OLIGOPOLY AND TRADE

In this chapter we present a selective analytic survey of some of the main results of trade under oligopoly. We concentrate on three topics: oligopoly as an independent determinant of trade, as illustrated by the reciprocal-markets model of Brander (1981); oligopoly as an independent rationale for government intervention, as illustrated by strategic trade and industrial policy in the third-market model of Spencer and Brander (1983); and the challenges and potential of embedding trade under oligopoly in general equilibrium as illustrated by the GOLE model of Neary (2002).GOLE (General Oligopolistic Equilibrium); reciprocal dumping; strategic trade policy.

Symmetric Research Joint Ventures - Cooperative Substitutes and Complements

We introduce the concept of cooperative substitutes and complements, and use it to throw light on the conditions for a research joint venture to choose equal levels of R&D by all member firms. We show that the second-order conditions for a symmetric optimum take a particularly simple form, ruling out both excessive cooperative substitutability and excessive cooperative complementarity, and nesting conditions already derived in the literature. Finally we explore the implications of our results for the comparison between research joint ventures and a non-cooperative equilibrium.Bertrand and Cournot competition; cooperative substitutes and complements; R&D; research joint ventures; strategic trade and industrial policy

Robust Rules for Industrial Policy in open Economies

The theory of strategic trade policy yields ambiguous recommendations for assistance to exporting firms in oligopolistic industries. However, some writers have suggested that investment subsidies are a more robust recommendation than export subsidies. We show that, though ambiguous in principle, the case for investment subsidies is reasonably robust in practice. Except when functional forms exhibit arbitrary non-linearities, it holds under both Cournot and Bertrand competition, with either cost-reducing or market-expanding investment, and with or without spillovers. Only if firms have strong asymmetries in their investment behaviour and engage in Bertrand competition is an investment tax clearly justified.cost-reducing investment; export subsidies; market-expanding investment; R&D subsidies; strategic industrial policy; strategic trade policy

Absorptive Capacity, R&D Spillovers, and Public Policy

Empirical evidence strongly suggests that R&D increases a firm’s "absorptive capacity" (its ability to absorb spillovers from other firms) as well as contributing directly to profitability. We explore the theoretical implications of this. We specify a general model of the absorptive capacity process and show that costly absorption both raises the effectiveness of own R&D and lowers the effective spillover coefficient. This weakens the case for encouraging research joint ventures, even if there is complete information sharing between its members. It also implies an additional strategic pay-off to policies that raise the level of extra-industry knowledge.Absorptive capacity of R&D; competition policy; industrial policy; R&D spillovers; research joint ventures

The Workers' Compensation System of British Columbia: Still in Transition

This inventory addresses eight core issues in the British Columbia workers' compensation system:* How is the system administered?* How do claims flow through the system?* What dispute resolution procedures are used, and to what effect?* What benefits are paid?* How are vocational rehabilitation services provided?* How is the system financed?* What are the actual costs of administration, benefits, claims processing, and appeal?* What aspects of the system deserve further attention

The Origin of X-shaped Radio Galaxies: Clues from the Z-symmetric Secondary Lobes

Existing radio images of a few X-shaped radio galaxies reveal Z-symmetric morphologies in their weaker secondary lobes which cannot be naturally explained by either the galactic merger or radio-lobe backflow scenarios, the two dominant models for these X-shaped radio sources. We show that the merger picture can explain these morphologies provided one takes into account that, prior to the coalescence of their supermassive black holes, the smaller galaxy releases significant amounts of gas into the ISM of the dominant active galaxy. This rotating gas, whose angular momentum axis will typically not be aligned with the original jets, is likely to provide sufficient ram pressure at a distance ~10 kpc from the nucleus to bend the extant jets emerging from the central engine, thus producing a Z-symmetry in the pair of radio lobes. Once the two black holes have coalesced some 10^7 yr later, a rapid reorientation of the jets along a direction close to that of the orbital angular momentum of the swallowed galaxy relative to the primary galaxy would create the younger primary lobes of the X-shaped radio galaxy. This picture naturally explains why such sources typically have powers close to the FR I/II break. We suggest that purely Z-symmetric radio sources are often en route to coalescence and the concomitant emission of substantial gravitational radiation, while X-shaped ones have already merged and radiated.Comment: 12 pages, 1 compressed figure; accepted for publication in ApJ Letter

Planck 2015 results: XXV. Diffuse low-frequency Galactic foregrounds

We discuss the Galactic foreground emission between 20 and 100 GHz based on observations by Planck and WMAP. The total intensity in this part of the spectrum is dominated by free-free and spinning dust emission, whereas the polarized intensity is dominated by synchrotron emission. The Commander component-separation tool has been used to separate the various astrophysical processes in total intensity. Comparison with radio recombination line templates verifies the recovery of the free-free emission along the Galactic plane. Comparison of the high-latitude Hα emission with our free-free map shows residuals that correlate with dust optical depth, consistent with a fraction (≈30%) of Hα having been scattered by high-latitude dust. We highlight a number of diffuse spinning dust morphological features at high latitude. There is substantial spatial variation in the spinning dust spectrum, with the emission peak (in Iν) ranging from below 20 GHz to more than 50 GHz. There is a strong tendency for the spinning dust component near many prominent H ii regions to have a higher peak frequency, suggesting that this increase in peak frequency is associated with dust in the photo-dissociation regions around the nebulae. The emissivity of spinning dust in these diffuse regions is of the same order as previous detections in the literature. Over the entire sky, the Commander solution finds more anomalous microwave emission (AME) than the WMAP component maps, at the expense of synchrotron and free-free emission. This can be explained by the difficulty in separating multiple broadband components with a limited number of frequency maps. Future surveys, particularly at 5–20 GHz, will greatly improve the separation by constraining the synchrotron spectrum. We combine Planck and WMAP data to make the highest signal-to-noise ratio maps yet of the intensity of the all-sky polarized synchrotron emission at frequencies above a few GHz. Most of the high-latitude polarized emission is associated with distinct large-scale loops and spurs, and we re-discuss their structure. We argue that nearly all the emission at 40deg > l > −90deg is part of the Loop I structure, and show that the emission extends much further in to the southern Galactic hemisphere than previously recognised, giving Loop I an ovoid rather than circular outline. However, it does not continue as far as the “Fermi bubble/microwave haze”, making it less probable that these are part of the same structure. We identify a number of new faint features in the polarized sky, including a dearth of polarized synchrotron emission directly correlated with a narrow, roughly 20deg long filament seen in Hα at high Galactic latitude. Finally, we look for evidence of polarized AME, however many AME regions are significantly contaminated by polarized synchrotron emission, and we find a 2σ upper limit of 1.6% in the Perseus region

Cluster analysis of wind turbine alarms for characterising and classifying stoppages

Turbine alarm systems can give useful information to remote technicians on the cause of a fault or stoppage. However, alarms are generally generated at much too high a rate to gain meaningful insight from on their own, so generally require extensive domain knowledge to interpret. By grouping together commonly occurring alarm sequences, the burden of analysis can be reduced. Instead of analysing many individual alarms that occur during a stoppage, the stoppage can be linked to a commonly occurring sequence of alarms. Hence, maintenance technicians can be given information about the shared characteristics or root causes of stoppages where that particular alarm sequence appeared in the past. This research presents a methodology to identify relevant alarms from specific turbine assemblies and group together similar alarm sequences as they appear during stoppages. Batches of sequences associated with 456 different stoppages are created, and features are extracted from these batches representing the order the alarms appeared in. The batches are grouped together using clustering techniques, and evaluated using silhouette analysis and manual inspection. Results show that almost half of all stoppages can be attributed to one of 15 different clusters of alarm sequences