development cost of global mitigation. Utilitarianism therefore is a promising inclusion to a set of benchmarks for future explorations of climate equity
HIV-1 expression within resting CD4+ T cells after multiple doses of vorinostat.
BackgroundA single dose of the histone deacetylase inhibitor vorinostat (VOR) up-regulates HIV RNA expression within resting CD4(+) T cells of treated, aviremic human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive participants. The ability of multiple exposures to VOR to repeatedly disrupt latency has not been directly measured, to our knowledge.MethodsFive participants in whom resting CD4(+) T-cell-associated HIV RNA (rc-RNA) increased after a single dose of VOR agreed to receive daily VOR Monday through Wednesday for 8 weekly cycles. VOR serum levels, peripheral blood mononuclear cell histone acetylation, plasma HIV RNA single-copy assays, rc-RNA, total cellular HIV DNA, and quantitative viral outgrowth assays from resting CD4(+) T cells were assayed.ResultsVOR was well tolerated, with exposures within expected parameters. However, rc-RNA measured after dose 11 (second dose of cycle 4) or dose 22 (second dose of cycle 8) increased significantly in only 3 of the 5 participants, and the magnitude of the rc-RNA increase was much reduced compared with that after a single dose. Changes in histone acetylation were blunted. Results of quantitative viral outgrowth and other assays were unchanged.ConclusionsAlthough HIV latency is disrupted by an initial VOR dose, the effect of subsequent doses in this protocol was much reduced. We hypothesize that the global effect of VOR results in a refractory period of ≥ 24 hours. The optimal schedule for VOR administration is still to be defined
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HIV-1 expression within resting CD4+ T cells after multiple doses of vorinostat.
BackgroundA single dose of the histone deacetylase inhibitor vorinostat (VOR) up-regulates HIV RNA expression within resting CD4(+) T cells of treated, aviremic human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive participants. The ability of multiple exposures to VOR to repeatedly disrupt latency has not been directly measured, to our knowledge.MethodsFive participants in whom resting CD4(+) T-cell-associated HIV RNA (rc-RNA) increased after a single dose of VOR agreed to receive daily VOR Monday through Wednesday for 8 weekly cycles. VOR serum levels, peripheral blood mononuclear cell histone acetylation, plasma HIV RNA single-copy assays, rc-RNA, total cellular HIV DNA, and quantitative viral outgrowth assays from resting CD4(+) T cells were assayed.ResultsVOR was well tolerated, with exposures within expected parameters. However, rc-RNA measured after dose 11 (second dose of cycle 4) or dose 22 (second dose of cycle 8) increased significantly in only 3 of the 5 participants, and the magnitude of the rc-RNA increase was much reduced compared with that after a single dose. Changes in histone acetylation were blunted. Results of quantitative viral outgrowth and other assays were unchanged.ConclusionsAlthough HIV latency is disrupted by an initial VOR dose, the effect of subsequent doses in this protocol was much reduced. We hypothesize that the global effect of VOR results in a refractory period of ≥ 24 hours. The optimal schedule for VOR administration is still to be defined