272 research outputs found
Price elasticity estimates for tobacco and other addictive goods in India
The tax base of tobacco in India is found to be heavily depended on about fifteen percent of the tobacco users who represent cigarettes smokers. Non-cigarette tobacco products used by the majority of tobacco users are largely out of the tax net. Analysis of the price elasticity of various tobacco products would bring out the potential of tax as an instrument to control tobacco use of any kind. In this context, this paper examines how the demand for a variety of tobacco products and addictive goods such as pan and alcohol respond to changes in prices. The spatial variations of prices that are obtained from a cross section of 120,000 households spread across the country have been used for this purpose. Estimates of price elasticities showed that the own price elasticity estimates of various addictive goods in India ranged between -0.5 to -1.0 with bidis, leaf tobacco and alcohol having elasticities close to unity, cigarettes being the least price elastic of all. As against the general notions regarding the complementarity between cigarettes and alcohol, our study nds that these are substitutes at least in urban India. We also observed that, over a five year period, the addictive goods such as bidis and leaf tobacco in India have become slightly more price responsive while elasticity of cigarettes and pan have stabilized. With some assumptions, it is shown that taxes on cigarettes can be raised nearly 2.5 times the current level while that of bidis can be raised tenfold without any fall in revenue.Tobacco, Bidi, Cigarette, Alcohol, Consumption, Elasticity, India
Price Elasticity Estimates for Tobacco and Other Addictive Goods in India
The tax base of tobacco in India is found to be heavily depended on about fifteen per cent of the tobacco users who represent cigarettes smokers. Non-cigarette tobacco products used by the majority of tobacco users are largely out of the tax net. Analysis of the price elasticity of various tobacco products would bring out the potential of tax as an instrument to control tobacco use of any kind. In this context, this paper examines how the demand for a variety of tobacco products and addictive goods such as pan and alcohol respond to changes in prices. The spatial variations of prices that are obtained from a cross section of 120,000 households spread across the country have been used for this purpose. Estimates of price elasticities showed that the own price elasticity estimates of various addictive goods in India ranged between -0.5 to -1.0 with bidis, leaf tobacco and alcohol having elasticities close to unity, cigarettes being the least price elastic of all. As against the general notions regarding the complementarity between cigarettes and alcohol, our study finds that these are substitutes at least in urban India. We also observed that, over a five year period, the addictive goods such as bidis and leaf tobacco in India have become slightly more price responsive while elasticity of cigarettes and pan have stabilized. With some assumptions, it is shown that taxes on cigarettes can be raised nearly 2.5 times the current level while that of bidis can be raised tenfold without any fall in revenue.Tobacco, Bidi, Cigarette, Alcohol, consumption, Elasticity, India
An Analysis of Household's Tobacco Consumption Decisions : Evidence from India
Tobacco products such as bidi and cigarette, both of which are smoked, cater to different kinds of households in India, and analyzing them separately may yield results that are useful for public policy. Hence, we analyze the consumption patterns, socio-economic distribution and the household choice of a variety of tobacco products across rural and urban India. Using a Multinomial Logit Model, we analyze the choice behavior of a household in deciding whether and which tobacco products to consume. Household level data from National Sample Survey in India for the year 1999-2000, which has information on 120,309 households, has been used for this purpose. We found that most forms of tobacco consumption are higher among socially disadvantaged and low-income groups in the country. Variables such as education, sex ratio, alcohol and pan consumption were found to be signifcant factors determining tobacco consumption habits of Indian households. The effect of some of the factors on the probability of consumption differs for certain types of tobacco products, increasing some, and decreasing others. Addictive goods such as alcohol and pan were found to be complimentary to tobacco consumption.Tobacco, Bidi, Cigarette, consumption, Multinomial Logit, India
Crowding-out Effect of Tobacco Expenditure And Its Implications on Intra-Household Resource Allocation
The aim of this paper is to examine if tobacco consumption crowds-out consumption of basic needs and whether it has implications for nutrition intake and intra-household resource allocation in developing countries. In the process we also examine whether preference over other commodities for tobacco users and non users vary significantly. Using a nationally representative household sample survey from India for the year 1999-2000, we analyze the pattern of spending on various groups of commodities by the status of tobacco consumption of households. Average per capita per diem intake of nutrients such as calorie, fat and protein were reported to be lower among the high tobacco spending group of households vis-`a-vis the no-spending category. A system of quadratic conditional Engel curves was estimated for a set of ten broad groups of commodities. Separability between tobacco and most other goods was rejected. The results suggest that tobacco consuming households had lower consumption of certain commodities such as milk, clean fuels and entertainment which has direct bearing on mostly children and female members in the household suggesting possible gender effects and biases in intra-household resource allocation. Tobacco spending also found to have negative effects on household nutrition intake.Tobacco, consumption, poverty, crowd-out, India.
Complete Zeldovich approximation
We have developed a generalization of the Zeldovich approximation (ZA) that
is exact in a wide variety of situations, including plannar, spherical and
cilyndrical symmetries. We have shown that this generalization, that we call
complete Zeldovich approximation (CZA), is exact to second order at an
arbitrary point within any field. For gaussian fields, the third order error
have been obtained and shown to be very small. For statistical purposes, the
CZA leads to results exact to the third order.Comment: 11 pages+1 figure, accepted in ApJ Letter
Fluctuations of K-band galaxy counts
We measure the variance in the distribution of off-plane (|b|>20 deg.)
galaxies with m_K<13.5 from the 2MASS K-band survey in circles of diameter
between 0.344 deg. and 57.2 deg. The use of a near-infrared survey makes
negligible the contribution of Galactic extinction to these fluctuations. We
calculate these variances within the standard Lambda-CDM model assuming that
the sources are distributed like halos of the corresponding mass, and it
reproduces qualitatively the galaxy counts variance. Therefore, we test that
the counts can be basically explained in terms only of the large scale
structure. A second result of this paper is a new method to determine the two
point correlation function obtained by forcing agreement between model and
data. This method does not need the knowledge of the two-point angular
correlation function, allows an estimation of the errors (which are low with
this method), and can be used even with incomplete surveys.
Using this method we get xi(z=0, r<10 h^{-1}Mpc)=(29.8+/-0.3)
(r/h^{-1}Mpc)^{-1.79+/-0.02}, which is the first measure of the amplitude of xi
in the local Universe for the K-band. It is more or less in agreement with
those obtained through red optical filters selected samples, but it is larger
than the amplitude obtained for blue optical filters selected samples.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, accepted to be published in A&
The spherical collapse model with shell crossing
In this work, we study the formation and evolution of dark matter halos by
means of the spherical infall model with shell-crossing. We present a framework
to tackle this effect properly based on the numerical follow-up, with time, of
that individual shell of matter that contains always the same fraction of mass
with respect to the total mass. In this first step, we do not include angular
momentum, velocity dispersion or triaxiality. Within this framework - named as
the Spherical Shell Tracker (SST) - we investigate the dependence of the
evolution of the halo with virial mass, with the adopted mass fraction of the
shell, and for different cosmologies. We find that our results are very
sensitive to a variation of the halo virial mass or the mass fraction of the
shell that we consider. However, we obtain a negligible dependence on
cosmology. Furthermore, we show that the effect of shell-crossing plays a
crucial role in the way that the halo reaches the stabilization in radius and
the virial equilibrium. We find that the values currently adopted in the
literature for the actual density contrast at the moment of virialization,
delta_vir, may not be accurate enough. In this context, we stress the problems
related to the definition of a virial mass and a virial radius for the halo.
The question of whether the results found here may be obtained by tracking the
shells with an analytic approximation remains to be explored.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, 9 tables, replaced to match the published MNRAS
versio
Generation of galactic disc warps due to intergalactic accretion flows onto the disc
A new method is developed to calculate the amplitude of the galactic warps
generated by a torque due to external forces. This takes into account that the
warp is produced as a reorientation of the different rings which constitute the
disc in order to compensate the differential precession generated by the
external force, yielding a uniform asymptotic precession for all rings.
Application of this method to gravitational tidal forces in the Milky Way due
to the Magellanic Clouds leads to a very low amplitude of the warp. If the
force were due to an extragalactic magnetic field, its intensity would have to
be very high, to generate the observed warps. An alternative hypothesis is
explored: the accretion of the intergalactic medium over the disk. A cup-shaped
distortion is expected, due to the transmission of the linear momentum; but,
this effect is small and the predominant effect turns out to be the
transmission of angular momentum, i.e. a torque giving an integral-sign shape
warp. The torque produced by a flow of velocity ~100 km/s and baryon density
\~10^{-25} kg/m^3 is enough to generate the observed warps and this mechanism
offers quite a plausible explanation. First, because this order of accretion
rate is inferred from other processes observed in the Galaxy, notably its
chemical evolution. The inferred rate of infall of matter, ~1 solar-mass/yr, to
the Galactic disc that this theory predicts agrees with the quantitative
predictions of this chemical evolution resolving key issues, notably the
G-dwarf problem. Second, because the required density of the intergalactic
medium is within the range of values compatible with observation. By this
mechanism, we can explain the warp phenomenon in terms of intergalactic
accretion flows onto the disk of the galaxy.Comment: 18 pages, 11 figures, accepted to be published in A&
Probability distribution of density fluctuations in the non-linear regime
We present a general procedure for obtaining the present density fluctuation
probability distribution given the statistics of the initial conditions. The
main difficulties faced with regard to this problem are those related to the
non-linear evolution of the density fluctuations and those posed by the fact
that the fields we are interested in are the result of filtering an underlying
field with structure down to scales much smaller than that of filtering. The
solution to the latter problem is discussed here in detail and the solution to
the former is taken from a previous work.
We have checked the procedure for values of the rms density fluctuation as
large as 3/2 and several power spectra and found that it leads to results in
excellent agreement with those obtained in numerical simulations. We also
recover all available exact results from perturbation theory.Comment: Accepted to be published in Ap
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