Notional Defined Contribution Pension Systems in a Stochastic Context: Design and Stability

Around the world, Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGO) public pension programs face serious long-term fiscal problems due primarily to actual and projected population aging, and most appear unsustainable as currently structured. Some have proposed the replacement of such plans with systems of fully funded private or personal Defined Contribution (DC) accounts, but the difficulties of transition to funded systems have limited their implementation. Recently, a new variety of public pension program known as "Notional Defined Contribution" or "Non-financial Defined Contribution" (NDC) has been created, with the objectives of addressing the fiscal instability of traditional plans and mimicking the characteristics of funded DC plans while retaining PAYGO finance. Using different versions of the system recently adopted in Sweden, calibrated to US demographic and economic parameters, we evaluate the success of the NDC approach in achieving fiscal stability in a stochastic context. (In a companion paper, we will consider other aspects of the performance of NDC plans in comparison to traditional PAYGO pensions.) We find that the basic NDC scheme is effective at preventing excessive debt accumulation, but does little to prevent significant asset accumulation along many trajectories and on average. With adjustment, however, the NDC approach can be made more stable.

COMBATING FOOD INSECURITY IN THE U.S. NAVY

To combat food insecurity, the Department of the Navy will increase the Basic Needs Allowance (BNA) total household income requirement up to 150% of the Federal Poverty Guideline (FPG) in accordance with the National Defense Authorization Act of 2023. This thesis uses machine learning techniques on comparable civilian data to create a model that best predicts the risk of food insecurity and the characteristics of Sailors who are food insecure. To measure the effectiveness of the BNA, this study simulates the increase in total household income up to 130% and 150% FPG, with and without the Basic Allowance for Housing included in the total household income calculation, and reruns the prediction model to see the changes in predicted risk of food insecurity. The model suggests that 17.6% of Sailors are food insecure. Additionally, the BNA in each simulation insignificantly decreases the food insecurity rate. Less than 1% of Sailors qualify for the BNA, while 17% are predicted to be food insecure. Therefore, the BNA provides an insufficient amount of allowance to an inadequate number of families to effectively reduce food insecurity in the Navy.NPS Naval Research ProgramThis project was funded in part by the NPS Naval Research Program.Lieutenant, United States NavyApproved for public release. Distribution is unlimited

Earnings and Dividend Announcements is there a Corroboration Effect?

We examine abnormal stock returns surrounding contemporaneous earnings and dividend announcements in order to determine whether investors evaluate the two announcements in relation to each other.We find that there is a statistically significant interaction effect.The abnormal return corresponding to any earnings or dividend announcement depends upon the value of the other announcement. This evidence suggests the existence of a corroborative relationship between the two announcements. Investors give more credence to unanticipated dividend increases or decreases when earnings are also above or below expectations, and vice versa.

Detection of reflector surface error from near-field data: Effect of edge diffracted field

The surface accuracy of large reflector antennas must be maintained within certain tolerances if high gain/low sidelobe performance is to be achieved. Thus the measurement of the surface profile is an important part of the quality control procedure when constructing antennas of this type. An efficient method for surface profile measurement has been proposed, i.e., the reflector surface is calculated from the measured near-field phase data using the theory of geometric optics. For a surface profile calculation of this kind, it is necessary to know the margin of error built into the method of calculation. This will enable a specification of the tolerance from which the surface profile can be determined. When calculating the surface profile from near-field phase data, there are two main sources of error. The first is the measurement error in near-field phase data. The second arises from the edge diffracted fields that are superimposed on the reflected fields in the measured near-field data. The error in the calculated surface profile produced by the edge diffracted fields is examined

A Hedonic Index for Collectables Arising from Modelling Diamond Prices

This article describes a case study concerned with modelling the price of wholesale diamonds, as part of a project to develop an online diamond auction platform. The work was extended to exploring how to develop an index that could be used to track market trends of wholesale diamond prices. The approach we used is readily generalised to defining market indices for so-called Collectables, and can provide the basis for construction of derivatives. With the burgeoning interest in new markets of collectables such as those generated by the concept of a Non-Fungible Token, it is reasonable to suppose that there will be concomitant increasing interest in developing derivatives for these markets.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure

Reflection on-line or off-line: the role of learning technologies in encouraging students to reflect

This paper presents case studies that describe the experiences of the two authors in trying to use learning technologies to facilitate reflective thinking in their students. At the University of Leicester, a Web-based biology tutorial called ‘How Now Mad Cow’, which covers the topics of bovine spongiform encephalopathy and a new variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease (nvCJD). At the University of Southampton, a web-based hyper-mail discussion list to support teaching on a first year psychosocial science module for occupational therapy and physiotherapy students has been established. In both examples, the tutors had attempted to create a learning environment that would engage students in the learning experience and facilitate reflection by helping them to create meaning from the learning experience and see things in a different way. The evaluation data from both case studies provides some evidence that the learning technologies helped to facilitate reflection for some students. However, the evidence for reflection is not overwhelming and the data provides some evidence that four key factors may have influenced how successful the use of learning technologies were in facilitating reflection. These factors are the way the learning technology is used, the nature of the student groups, the role of the tutor and student preferences for ‘off-line reflection’. These are discussed and ways forward are identified

Statistical Communication Theory

Contains research objectives and reports on two research projects.Joint Services Electronics Programs (U. S. Army, U. S. Navy, and U. S. Air Force) under Contract DA 36-039-AMC-03200(E)National Science Foundation (Grant GP-2495)National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Grant NsG-334)National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Grant NsG-496