"Macroeconomic Market Incentive Plans: History and Theoretical Rationale"

This paper explores the contemporary debate among economists on the means to move the economy toward high employment without inflation-beyond the traditional instruments of monetary and fiscal policy. The authors pay particular attention to the Market Anti-Inflation Plan (MAP), submitted by Lerner and Colander in 1980. The reasons economists have searched for alternative measures relate to the problems associated with wage and price controls. MAP is an anti-inflation plan that allows relative prices to adjust: The scheme increases costs to firms that raise prices, and contains an added incentive to lower prices. Since MAP is designed to fight macroeconomic inflation by changing the incentives of individual price setters, the relationship between microeconomic behavior and macroeconomic outcomes must be addressed. The theoretical justification for MAP is that there is a macroeconomic externality, and MAP can mitigate the ramifications of the externality. However, efforts to more clearly define the nature of this externality require a better understanding of transaction costs. Consequently, there will be the need for a mechanism to integrate such costs into microeconomic and macroeconomic models.

Stanley Home Products, Inc. - a study of its current public relations policies with recommendations for a future program

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston Universit

The Natural Rate in a Share Economy

Will the natural rate 0f unemployment be lower in the share economy described by Martin Weitzman than in a wage economy? We examine this question for a search economy with an equilibrium unemployment rate, a version 0f Salop's (1979) quits model. Equilibrium unemployment is the same in both economies. We also examine firms' short-run adjustment to shocks. Share-economy firms adjust output less than wage-economy firms for both demand shocks and labor-supply shocks. Depending on whether rapid output adjustment is stabilizing, a share economy may be more or less stable than a wage economy

Application of Market Anti-inflation Plans in the Transition to a Market Economy

How can the former socialist countries' transition to a market economy be made less painful and more effective? We propose the use of incentive policies to stabilize prices and output. This would reduce former planned economies' tendency for output to fall and prices to rise as firms and workers take advantage of their market power. The policy allows firms individual pricing freedom while giving assurance that the price level will be stable. It also can break the vicious circle of reduced aggregate output by setting fixed level of output.Socialists

ClinicalTrials.gov as a Data Source for Semi-Automated Point-Of-Care Trial Eligibility Screening

Background: Implementing semi-automated processes to efficiently match patients to clinical trials at the point of care requires both detailed patient data and authoritative information about open studies. Objective: To evaluate the utility of the ClinicalTrials.gov registry as a data source for semi-automated trial eligibility screening. Methods: Eligibility criteria and metadata for 437 trials open for recruitment in four different clinical domains were identified in ClinicalTrials.gov. Trials were evaluated for up to date recruitment status and eligibility criteria were evaluated for obstacles to automated interpretation. Finally, phone or email outreach to coordinators at a subset of the trials was made to assess the accuracy of contact details and recruitment status. Results: 24% (104 of 437) of trials declaring on open recruitment status list a study completion date in the past, indicating out of date records. Substantial barriers to automated eligibility interpretation in free form text are present in 81% to up to 94% of all trials. We were unable to contact coordinators at 31% (45 of 146) of the trials in the subset, either by phone or by email. Only 53% (74 of 146) would confirm that they were still recruiting patients. Conclusion: Because ClinicalTrials.gov has entries on most US and many international trials, the registry could be repurposed as a comprehensive trial matching data source. Semi-automated point of care recruitment would be facilitated by matching the registry's eligibility criteria against clinical data from electronic health records. But the current entries fall short. Ultimately, improved techniques in natural language processing will facilitate semi-automated complex matching. As immediate next steps, we recommend augmenting ClinicalTrials.gov data entry forms to capture key eligibility criteria in a simple, structured format

The Dynamical Regime of Sensory Cortex: Stable Dynamics around a Single Stimulus-Tuned Attractor Account for Patterns of Noise Variability.

Correlated variability in cortical activity is ubiquitously quenched following stimulus onset, in a stimulus-dependent manner. These modulations have been attributed to circuit dynamics involving either multiple stable states ("attractors") or chaotic activity. Here we show that a qualitatively different dynamical regime, involving fluctuations about a single, stimulus-driven attractor in a loosely balanced excitatory-inhibitory network (the stochastic "stabilized supralinear network"), best explains these modulations. Given the supralinear input/output functions of cortical neurons, increased stimulus drive strengthens effective network connectivity. This shifts the balance from interactions that amplify variability to suppressive inhibitory feedback, quenching correlated variability around more strongly driven steady states. Comparing to previously published and original data analyses, we show that this mechanism, unlike previous proposals, uniquely accounts for the spatial patterns and fast temporal dynamics of variability suppression. Specifying the cortical operating regime is key to understanding the computations underlying perception

The Natural Rate in a Share Economy

Will the natural rate 0f unemployment be lower in the share economy described by Martin Weitzman than in a wage economy? We examine this question for a search economy with an equilibrium unemployment rate, a version 0f Salop's (1979) quits model. Equilibrium unemployment is the same in both economies. We also examine firms' short-run adjustment to shocks. Share-economy firms adjust output less than wage-economy firms for both demand shocks and labor-supply shocks. Depending on whether rapid output adjustment is stabilizing, a share economy may be more or less stable than a wage economy

Intracrystalline site preference of oxygen isotopes in goethite: A single-mineral paleothermometer

The crystal structure of goethite, FeO(OH), has two distinct oxygen sites, one with exclusively Fe-O bonds, the other with bonds to both iron and hydrogen. We developed a method to assess the oxygen isotope contrast between these sites by measuring both the bulk goethite and the oxygen released in the conversion of goethite to hematite. The method involves collecting the water released by dehydroxylation, fluorinating that population of extracted atoms, and measuring the resulting oxygen isotope composition (extracted δO¹⁸). Then, on a separate aliquot, all structural oxygen is fluorinated and measured (bulk δO¹⁸). Using synthetic goethite precipitates grown under controlled environmental conditions, we found significant temperature-dependent fractionation, ε_(bulk-extracted)=(5.51±0.26)×(10⁶/T²)−(44.5±2.8); T in Kelvin). This intracrystalline fractionation forms the basis of a single-phase paleothermometer with an estimated uncertainty of ∼2-3°C. The temperature dependence appears to be independent of the isotopic composition of the parent fluid from which the goethite formed and the pH of that fluid. This intracrystalline thermometer can be used to simultaneously determine the formation temperature of a goethite and the isotopic composition of the water from which it formed. Natural goethites analyzed with this technique yield geologically reasonable formation temperatures of between 15 and 41°C