All-Payer Claims Databases: State Initiatives to Improve Health Care Transparency

Examines states' efforts to support transparency and reform by developing claims databases with comprehensive information on disease incidence, utilization patterns, costs, and health outcomes. Outlines benefits, models, and implementation challenges

The Real Exchange Rate and Employment in U.S. Manufacturing: State and Regional Results

In a series of earlier papers we have examined the impact of exchange rate movements on employment and output in the manufacturing sector, disaggregated by industry sector and by production and non-production workers. In this paper we examine the impact of exchange rate movements on manufacturing employment, disaggregated geographically, using census divisions, regions, states and SMSA's as the unit of analysis. Empirical estimates of employment changes are first presented for the four census regions, the nine census divisions, and the fifty states plus the District of Columbia. For the country as a whole, we estimate that movements in the real exchange rate led to the loss of about 1 million manufacturing jobs over this period. We go on to examine in greater detail manufacturing employment in New York State, and report that exchange rate movements had a much larger impact in the areas outside of New York City than in the metropolitan area. This result is consistent with earlier work that found that employment in management or research is not as sensitive to exchange rate movements as employment in production processes. The New York results are followed by an examination of manufacturing employment in five southern states with large rural populations. Some policy makers have expressed a concern that manufacturing employment in rural areas suffered more than in urban areas during the period of the dollar appreciation. We find that within these five states, the impact of the exchange rate on manufacturing employment in the non-SMSA areas was the same or less than was the case for employment within SMSA areas. Finally, we use a multivariate model to explore why manufacturing employment is more sensitive to exchange rate movements in some states than in others. Factors which are associated with greater sensitivity of manufacturing employment to exchange rate movements are: the percent of the population living outside of SMSA areas, the level of production worker wages, and crude oil production. Factors that are associated with less sensitivity of manufacturing employment to exchange rate movements include the percent of the population with 4 years or more of college or per-capita expenditures on public secondary schools.

COMMODITY PROGRAM SLIPPAGE RATES FOR CORN AND WHEAT

Slippage rates for corn and wheat are estimated using a simultaneous system explaining per-acre yields, input usage, technical change, and levels of participation in government programs. Soybeans are included due to cross-compliance requirements and because they substitute for corn in production. Slippage rates for wheat are in the range of 29-37% and for corn in the range of 48-58%. The results imply that efficient design of commodity programs must account for the slippage of aggregate yields due to changes in land quality and the use of constrained resources over fewer acres.Crop Production/Industries,

The Real Exchange Rate, Employment, and Output in Manufacturing in the U.S. and Japan

In the spring of 1981 the U.S. dollar began a four-year period of real appreciation that took it to a peak of more than 50 percent by first quarter 1985. Since then, the dollar has depreciated substantially, but remains above its 1980 level. During the same period, the Japanese yen first depreciated by 12 percent in real terms from 1981 to 1982, and then appreciated by some 30 percent to 1986. These swings in real exchange rates effects on the relative competitiveness of U.S. and Japanese industry, and have effects on employment and output in sectors producing tradeable goods. This paper presents estimates of these effects. Using time series data for the period 1970 to 1986, we use a simple model of supply and demand to estimate the impact of swings in the effective real exchange rate of the dollar and the yen on manufacturing employment and output in the U.S. and Japan, disaggregated by industry sectors, and by production and non-production workers in the case of the U.S. employment. These results are part of a larger research project to estimate the effects of the movements in the real exchange rate on world manufacturing industries. We find significant and substantial effects of the dollar appreciation on employment and output in U.S. manufacturing. In particular, we find that exchange rate movements have had important effects on the durable goods sectors, including primary metals, fabricated metal products, and non-electrical machinery. Other sectors that suffer large employment and output losses when the dollar appreciates are stone, clay and glass products, transportation, instruments, and chemicals. Estimates are also presented for non-production and production workers in the U.S. employment of the latter is more sensitive to the real exchange rate, especially in the durable goods sectors. This suggests the possibility of hysteresis in trade. For Japan, we find significant effects of movements in the yen on employment and output in the durable goods sectors, especially those producing machinery. In particular, yen appreciation causes substantial losses in employment and output in fabricated metal products, general machinery, and electrical machinery. The results for Japan are not as clear as for the U.S., perhaps because we have only annual data for Japan, but quarterly data for the U.S.. Nevertheless, the importance of movements in the real exchange rate for employment and output in manufacturing is evident in both cases.

A compilation of research concerning some of the problems facing the Kansas City, Missouri School District

28 leaves ; 28 cm

Criminal Law

Covers laws on abandoned iceboxes, duty of the sheriff to file complaints, indecent liberties, mandatory sentences for certain traffic violations, prisoners, and terms of sentences

Wright Flyer Project

The time is December of 1903. The place is Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; an inhospitable, barren, and windy wasteland. Yet, in this forsaken desert, something magical and historic was about to take place. Many people believed that the Wright Brothers were insane to even fantasize about flight. Man kind was not suppose to fly. The brothers were likened to the myth of Icarus, and warned that those who try to fly to close to the sun will meet an untimely demise. Luckily, the jeers were not enough to sway the Wright Brothers from believing. The home-built aircraft started down the monorail as onlookers; some of them dreamers, but most skeptics of powered flight; gazed from all sides. The wooden and cloth contraption began to pick up speed, and at that moment the course of history was changed forever as the flyer lifted heavenward. Although the first sustained flight in a heavier-than-air craft only lasted for 12 seconds and traveled 120 ft., it meant much more than that to the world of science. In order to honor the Wright Brother\u27s accomplishments of almost a century ago, Utah State University built a replica of the 1905 Wright Flyer using modern materials that would be available to the brothers today